59,236 results on '"*FREEDOM of speech"'
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2. The Nexus between Patriotism and Censorship: The 'New Normal' for Academic Expression
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Patricia A. Somers, Suchitra V. Gururaj, Jess Geier, and Curtis A. Brewer
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According to the ACLU (2005), ". . .at times of national stress -- real or imagined -- First Amendment rights come under enormous pressure." So, too, academic freedom of expression for faculty, staff, and students has become a casualty in the post-9/11 world. Academics were criticized and reprimanded for not being patriotic enough. Using a conceptual framework that includes historical reanalysis, terror management theory, contradictory constructions of patriotism, and electronic discourse, this essay explores the nexus between patriotism and free expression in higher education. We examine historical trends in freedom of expression, analyze three higher education case studies (Chilling Churchill; 9/11 and Middle Eastern Studies; and Shunning Bob Jensen), and suggest why patriotism and censorship go hand and glove in times of national crisis. We end one a cautionary note, expressing concern about how easily words can be turned against academics, the very people who should have the highest level of protection for their words. Nearly 20 years ago, Professor Pat Somers joined the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin bringing her trademark wit and her seemingly indefatigable energy to root out injustice. The paper below represents one such branch of her academic curiosity in response to a perceived injustice to a fellow member of the Academy. This paper was first presented as a draft manuscript at the American Educational Research Association and later submitted to a notable journal. Unfortunately, a second paper on academic freedom was already included in the edition, but the editors encouraged Pat and her team to pursue other publications. And then, as with many things, this paper fell to the side as Pat pursued a new branch of academic curiosity and stewarded her many doctoral students through the dissertation process. As you will note in the dedication, Pat was a deeply curious and pedagogically dynamic member of the Academy and this paper stands at the ready for updating and resubmission. We present it today unadulterated as a testimony to Pat's prescience, her passion and her drive -- a historical glimpse into the early days of a very real threat to academic freedom that persists today.
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- 2024
3. Paradigms of New Media and Terror Agencies
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Ferhat Atik and Muharrem Özdemir
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As a fundamental communication tool, media has undergone transformative changes throughout history. This has a lot to do with education. Each era has been characterized by its own unique media paradigms, from the invention of the printing press in the 15th century to the emergence of radio and television in the 20th century. These paradigms not only define how information is disseminated but also shape the social and political landscapes of their respective periods. In the modern age, the emergence of digital technology and the internet has brought about a new media paradigm that deeply influences every aspect of human interaction and the fabric of society. Today, new media, characterized by its interactivity, decentralization, and unprecedented access, dominates our daily lives. The significance of new media, which affects individual behaviors and global politics, economy, and cultures, cannot be underestimated. This process is also of great importance in terms of education. In particular, media literacy education will enable the individual to personally prepare for or otherwise intervene in the positive or negative aspects of their interaction with the media. From connecting distant communities to altering the dynamics of political campaigns, the impact of new media is ubiquitous. However, along with these advantages, new challenges have also emerged. One of the most concerning aspects of this shift in media is the potential for its exploitation by malicious groups, particularly evident in the rise of "terror agencies" utilizing new media platforms. These organizations adeptly employ new media tools for propaganda, recruitment, and operations, forming a symbiotic relationship that poses significant threats to global security. This article explores how new media paradigms enable the existence of terrorist organizations, the place of education in this regard, and what this complex relationship means for our interconnected world.
