Academia, The Economic Crisis, and What Professors Do

Over at The Cyber Hacienda Jaime has a post in which he links an open letter from an Arizona State University professor explaining what it is that professors do, clearing up some misconceptions along the way. I would further add that research expectations are not only prevelant at Research I universities such as ASU and that even in smaller institutions, such as mine, research is a serious expectation, and that when people don't get tenure here, as at a large swath of schools, it is almost universally because of a lack of research productivity.

The professor (who is not yet tenured) had to write anonymously because the university president has apparently put forth a dictum that faculty may not speak about the crisis. Were I a tenured professor at ASU, and especially were I in a discipline in which writing about politics or current affairs could plausibly be part of what I do -- ie: were I me -- I might challenge that demand of silence frontally in the name of both academic freedom and free speech. Of course that's easy for me to say here and now, as the crisis in Texas is nowhere near as dire as that in Arizona, and we are not facing such severe circumstances.

Bias in the Academy

At Brainstorm, a blog at The Chronicle of Higher Education, Mark Bauerlein discusses perceptions of bias on the part of professors by confusing two distinct issues -- what goes on in the classroom and what professors do when, say, they write an op-ed piece. The comments are also worth perusing. At the end of the day, my argument here is what it always is: Most of us have far too much to do with our time in the classroom to be imposing a political agenda, what many students may think of as being ideological may be no such thing, and this is an irrelevant question in the vast majority of college classes that have almost nothing to do with contemporary politics. When it comes to the question of bias in the classroom there is lots of sound and fury, sturm and drang, and gnashing of teeth about what is ultimately a non-issue (and for some reason, the accusers never look in the halls of business schools, or anywhere outside of the liberal arts, which I find curious).

Buzzwords and the Historical Profession

Over at POTUS friend and mentor of dcat Alonzo Hamby worries about buzzwords (and topics) at the AHA convention. To my mind the buzzwords are more worrisome than the broader topics, but he is generally right to worry.

Hat Tip: Steve at Big Tent

The Graying Professoriate?

I have a post over at Ephblog about the supposed "graying" of the professoriate.