GVSU-AAUP
Some Important News From AAUP
AAUP Council Adopts Policy on
Contingent Faculty Appointments
and the Academic Profession
The governing Council of the American Association of University
Professors adopted a new policy statement, Contingent
Appointments and the Academic Profession, on November 9. The statement
addresses the increasing over reliance on part-time and non-tenure-track faculty
that threatens the quality and stability of higher education and the academic
profession's capacity to serve the public good. "Contingent"
appointments include all those off the tenure track, whether part or full time,
and whether compensated on a per-course or salary basis. Individuals holding
such appointments are called by various titles including "adjuncts,"
"lecturers," "instructors," and "visiting
professors." Click here
to read more.
AAUP Decries Secrecy in Nation's
Response to National Security: Calls for Increased Freedom of Inquiry and Open
Exchange of Ideas
In a new report,
a special committee of the American Association of University Professors calls
for more freedom of inquiry and openness in academic settings. The AAUP
established the Special Committee on Academic Freedom and National Security in a
Time of Crisis to assess the risks to academic freedom and free inquiry posed by
the nation's response to the attacks of September 11, 2001, on the World Trade
Center and the Pentagon. Click here
to read the press release or here
to read the executive summary. (Updated with report 11/12/03)
Faculty Handbooks as
Enforceable Contracts is a state-by-state guide that provides
summaries of legal cases involving faculty handbooks. The AAUP's legal office
developed the guide in response to the hundreds of calls a year it receives from
professors, academic administrators, and lawyers about the enforceability of
faculty handbooks as contracts. The newly updated third edition of the guide is
available and can be ordered now. Click here
to order the guide.
Since the passage of the USA Patriot Act
last October, faculty members have raised a number of questions about what the
act means to their day to day activities. At the request of AAUP's Committee on
Government Relations the office has prepared a
brief handout providing some basic information for faculty who receive law
enforcement inquiries under the new provisions of the Act. For more
information and related documents, click on our Homeland
Security and Higher Education page.
For more AAUP Resources, go to our Catalogue page