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- 2024
4. Diversity of Thought: Protecting Free Speech on College Campuses. Hearing before the Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development of the Committee on Education and the Workforce. U.S. House of Representatives, One One Hundred Eighteenth Congress, First Session (March 29, 2023). Serial No. 118-4
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US House of Representatives. Committee on Education and the Workforce, Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development
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This document records testimony from a hearing before the Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development of the Committee on Education and the Workforce on protecting free speech on college campuses. Opening statements were provided by: (1) Honorable Burgess Owens, Chairman, Subcommittee on Higher Education and the Workforce Development; and (2) Honorable Robert C. Scott, ''Bobby.'' Ranking Member, Committee on Education and the Workforce. Witness statements were provided by: (1) Cherise Trump, Executive Director, Speech First, Washington, D.C.; (2) Josiah Joner Executive Editor, The Stanford Review, Stanford, California; (3) Suzanne Nossel, Chief Executive Officer, Pen America; and (4) Ilya Shaprio, Director of Constitutional Studies, Manhattan Institute, New York, New York. Additional submissions include: (1) Honorable Jim Banks, a Representative in Congress from the State of Indiana: Report dated December 8, 2021 from The Heritage Foundation; (2) Honorable Suzanne Bonamici, a Representative in Congress from the State of Oregon: Statement for the record dated February 7, 2023, from the American Psychological Association; (3) Honorable Mark Takano, a Representative in Congress from the State of California: Memo dated March 22, 2023, from Jenny S. Martinez; and (4) Honorable Tim Walberg, a Representative in Congress from the State of Michigan: Support letter for the record dated March 13, 2023.
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- 2024
5. Not 'Citizens in Waiting': Student Counter-Narratives of Anti-Equity Campaigns
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Andrene J. Castro, April Hewko, Kevin L. Clay, Genevieve Siegel-Hawley, and Kim Bridges
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Recent efforts prohibiting race-related diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives have informed localized public pushback narrating anti-equity campaigns. Emerging research and media accounts have largely focused on adults engaged with or against these efforts, with less attention on youth and their perceptions of these campaigns. To center youth voice, we analyzed 224 student newspaper articles published in Carmel, Indiana and Loudoun County, Virginia--two sites replete with localized contestations of equity reform. Using narrative policy analysis and approaches to counter-narratives, findings demonstrate youths' roles as engaged policy actors as student journalists highlighted forms of political engagement and action in their local contexts. We include recommendations for school leaders and policymakers to promote youth voice and engagement in education governance.
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- 2024
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6. Addressing Democracy and Its Threats in Education: Exploring a Pluralist Perspective in Light of Finnish Social Studies Textbooks
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Pia Mikander and Henri Satokangas
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Democracy is increasingly being challenged, by disengagement and by anti-pluralist movements (Levitsky and Ziblatt in How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future, Viking, New York, 2018; Wikforss in "Därför demokrati. Om kunskapen och folkstyret" [Because of this, democracy. On knowledge and people's rule] Fri Tanke, 2021; Svolik et al. in J Democr 34(1):5-20, 2023). This article draws upon a theoretical discussion about democracy, pluralism, and threats to democracy. Departing from Dewey, Laclau, Mouffe, Young and Allen, we address democracy as an ideology that centers around pluralism, or an ever-increasing inclusion of voices from the margins as its goal. We argue that perceiving democracy pedagogically as a pluralistic ideology would support students' democratic citizenship and equip them for a world where threats to democracy are being reported. Employing a case study on Finnish social studies textbooks, we analyze how democracy as well as threats to democracy are discursively portrayed. Our study shows that the textbooks present democracy as predominantly institutional and static. We also find that while disengagement is portrayed as a problem for democracy, anti-pluralist movements are generally not referred to as a threat. Additionally, we examine a discourse in the textbooks that connects freedom of speech with democracy in a way that favors a multitude of opinions, even antidemocratic ones, over creating space for marginalized voices. Drawing on the theoretical discussion and the results of the analysis, we argue that a focus on pluralism as the core of democracy makes the opposition between restricting hate speech and advocating for democracy redundant.
