The Student Rights Movement: What Do Our Students Think

1
The Student Rights Movement What Do Our Students
Think?

• Rebecca L. Stein
• Los Angeles Valley College
• with Cherine Trombley and Suzanne Engler

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The Student Rights Movement

• David Horowitz Students for Academic Freedom
• Defined Problems in Higher Education
• a lack of accountability on the part of colleges
  and universities
• a largely liberal professoriate that does not
  reflect the political diversity found in the U.S.
• instructors using the classroom to introduce and
  advocate controversial material not related to
  the course subject
• instructors attempting to indoctrinate students
• instructors presenting only a single viewpoint
• instructors singling out students based on their
  political or religious beliefs

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The Student Bill of Rights

• Similar legislation introduced in every state.
• Students graded only on reasoned answers and
  appropriate knowledge not on basis of their
  political or religious beliefs
• Curricula and reading lists in social
  sciences/humanities should reflect the
  uncertainty and unsettled character of all human
  knowledge provide students with dissenting
  sources and viewpoints
• Faculty will not use their courses for the
  purpose of political, ideological, religious, or
  anti-religious indoctrination.

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The Student Bill of Rights Implications?

• Diversity measured by political, not scholarly
  criteria
• Transfers evaluation of student competence from
  faculty to administrators/legislators
• Reduces all knowledge to opinion
• Ramifications for hiring
• Could students sue professors for teaching
  evolution?

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Motivation for Survey

• Lack of research to back up claims
• Little-no attention paid to community colleges
• Test claims of the Student Rights movement
• Explore faculty and student opinions about
  academic freedom and what constitutes appropriate
  faculty behavior

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The Survey

• Suburban college part of Los Angeles Community
  College District
• Approx. 16,000 students 500 faculty members
  (full and part-time)
• 937 student surveys completed
• 123 instructor surveys completed
• Questions designed to mirror language of
  movement ask about experiences and opinions.

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The Liberal Professoriat?

• More Democrats than Republicans among
  instructors.
• But on a 1-4 liberal-conservative scale, most
  instructors rated themselves in the center of the
  scale (40 chose 2 and 25 chose 3), not on the
  extreme endpoints (22 chose 1 and 13 chose 4).
  The mean value for this question was 2.29.

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Non-Representative Professoriat?

• Party affiliation and liberal-conservative
  ratings for professors and students similar (mean
  2.3 for both on 1-4 scale).
• 72 of students say unaware of professors
  political views.
• 76 of students say their professors political
  affiliation does not matter to them.

- individuals not registered to vote were not
considered for this analysis
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Professorial (Mis)conduct?

• Students disagreed
• 86 disagreed that profs single them out based on
  either political or religious beliefs.
• 85 disagreed with I feel that professors are
  trying to indoctrinate me into a specific
  viewpoint that I dont agree with.
• 82 disagreed with My professors use time to
  present their personal political view that is
  unrelated to course material.
• 73 disagreed with My professors present
  material in a manner that is biased toward a
  single viewpoint.

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Professorial (Mis)conduct?

• Where students reported that professors had done
  the preceding things, they generally reported
  that it was only one or two professors and that
  it bothered them either a little or not at
  all.

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What is Inappropriate Behavior?

• There was less agreement about what is
  appropriate and inappropriate conduct for
  professors.
• Responses by students and faculty were generally
  similar on these questions.

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Academic Freedom?

• The Student Rights Movement says that professors
  should be required to present all possible
  viewpoints on a topic.
• 55 of professors and 81 of students agreed with
  this statement.
• Academic freedom means that a professor can
  discuss whatever he or she wants to in class.
  57 of professors disagreed while 43 agreed with
  this statement.

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The Liberal-Conservative Effect - Students

• The most conservative students (4 on a 1-4 scale)
  were more likely to report feeling
• singled out by professors and other students
  based on political beliefs
• that they have taken courses where they felt they
  had to agree with the professors political or
  social views to get a good grade
• that professors present material in a manner
  biased toward a single viewpoint

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The Liberal-Conservative Effect - Students

• The most conservative students were more likely
  to agree that it would be inappropriate for a
  professor to
• make a political joke during class
• have a political cartoon a student may find
  offensive displayed in his/her office

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The Liberal-Conservative Effect Professors

• More conservative instructors were more likely
  than more liberal instructors to agree with the
  following statements
• A course on human biological evolution should
  include information on the view that God is the
  primary architect of human affairs.
• It would be inappropriate for a professor to
  have a political cartoon that a student may find
  offensive displayed in his/her office.
• It would be inappropriate for a professor to
  make a political joke during class (e.g., against
  the President or the war in Iraq).
• Professors should be required to present all
  possible viewpoints on a topic.

Small sample size. Interpret with caution.
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Small sample size. Interpret with caution.
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The Liberal-Conservative Effect Professors

• Instructors who rated themselves as more
  conservative were also more likely to report
  feeling that their colleagues and other students
  singled out students based on political and
  religious beliefs.

Small sample size. Interpret with caution.
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Still to Come

• Analysis of open-ended responses by professors to
  questions
• What does academic freedom mean to you?
• What, if any, are the limits to academic freedom?
• Final report presentation to college community.
• Faculty-student dialogue through STARS program.

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Resources

• Students for Academic Freedom www.studentsforacad
  emicfreedom.org
• American Association of University Professors
  response www.aaup.org/statements/SpchState/Statem
  ents/billofrights.htm
• Complete report on survey results
  www.lavc.edu/research/News.html