Annual meeting addresses liberal education

How can colleges and universities promote civic engagement as part of liberal education? How does the academy fit into a society that increasingly values numbers, money, and measurable outputs over the intangibles of honor, community, and shared knowledge? These and other questions were explored by panelists, keynote speakers, and participants at the 2003 AAUP annual meeting, held June 11-15 in Washington, D.C.

Keynote speaker David Bollier, senior fellow at the University of Southern California's Annenberg Center for Communication, warned against the tendency of the academy to succumb to the seductive power of the market economy. He argued that the values of the "academic commons"-collaboration, openness, and sharing-conflict with the values of the market, and he explored ways in which the drive toward the "propertization" of knowledge in American society poses a serious threat to the future vitality of the commons. Bollier cited the privatization of publicly funded knowledge, specifically scientific research, noting that many institutions have opened special technology-licensing offices to patent and collect royalties for university research. Bollier cautioned that viewing research as property gives researchers and institutions an incentive to limit inquiry to potentially lucrative areas, a practice that impedes the acquisition of knowledge.

Bollier also discussed conflicts of interest between universities and private industry, referring to cases in which corporate sponsors of research have prevented university investigators from publicizing findings unfavorable to the firm's products. Bollier said that the academy must interact with the market, but he urged that institutions of higher education resist the overwhelming drive toward commercialization.

Plenary speaker Marlene Springer, president of the College of Staten Island, part of the City University of New York, talked about the strong ties between colleges and local communities. She argued that maintaining community support is increasingly important now that public funding for higher education is shrinking. She said her community benefits from college programs that permit faculty to apply their research to local problems as well as from the broad liberal education the college's students receive. Springer detailed current pressures on higher education resulting from federal tax policy, rising tuition, homeland security requirements, and the need to educate a diverse student population. "We need to get the word out to the community," she said, "because it controls our fate."

The annual meeting included updates on topics of interest to the membership. David Warren, president of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, spoke about Campus Cares, an initiative launched by a coalition of higher education associations, including the AAUP, in 2002. Campus Cares, of which Warren is co-chair, promotes and studies the civic engagement and participation in community service of students, faculty, administrators, and college and university staff. Warren said that research shows that, contrary to popular belief, today's college students are engaged with their communities in ways ranging from doing volunteer work to contributing money to charity to voting in presidential elections. He also noted that faculty tend to be similarly involved in their communities, and urged those present to find ways to make this fact more widely known.

Carol Schneider, president of the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) spoke about the long-standing relationship between that organization and the AAUP. When it was known as the Association of American Colleges, the AAC&U worked with the AAUP to draft the landmark 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure, which has subsequently been endorsed by more than 180 higher education associations and disciplinary societies. More recently, the AAUP and the AAC&U have joined together in affirming the importance of providing a liberal education for all students, not just an elite few. The increasing stratification of access to liberal education is a social injustice, Schneider said, and more needs to be done to combat the perception that liberal education is incompatible with practical, career-oriented education. Liberal education is not a set of disciplines, Schneider said, but an approach to any discipline.

CAPITOL HlLL DAY

Conference attendees participated in Capitol Hill Day on June 12. After an orientation session organized by the AAUP's government relations department, groups of AAUP members from different states visited their senators and representatives to discuss the importance of federal funding for higher education, including student aid and research funding; the upcoming reauthorization of the Higher Education Act; and governmental threats to academic freedom and freedom of expression. The day ended with a reception in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill and the presentation of the Henry T. Yost Award to U.S. Representative Sherwood Boehlert of New York. The award recognized Boehlert's leadership on higher education issues, especially on matters pertaining to research. Under his leadership, the House Science Committee has held a series of hearings on the impact of the war on terrorism on college and university research. These hearings have illuminated problems faced by foreign students and scholars, as well as potential pitfalls in balancing the need to protect security with the need to protect open scientific inquiry.