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- 2024
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7. Political Speech on Campus: Shifting the Emphasis from 'If' to 'How'
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Mario Clemens and Christian Hochmuth
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Universities in many liberal democracies, such as the US, the UK, or Germany, grapple with a pivotal question: how much room should be given to controversial utterances? On the one side, there are those who advocate for limiting permissible speech on campus to create a safe environment for a diverse student body and counter the mainstreaming of extremist views, particularly by right-wing populists. On the other side, concerns arise about stifling the free exchange of ideas and creating an atmosphere of fear and censorship. The debate is further complicated by participants' occasional uncertainties about the legal norms relevant in the given context, such as when freedom of speech is an issue and when it is not. This paper addresses the question of whether universities should allow actors with primarily political (as opposed to scholarly) agendas to speak on campus. Focusing on German universities, we begin by discussing some of the potentially relevant legal norms. We then propose shifting emphasis from "whether" we should make room for public political discussions on campus to "how" such events must be organized so that they deliver the goods that their advocates emphasize while avoiding the dangers of which critics warn. Drawing on conflict management literature concerned with process design, we make several practical suggestions on how to organize an event that brings political discourse to the university campus without causing harm.
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- 2024
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8. An Uneasy Peace: How STEM Progressive, Traditionalist, and Bridging Faculty Understand Campus Conflicts over Diversity, Anti-Racism, and Free Expression
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Steven Brint, Megan Webb, and Benjamin Fields
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In recent years an uneasy peace has descended in U.S. academe between those who feel research universities have done too little to advance the representation of minority groups and women and those who feel that the administrative policies developed to improve representation can and sometimes do come into conflict with core intellectual commitments of universities. Using quantitative and qualitative evidence from interviews with 47 natural sciences, engineering, and mathematics faculty members at a U.S. research university, the paper examines the background characteristics of three sets of protagonists -- academic progressives, academic traditionalists, and those whose views bridge the divide -- and the way respondents discussed and justified their viewpoints. The paper draws on the theory of strategic action fields to illuminate the structure and dynamics of the conflict and suggests modifications to the theory that would improve its explanatory power for this case.
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- 2024
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9. Diversity's Promise for Higher Education: Making It Work. Fourth Edition
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Daryl G. Smith and Daryl G. Smith
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Building sustainable diversity in higher education isn't just the right thing to do--it is an imperative for institutional excellence and for a pluralistic society that works. In "Diversity's Promise for Higher Education," author Daryl G. Smith proposes clear and realistic practices to help institutions identify diversity as a strategic imperative for excellence and pursue diversity efforts that are inclusive of the varied issues on campuses--without losing focus on the critical unfinished business of the past. To become more relevant while remaining true to their core missions, colleges and universities must continue to frame diversity as central to institutional excellence. Smith suggests that seeing diversity as an imperative for an institution's mission, and not just as a value, is the necessary lever for real institutional change. Furthermore, achieving excellence in a diverse society requires increasing institutional capacity for diversity--working to understand how diversity is tied to better leadership, positive change, research in virtually every field, student success, accountability, and more equitable hiring practices. In this edition, Smith emphasizes a transdisciplinary approach to the topic of diversity. Drawing on fifty years of diversity studies, this fourth edition engages with how the environment has transformed for diversity work since the third edition appeared in 2020. It: (1) addresses the changed landscape in which DEI work has been politicized both on and off campus; (2) provides examples and language to suggest ways to articulate the centrality of diversity to mission and excellence; (3) emphasizes the link between healthy democracies and higher education's mission in light of the current global and domestic challenges to democracy; (4) highlights the need to focus on the conditions for developing healthy communities where dialogue, difference, and learning can take place; (5) examines the current climate of campus protests and the implications for free speech and academic freedom; and (6) reemphasizes the complexity of identity--and explains how to attend to the growing kinds of identities relevant to diversity, equity, and inclusion while not overshadowing the unfinished business of race, class, and gender.
