Bipartisan Policy Center and Purdue University Hold Symposium on Challenges to Academic Freedom in the STEM Fields

West Lafayette, IN – A select group of provosts, deans, and faculty in STEM fields convened at Purdue University last month for an executive symposium to debate and discuss the state of academic freedom in higher education and how better to cultivate an open, scholarly environment for mathematics, sciences, and engineering.

The symposium, Academic Freedom and STEM: Challenges on Campus and Beyond, co-hosted by the Bipartisan Policy Center and Purdue University, addressed the perceived tension between free expression and diversity, equity, and inclusion, with sessions focused on the faculty experience; preparing graduate students as scholars and classroom instructors; the impact of state legislation; and preparing undergraduates with skills for dialogue across difference.

Led by Jacqueline Pfeffer Merrill, Director of BPC’s Campus Free Expression Project, and David A. Reingold, Senior Vice President of Policy Planning and Dean of the College of Liberal Arts at Purdue, the two-day conference, held under the Chatham House Rule, provided an opportunity for college leaders from 17 schools to have candid, off-the-record conversations about the institutional and disciplinary pressures that undermine their research and classroom instruction.

“Academic freedom is a threatened value not only due to legislative overreach, but because of pressures on open inquiry on campuses and within scientific disciplines,” said Pfeffer Merrill.

Often considered a problem for the humanities and social sciences, there is growing evidence of breakdowns in the integrity of peer review, the politicization of labs, and increasing barriers to collaborations with scholars abroad occurring within the hard science departments, undermining the quality of research produced on our nation’s campuses.

“As discussion around the concept of freedom of academic inquiry ramps up, it is important that we continue to engage on this topic,” said Reingold. “Freedom of inquiry is the foundation upon which our American higher educational system is built. If that is lost, we risk losing our place as the crown jewel of education in world.”

The symposium featured three presentations on programs that prepare undergraduate and doctoral students with skills for conversation across differences, lessons learned, and how attendees could bring these lessons to their campus.

Leaders from Purdue shared details about its Cornerstone liberal arts program, in which STEM students engage with different viewpoints through vigorous intellectual inquiry and exploring transformative texts. The program serves as the core of Purdue’s general education curriculum and features courses taught by over a hundred faculty from across STEM and liberal arts disciplines.

Faculty from the University of Colorado Boulder’s Herbst Program for Engineering, Ethics & Society described their courses and programming which challenge STEM students to wrestle with philosophical questions by examining great works of literature and film and connecting those questions to the ethical issues STEM graduates will face in their careers.

A leader from Morgan State University described its award-winning Teaching Assistant Project that prepares doctoral students with the skills and experiences to be exceptional classroom instructors in higher education institutions. The program emphasizes rigorous preparation for changing instructional demands, and a teaching philosophy informed by diversity and inclusion.

Faculty and administrators from the following higher education institutions participated in the symposium:

• Baylor University
• Carnegie Mellon University
• DePauw University
• Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
• Indiana University School of Medicine
• James Madison University
• Morgan State University
• Northern Illinois University
• Purdue University
• Saint Mary’s College
• University of California, Davis
• University of Chicago Law School
• University of Colorado Boulder
• University of Dallas
• University of Denver
• Vanderbilt University
• Washington and Lee University