Academic freedom

Last week, I gave the hypothetical example of a college teacher who does not agree with some portions of a prescribed textbook. Does the teacher have the academic freedom not to prescribe that textbook?

If we follow the Supreme Court’s definition of institutional academic freedom, the teacher has no choice but to prescribe the textbook, since textbooks are included in “how lessons shall be taught.” Having the textbook in class, however, is not the same as agreeing to everything written in it.

A textbook is just one of several instructional materials that are in a classroom. In a fully equipped college classroom, for example, we can find a blackboard or a white board, a corkboard, a computer, a projector, a TV set, a DVD player, a teacher’s desk, a podium, chalk or markers, and so on. The teacher cannot dictate to the university the brand of the projector or chalk or anything else in a classroom. The textbook is just one of these materials. It is there, but just as a teacher does not have to show a film because there is a DVD player available, the teacher need not use the textbook if s/he finds it erroneous in part or in whole.

In fact, individual academic freedom allows the teacher to tell the students that, as far as s/he is concerned, this or that chapter of a textbook is wrong.

Prescribing a textbook, however, is a management decision. A textbook is (admittedly sadly) one way for a university to make money, either because the textbook is published by the university press or because the textbook publisher gives a commission on sales in the university bookstore. If the students or their parents feel that the extra expense for textbooks is not justified, they can always say so during the annual consultations on tuition and miscellaneous fees. Then it becomes a management decision anyway to prescribe a different textbook or not to prescribe any textbook at all for a particular course.

Administrators, of course, can always give the individual teacher the choice of textbooks. This is done in the better schools, because the administrators there trust their teachers to make the right decisions about instructional materials. In schools where the administrators are not so sure of the quality of their teachers, then they have the constitutionally guaranteed right to demand that certain textbooks be prescribed for certain courses.

Just like any other freedom, institutional academic freedom does not need to be exercised. (Analogy: we all have the freedom to go to Boracay, but we don’t have to.) Institutional academic freedom can be waived in favor of individual academic freedom.

The important thing to remember is that individual academic freedom, as the Supreme Court has defined it, is “the right of a faculty member to pursue his studies in his particular specialty and thereafter to make known or publish the result of his endeavors without fear that retribution would be visited on him.” The Court has even clarified that individual academic freedom does not “go beyond the concept of freedom of intellectual inquiry.” Individual academic freedom is, in effect, only a part, though privileged, of freedom of thought and freedom of speech.

The issue is not prescribing or not prescribing textbooks or any other instructional materials. The issue is allowing or prohibiting a teacher from saying in class or publishing in a journal the results of his or her research in his or her field of expertise.

Because I am a lifetime member of the Modern Language Association (MLA), the biggest organization of language and literature professors around the world, I subscribe to the definition of academic freedom by the MLA.

In 1940, the MLA signed the “Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure” of the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges and Universities. The MLA has reaffirmed that decision a number of times, most recently in September 2014.

The September 2014 revision emphasizes that every faculty member in higher education, whether “adjunct, temporary, part-time, non-tenure-track, probationary, (or) tenured,” enjoys academic freedom.

Why does the MLA find it important to emphasize academic freedom today?

The rationale of the MLA statement says it all: “Despite a long history of the defense of academic freedom, each generation of scholars faces new challenges to its protection. The increasing number of contingent faculty members without the protection of tenure; political pressure on curriculum, faculty appointments, and policy; intrusive processes of standardization and accreditation; erosion of traditional faculty governance structures; the impact of economic challenges on our institutions; and legislative efforts to restrict faculty members from taking positions on issues in the public sphere are among the new concerns that threaten academic freedom.”

Some of these issues are directly relevant to Philippine Higher Education Institutions. Let me single out the “intrusive processes of standardization.” In our context, this brings us to the problematic position of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) when it comes to prescribing curriculums, syllabuses, faculty qualifications, number of books and chairs in libraries, and other items included in what are known as “minimum standards.”