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- 2024
10. Connections and Tensions between Free Speech and 'in Loco Parentis' on College Campuses: The Mission of College and the Education of the Whole Student
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Jeff Frank
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By focusing on the role that "in loco parentis" plays on college campuses, according to the author, we are offered a new angle of vision, one that may break us out of simplistic understandings of campus life in our time. In the 1960s, college students fought for free speech and against in loco parentis. Students did not want their colleges to dictate, through rules or unstated norms, how they could fight for causes they believed in. Colleges began to step out of the role of guardian and allowed students new freedoms of expression. Fast forward to today when the college students of the 60's and 70's are raising children. Many still believe in the importance of free speech as an ideal and yet their generation is also known as "helicopter" or even "snowplow" parents. In their role as defender of free speech, they object as college students protest or no-platform speakers they disagree with. At the same time, when their child faces difficulties on campus -- from issues with roommates, to issues with a professor, to being caught breaking school rules -- they go on the attack, demanding that the college make things right. The goal of this article is to do some reflecting so that colleges are better positioned to offer the most reasonable and educative response to the tensions that exist between and within free speech demands and demands that colleges take on some of the "in loco parentis" roles that they were asked to step out of in the 1960s. Higher education can model what it means to respect growth and freedom, creating norms of interaction that have the potential to influence the wider culture.
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- 2024
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11. Values in British Higher Education: Knowledge, Freedom and Wellbeing
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Rosalind M. O. Pritchard
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British higher education is ranked among the best in the world, but some of its core values are under strain. Knowledge and critical thinking can be undermined by biased mind-sets, especially when engaging with the social media. Research demonstrates that false news goes viral much more quickly than true news. Political correctness and the woke movement can militate against freedom, especially in gender-related matters. Surveys show that many staff and students have a lower sense of wellbeing than the rest of the population. Conscious of these problems, the Government has responded with an Act to place extensive new obligations on certain types of online service providers, requiring them to protect their users by managing risks relating to illegal and harmful content. A separate Act has also been passed to protect freedom of speech in universities. The issue of staff and student unhappiness is much less amenable to legislation because it is so multi-faceted. However, it is a very important issue for a healthy, democratic society that fosters cooperation, trust and community. It needs to be addressed.
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- 2024
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12. The Company They Keep: Organizational and Economic Dynamics of the BDS Movement
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National Association of Scholars (NAS) and Oxnevad, Ian
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The "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions" (BDS) movement against Israel is one of the faces of anti-Semitism in the United States. It threatens not only Jewish students and scholars but also the political neutrality of the university. The BDS movement is particularly concentrated in higher education and creates an environment of academic politicization to the detriment of academic freedom, freedom of speech, and constructive civil discourse. This report finds that the BDS movement's success on campus is mixed, while its broader movement is well-funded and growing in influence. This report expands beyond previous work on the BDS movement by examining its constitutive student groups in the context of its off-campus support organizations and funding. BDS in universities must be understood as one component of a larger left-wing social justice movement that politicizes higher education. This report first describes the Palestinian origins and development of the campus BDS movement, before examining its rates of success and failure nationwide from 2005 to the Fall 2022 semester. Three campus case studies then examine how pro-BDS initiatives are propagated, how such anti-Israel measures affect anti-Semitism on campus, and how university administrations address the issue. The second half of this report examines the off-campus organizations that enable BDS student activism by means of training, legal assistance, and funding. This report also notes ties between BDS organizations and terrorism.
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- 2023
13. Manufacturing Backlash: Right-Wing Think Tanks and Legislative Attacks on Higher Education, 2021-2023
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American Association of University Professors (AAUP) and Isaac Kamola
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During the 2021, 2022, and 2023 state legislative sessions more than one hundred and fifty bills were introduced seeking to actively undermine academic freedom and university autonomy. This includes nearly one hundred academic gag orders affecting higher education, such as those restricting the teaching of "critical race theory" (CRT) and other so-called "divisive concepts." These academic gag orders were shortly followed by efforts to undermine campus diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), bills weakening tenure and accreditation, and legislation mandating "viewpoint diversity" and academic programming, often in ways that circumvented faculty governance over the curriculum. This legislative onslaught has been understood as simply an effect of America's highly polarized politics. However, as this white paper demonstrates, this legislation has been pushed by a network of right-wing and libertarian think tanks, working closely with Republican politicians, to manufacture a culture war backlash against educators and academic institutions. This white paper explores eleven think tanks that have helped created a self-reinforcing echo chamber of reports, commentary, webinars, op-eds, and other content villainizing faculty and academic institutions. Many of these same organizations also develop model legislation and lobby in support of bills designed to address this manufactured "crisis."
