The Square Circuit

Academia, parenthood, living in a bankrupt city, and what I read in the process.

Sunday, November 26, 2006

The Report is In

The Pennsylvania House Select Committee on Academic Freedom finally wrapped up its phony work last week--and, not surprisingly, after four public hearings across the state they decided that (in the words of the Philadelphia Inquirer, "A statewide policy governing college students' academic freedom is unnecessary because political bias is rare at Pennsylvania's public colleges and universities, a bipartisan legislative panel has found." I've written before (as has Michael Bérubé of Penn State, much more extensively and eloquently) about the nonsensical nature of these hearings: a solution, one provided by the deeply disingenuous David Horowitz, looking for a problem). Horowitz's "Academic Bill of Rights" was soundly smacked down by the PA committee's report, which saw--in a bipartisan report--no need for such legislation, and not just because as written it's ludicrous: they found that the purportedly pervasive anti-conservative bias in academia, the constant harassment of honorable conservative students, was almost entirely a fiction. Horowitz, though, is claiming victory, apparently because he got people with "Honorable" attached to their names to listen to him.

I'll post a link to the Committee's report when I can find it (they haven't released it yet, apparently).

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