Indiana lawmakers are considering a legislation that would restrict tenure at state colleges and universities and partially alter the priorities of diversity, equity and inclusion at these institutions.

I'm curious if anyone feels they get the same degree of workplace protection the concept of tenure for professors?

  • Some contractors get protection if it's built into their contracts
  • Unions create termination restrictions
  • Military gets sanctuary for their last two years before twenty years service, then usually kicked out, unless they're generals
  • you can't legally fire someone because color, religion, orientation, etc

What makes professors different or not different?

You can fire retail workers for anything not illegal

Based on your stance, if professors should be special, why?

If not, do you believe we won't get good ones all the sudden if they can't have tenure?

I'll try to find specific arguments made by opposing legislation, but but not necessarily asking for people just to verbally slay conservative/liberals. There's already a million posts for that.

  • RedFox@infosec.pub
    ·
    4 months ago

    Here's some opposition quotes:

    several well-known academic leaders have expressed their opposition. Let’s delve into their viewpoints:

    Moira Marsh, a librarian at Indiana University and president of the Indiana Conference of the American Association of University Professors, opposes the bill. She argues that it would have a chilling effect on teaching and research at all levels. The proposed policy could effectively eliminate tenure, a status that traditionally protects faculty from being terminated based on their teaching and research.

    Robert Eno, an officer of the IU-Bloomington chapter of the American Association of University Professors, also criticizes the bill. He believes that the bill would make it easier to fire veteran faculty members based on their expressed viewpoints. By potentially restricting academic freedom, the bill could harm the quality of education and research within Indiana campuses.

    I have not yet found instances where professors were terminated due to personal view points, but that would require finding them before the concept of tenure was established.

  • RedFox@infosec.pub
    ·
    4 months ago

    Not surprisingly, I cannot find any supporters of elimination of tenure who work in academia and are not politicians.

    I'd like to find some concrete support for this idea that isn't totally motivated by political division, conservative vs prog/lib. 🤔