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- 2024
14. Between Two Systems: Navigating Censorship and Self-Censorship in Higher Education in Prisons. Report
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Ithaka S+R, Ess Pokornowski, and Kurtis Tanaka
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In 2023, Federal Pell Grant funding was reinstated for learners who are incarcerated, and new regulations were released to govern the eligibility of higher education in prison programs for such funding. This has driven increased interest in higher education in prison programming, as programs look to help their students access Pell grants and adjust their practices to account for the new regulations. At the same time, research and advocacy organizations have also redoubled efforts to better understand how higher education in prison programs are provided, what technology their students have access to, and how the student experience of education in prison differs from the student experience on college campuses. The cultural and institutional focus on security within departments of correction allows correctional institutions wide latitude to practice censorship and surveillance; however, higher education institutions have a duty to protect the privacy and academic freedom of their students. As higher education opportunities expand for individuals who are incarcerated, new configurations and collaborations will be needed to meet these needs. With funding from Ascendium Education Group, Ithaka S+R has published two reports on relevant issues: a report detailing survey findings on technology access in higher education in prison programming and a report on media review directives and censorship policy in higher education in prison. Past work has explored the ways that media review directives and censorship policies may limit or protect student access to intellectual and education material and explored what technology students on the inside can access for educational purposes--and the quality of both the access and use that they have. Building on that work, this report, also made possible with funding from Ascendium Education Group, contributes to the conversation by exploring how educators in higher education in prison programs navigate censorship and self-censorship. Specifically, the authors sought to understand how the institutional context, and the relationship between educational programs and departments of corrections, may have an impact on both how students experience higher education in prison and their learning outcomes.
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- 2024
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15. Try to Love the Questions: From Debate to Dialogue in Classrooms and Life. An Essential Guide to Dialogue in the College Classroom and Beyond. Skills for Scholars
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Lara Schwartz and Lara Schwartz
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"Try to Love the Questions" gives college students a framework for understanding and practicing dialogue across difference in and out of the classroom. This invaluable guide explores the challenges facing students as they prepare to listen, speak, and learn in a college community and encourages students and faculty alike to consider inclusive, respectful communication as a skill--not as a limitation on freedom. Among the most common challenges on college campuses today is figuring out how to navigate our politically charged culture and engage productively with opposing viewpoints. Lara Schwartz introduces the fundamental principles of free expression, academic freedom, and academic dialogue, showing how open expression is the engine of social progress, scholarship, and inclusion. She sheds light on the rules and norms that govern campus discourse--such as the First Amendment, campus expression policies, and academic standards--and encourages students to adopt a mindset of inquiry that embraces uncertainty and a love of questions. Empowering students, scholars, and instructors to listen generously, explore questions with integrity, and communicate to be understood, "Try to Love the Questions" includes writing exercises and discussion questions in every chapter, making it an indispensable resource for anyone interested in practicing good-faith dialogue.
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- 2024
16. Avenues for Engagement? Testing the Democratic Nature of Library Book Challenge Processes
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Pamela Catherine Callahan and Joel D. Miller
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Background or Context: Public school library book challenges have garnered ample media attention in recent years as many school districts and advocacy organizations have reported record numbers of book challenges. Book challenges are not a new phenomenon, historically speaking, but they have often illuminated values clashes in communities and raise questions about the rights and freedoms of public school students. Judicial rulings and school district policies that address book challenges could provide insights for many members of school communities (including, but not limited to, school board members, students, parents, and teachers) as they experience challenges, but these aspects of the legal record and their influence on responses to book challenges remains underexamined in scholarship. Purpose, Objective, Research Question, or Focus of Study: The 1982 Supreme Court case "Island Trees School District v. Pico" remains the lasting judicial precedent for interpreting public school students' First Amendment rights as they interact with school library books. We examine the extent to which school district book challenge policies align with court precedent set in "Pico" (1982) and the implications for students' rights and democratic participation during book challenges. Research Design: Drawing on elements of the law and society framework as well as political analysis categories, this study uses qualitative methods to illuminate specific elements of district policies that govern book challenges. Specifically, we examine 29 policies in school districts that experienced a publicly reported book challenge between 2017 and 2021 to understand relationships between school district book challenge policies and the "Pico" (1982) precedent. Conclusions or Recommendations: Our findings reveal ample space between judicial rulings and school district policies we examine. In fact, we find a broader array of relevant actors in book challenge processes than conceived by the courts and raise implications for students' constitutional rights and protections related to who policies indicate may or must be involved in these processes, the settings in which book challenge decisions are made, and the limited roles for public involvement during school library book challenges.
