![]() Michael Shermer is the publisher of Skeptic magazine ( ), a monthly columnist for Scientific American, an adjunct professor at the School of Economics and Politics at Claremont Graduate University and the author of 10 books. This market solution elegantly addresses the problem of grafting a general principle onto a extraordinarily varying human institution, a problem well captured by that sage dispenser of pop philosophy, Yogi Berra: "In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. A simple solution, then, is to retain the spirit of tenure across the academic board while allowing each institution to define tenure within the parameters of its own core values. The problem in the case of Ward Churchill and the University of Colorado (for stepping beyond the bounds of his duties as a college professor when he penned an essay that equated the victims of 9/11 to "little Eichmans", among other things) - as with so many tenure disputes - is the difficulty involved in attempting to apply a single overarching principle to a system as complex and multivariate as the academy. In neither example is an all-encompassing rule about tenure - enforced through state or national teacher unions or courts - necessary or even possible. ![]() On the other hand, if an institution is willing to tolerate some deviance from its foundational norms as part of an intellectual diversity program, then contracts with faculty should specify such deviance parameters where a contract cannot anticipate specific instances of parameter violations, conflicts can be resolved through institutional arbitration. An extreme religious fundamentalist professor thumping a Bible on campus might reasonably be considered polluting this campus atmosphere. By contrast, Occidental, well-known as a far left-leaning institution (I kept my fiscal conservatism to myself when I taught there), can market to its potential customers that it fosters a politically liberal-learning atmosphere. Having taught as an adjunct professor at four different institutions over 20 years ( Glendale Community College, California State University Los Angeles, Occidental College and now Claremont Graduate University), one solution occurs to me: Let the market decide that is, allow individual institutions to define the parameters of tenure according to their unique core values.įor example, if Pepperdine offers its customers (parents and students) a conservative Christian-learning atmosphere, and as one of their professors I was purposefully undermining that mission through social activism inside and outside the classroom, then by all means the administration should do what it needs to do to preserve the integrity of the university's core values, even if that means firing me. If students and their parents are paying in excess of $40,000 for a quality education within a Christian environment, the Pepperdine administration should have the option of firing any employee whose actions clearly violate the mission of the college and the contractual arrangement with that professor to fulfill the duties of the job. Their reasoning is that academic freedom trumps institutional needs, and the opportunity for faculty growth and the volition to change your mind is more important than student preferences or collegiate predilections. Should my employment there be protected, my tenure for life enforced in the name of free speech? ![]() ![]() Then I became an militant atheist, spewing anti-religious sentiments whenever I had the chance, calling Christians ignorant, closed-minded, dogmatic and deluded, and trying to convert them to atheism. Here I would like to conduct a counterfactual thought experiment: Let's say that I was still a Christian and Pepperdine hired me to teach there, was pleased with my academic performance, and in time granted me tenure. On Tuesday I mentioned that I attended Pepperdine University, a distinctly religious institution with a well-defined Christian environment, exactly what I was looking for as part of my undergraduate education. Previously, they discussed allegations of instructor bias in classrooms, whether it's proper for schools to set limits on the expression of their students, if theories such as intelligent design should be taught in classrooms, and diversity of curricula in K-12 education. Today, Shermer and Lukianoff finish their Dust-Up with a discussion on lifetime tenure for professors.
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