Sir
Your News story on our organization's academic bill of rights, “Professors bristle as states act to mould lecture content” (Nature 434, 686; 200510.1038/434686b), quotes the president of a Florida faculty union who claims that the bill would amount to “a right-wing political takeover of the universities”. A representative of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) is quoted saying it would “politicize the agenda” of higher education.
Yet despite lengthy interviews with three representatives of our organization, your story failed to quote a single staff member, thus denying us the opportunity to respond.
As we repeatedly explained in interviews, the charges raised by faculty opponents and the AAUP are not based on any evidence and represent gross distortions of the bill. Neither the academic bill of rights nor any of the state legislation inspired by it are informed by a political agenda. This is clear from the text itself, which explicitly prohibits the consideration of politics in hiring and tenure decisions and forbids professors to grade students on their political or religious beliefs.
In addition, the bill's provision requiring professors to make students aware of “serious scholarly viewpoints” other than their own in class echoes the existing policies of the American Historical Association and many public universities. Fringe views, or views based on non-scientific texts such as creationism, could not be considered “serious scholarly viewpoints”.
We invite readers of Nature to visit our website, http://www.studentsforacademicfreedom.org, and to form their own judgments.
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Dogan, S. No political agenda in academic bill of rights. Nature 435, 1028 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/4351028b
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/4351028b