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- 2024
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17. Taking Seriously Campus Debates Surrounding Invited Speakers: Open-Mindedness and the Ethics of Inquiry in Higher Education
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Rebecca M. Taylor
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Context: College campuses in the United States are currently engaged in public and ongoing negotiation of the value and limits of free speech in educational contexts. Responses to invited campus speakers from students, faculty, and campus leaders point to diverging perspectives on the roles and responsibilities of higher education institutions and their members as communities of inquiry. Considering these perspectives raises questions about the epistemic aims of colleges and universities. Purpose: The purpose of this article is to investigate perspectives on the ethics of inquiry and on the value and demands of open-mindedness in higher education. Specifically, I examined one case of an invited campus speaker who sparked considerable debate--Charles Murray's invited talk at Middlebury College in 2017. Research Design: This study employs the methods of empirically engaged philosophy, a philosophical approach to inquiry that engages with empirical evidence in considering educational aims and implications for institutional structures and policies. I apply conceptual tools stemming from the philosophical theories of knowledge and justice to a thematic content analysis of public statements made by faculty, administrators, and students in the Middlebury case. Conclusions or Recommendations: Through analysis of this campus speaker case, I observed two alternative perspectives on the ethics of inquiry--rational individualism and just collectivism. These two perspectives shared a number of common commitments, including the importance of cultivation of the mind as a primary aim in higher education; the value of open-mindedness, debate, and protest in the pursuit of truth; and the importance of justice, equality, and inclusion. They diverged in their epistemic orientations (individual vs. collective responsibility), their views on the proper bounds of open debate within an institution oriented toward truth-seeking, and what virtuous open-mindedness requires of individuals and collectives. This study contributes to a contemporary understanding of the unique ethical responsibilities of colleges and universities as inquiring organizations, whose members may hold divergent epistemological orientations. By investigating the relationship between open-mindedness, inquiry, and justice in contemporary public discourse in higher education, this study addresses a need for deeper engagement with the philosophical foundations of higher education.
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- 2024
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18. Seizing the Moment: A State Education Agenda for 2023. Backgrounder. No. 3745
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Heritage Foundation, Center for Education Policy, Butcher, Jonathan, and Burke, Lindsey M.
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K-12 public education is a state responsibility and a federal interest, which means that state lawmakers have the primary responsibility for adopting and revising the laws governing public schools as well as scholarships, education savings accounts, and other private learning options. State officials also have significant authority over the laws concerning higher education, and given the dismal student results at elementary, secondary, and postsecondary levels, state lawmakers have opportunities to make critical reforms to improve student achievement. This report presents the Heritage Foundation's blueprint for state lawmakers in 2023.
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- 2023
19. Teachers' Social Media Use and Its Legal Implications
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Martha Crockett, Lavare Henry, Stephanie McGuire, and Ayse Gurdal
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As society becomes increasingly dependent on technology, school leaders must navigate the evolution of websites, resources, and platforms, including social media, as part of their responsibility to facilitate a safe and productive learning environment for students. This article reviews both constitutional and case law as a means of informing educational leaders of their rights and duties, as well as providing a foundation upon which effective K-12 social media policies and practices for educators can be built. Specifically, we offer an analysis of landmark cases involving the First Amendment and free speech, the delicacy around teachers' roles as both public employees and private citizens, and recent court cases involving social media use. Additionally, we propose guidelines around social media use, compiled from both practitioners in the field and relevant literature.
