Academic Freedom and Teaching

So those Zegna-suited Blackshirts known as the Young Liberals have been (for a while now) campaigning against academics who express left-leaning opinions when teaching. The problem is it's not just targeting discriminatory grading practices or demonstrable bias against legitimate differences of opinion. Rather it's a crusade against anything perceived as a leftist perspective. (Broadly construed to include anything that shows a moral dimension, from the sound of some of the complaints.) Some of the complainants really show their true colours by whinging about lecturers who so much as admit that they have political opinions of their own! One said she felt she had to drop a class because the lecturer outed himself as a member of the Greens. (No report on whether he was willing to name other members or fellow travellers for the black list.)

John Kaye has already spoken out against this crazy Senate inquiry:

Unless [the terms of reference] are ignored they could end up stifling academic independence, academic freedom and freedom of expression in schools and universities around Australia

This would be a dreadful outcome at a time when we're already facing a skills shortage, and when universities and schools are already under enormous pressure.

And today, another academic I used to know quite well, Peter Slezak has argued that the teaching styles the witch-hunt is looking for are the best methods at the tertiary level.

Here's the email I sent Peter:

Hi Peter,

I just read your article in the Herald and wanted to tell you how the more teaching experience I get, the more I come to agree with your approach when teaching certain topics.

I had heard about the Young Libs' campaign and was just as shocked as everyone. Disgusted really at the quote from one young woman who said she couldn't stay in the class taught by a member of the Greens. I fear we may not see the real damage of the Howard era until that generation of Young Libs comes to power.

But here's a glimpse at what it might be like:
I'm sure you're familiar with the stereotype of the "liberal college professor" that working-class Americans fear will corrupt their children. Here in the States (particularly right here in the Midwest) all academics are acutely aware of this and try very hard not to have students put up the shutters.
The best example I saw was when I was tutoring for (the philosopher of biology) Elisabeth Lloyd's class on evolution and creationism. It wasn't just equal time (which is fine in a philosophy class); her attempts at respect and even-handedness went too far, it seems. A more-astute student said he appreciated the equal time given in lectures but was disappointed that she never presented equally-strong arguments for creationism. It was then I switched into Slezak-mode and told him there weren't any, that he'd need to find one himself if he wanted a strong argument.
Conversely, a less astute student actually asked me, "What do you [the two tutors and the lecturer] actually believe, evolution or creationism?" My jaw dropped to the floor at that point. It took a lot of restraint to maintain that veneer of respect for creationism as I explained that this was a philosophical controversy, not a scientific one, that there's no doubt where the evidence points.
At the end of the course there were a number who had counted themselves creationists at the start that came to believe in evolution but this was just for lack of knowledge. Apart from doing some good, I fear that we might have legitimated "the controversy" a little.

So you might be pleased to hear that I take a less-sympathetic approach when I lecture on the history of evolution. A respectful critique of Paley is contrasted with a brusque dismissal of neo-creationists; I defend catastrophists such as Cuvier who only believed that the Noah legend was based on an actual event etc. (I expect Americans find me a little bumptious but you can get away with a lot if you say it with the right accent!)

Hope all is well at UNSW. Keep fighting the good fight,

Nick