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- 2023
20. 'Bildung' to 'dannelse': A Historical Analysis of an Educational Concept in Motion from Fichte's 'Addresses to the German Nation' to Grundtvig's 'Nordic Mythology,' 1808-1832
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Waterman-Evans, Louis
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This conceptual research analyses the historical development of the German concept of "Bildung" to the Danish "dannelse." The starting point is J.G. Fichte's 1808 "Addresses to the German Nation," in which "Bildung" is analyzed as a key concept. The paper illustrates the influence Fichte had on N.F.S. Grundtvig, the "father of modern Denmark," with important adaptations based on English liberties and Nordic mythology. Grundtvig's "dannelse" is then analyzed based on his 1832 "milestone" work, "Nordic Mythology." The paper finds that "Bildung" and "dannelse" can be considered parallel concepts of similarity in their shared emphasis on the mother-tongue as a "living language," and focus on social cohesion. However, "Bildung" and "dannelse" can also be characterized as concepts of difference, in that: 1) "dannelse" popularized "Bildung," meaning that it was not just for the academic bourgeoisie, but the entire "folk"; 2) freedom of expression is fundamental to "dannelse," in contrast to the stability of will and moral order in "Bildung;" 3) in "dannelse," national unity is expanded to a wider circle of belonging, the whole of humankind; 4) Nordic mythology is a social cohesive in "dannelse," to contrast Fichte's more rational conception of "Bildung." Written by a British author for an English-speaking readership, this research does not feign to be more than a prefatory glance at two rich and complex concepts. However, in shedding light on the historical development of "Bildung" to "dannelse," it aspires to edge readers closer toward a shared conceptual understanding or, more aptly, to better understand misunderstandings.
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- 2023
21. The Changing Legal Landscape for LGBTQIA Students in Higher Education: Title IX, Religious Freedom of Expression, and the Special Relationship Doctrine
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Jarvis, Judy F.
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LGBTQIA students are an important stakeholder group on college and university campuses, especially as both their visibility and expectations for support and empowerment on campus increase. But how ready is the field of higher education for litigation related to LGBTQIA issues, and how should student affairs practitioners prepare to address LGBTQIA students' possible negative campus experiences proactively? By reviewing details of cases that have set an important precedent and signal what might be coming with respect to LGBTQIA students' rights and experiences in higher education, this article seeks to provide detail and analysis of important legal areas that student affairs practitioners should be attuned to as they continue to educate thousands of LGBTQIA students each year. I explore how Title IX may be increasingly a route of redress for LGBTQIA students who have experienced discrimination; how rulings on religious freedom of expression may erode some of LGBTQIA students' rights on college and universities campuses; and the special relationship doctrine and how it may be applied to LGBTQIA students in mental health crisis.
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- 2023
22. Children's Rights: Comparison of the Consciousness Levels of Gifted and Non-Gifted Children
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Koca, Selda, Senol, Fatma Betül, Erbasan, Ömer, and Aktepe, Gülenay Esranur
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The study was conducted to examine the consciousness levels of gifted children about children's rights and to compare them with their non-gifted peers. The general survey model was used in this study, in which the consciousness levels of gifted and non-gifted children on children's rights were compared. The study group of the research consists of 63 gifted and 65 non-gifted primary school students studying in a science and art center in Afyonkarahisar. In the research, the "Children's Rights Consciousness Level Determination Scale" developed by Akgül and Çaglayan (2019) was used to determine the consciousness levels of students about children's rights. In the analysis of the collected data, the difference between the groups was examined with the Mann Whitney U test using the data analysis program. As a result of the research, the consciousness level of gifted students about children's rights was found to be significantly higher than their non-gifted peers. In addition, this difference emerged in the "right to information and opinion" dimension of the scale. The unique developmental characteristics of gifted children may have an impact on their knowledge, consciousness and behavior towards children's rights. However, there is a need for comparative and longitudinal large-scale studies based on epidemiological data on the sensitivity of gifted children to children's rights. In addition, educational and behavioral interventions should be made in order to increase the consciousness of gifted children about children's rights, regardless of their educational environment.
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- 2023
23. Civic Education and Defensive Republicanism in France after the Assassination of Samuel Paty
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Szukala, Andrea
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Purpose: The Samuel Paty murder has generated a great response from the professional community and the world of education and schools in Europe and worldwide. In a unique way, civic educators expressed horror, sorrow, and solidarity with the family and with their French colleagues. The article is dedicated to Samuel Paty and the question of whether and how we as a community of international civic educators can learn from this terrible event. Design/methodology/approach: The article presents a case reconstruction using press and public documents attempting to disentangle the actors' positions, their stated intentions and contexts, and the following political intricacies of the case. Findings: The murder of Samuel Paty provoked a series of educational policy reactions that have paradoxical effects on civic education in schools, seen its intentions of political-social inclusion into a citizenship model. The case analysis documents the pitfalls of the instrumentalization of civic education for the securitization of societies.
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- 2023
24. Social Media in Schools -- A Comparative Legal and Educational Perspective
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Smit, Marius
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The comparative research paper explores the use and risks of social media in South African, USA and European schools. It discusses the potential challenges that schools, educators and learners may face such as cyberbullying, sexting, identity theft, fraud, catphishing, cybercrimes, excessive online presence, and addiction to social media. The paper reports on the findings of a phenomenological study and purposive survey among school principals and educators in South African schools. The paper highlights the advantages of applying social media in the classroom, and provides recommendations for schools, educators, parents and principals to manage the use of social media in the education environment. [For the complete Volume 21 proceedings, see ED629259.]
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- 2023
25. Survey on Academic Freedom, Institutional Autonomy and Academic Integrity from a Student Perspective
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European Students' Union (ESU) (Belgium), Kimizoglu, Iris, and Vespa, Matteo
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Academic freedom is the most important pillar that underpins and enables a democratic and free higher education sector. Given that the academic and political debate on the concept of academic freedom tends to be one-sided and confined to the needs and experiences of academic staff and researchers, as well as in face of the ongoing attacks on the academic community in Europe, the European Students' Union inquired how European students perceive the current situation around academic freedom, institutional autonomy and academic integrity in their national/regional contexts, and how academic freedom is perceived by students and their representative bodies. This report summarises the results of the survey on academic freedom, institutional autonomy and academic integrity conducted by ESU and financially supported by the Open Society Foundation. We hope that this report on student perceptions will enrich current debates as it is a first starting point to explore and address student perspectives on and the need for (student) academic freedom.
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- 2023
26. Using Video Diaries in Educational Ethnography: What Being Alone with a Camera Does for Self-Representation, Trust, and Affording a Participant Perspective
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Clemens Wieser
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Video diaries are an innovative tool for ethnographic research, contributing to the quality of fieldwork and ethnographic data by giving additional attention to participant voices. Grounded in two fieldwork periods in secondary and higher education, this paper illustrates three key qualities through which video diaries contributed to ethnographic research: (1) Building trusting relationships with participants, (2) providing a space for participant autonomy, and (3) being a medium of self-explication and truth-telling. In video diaries, participants exercised free speech, providing a widely unmediated, personal perspective on their professional identity, roles, and relationships. This personal perspective allowed participants to contribute to trusting on their own terms, which mitigated face-work -- especially when talking about conflicts and challenges -- and provided additional entry points for conversations, enabling deep dialogue and understanding. Ultimately, the use of video diaries significantly strengthened the researcher-participant relationship and enriched the ethnographic data and the quality of interactions.
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- 2024
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27. The Phenomenon of Cancel Culture through the Social Media: Pedagogical Implications for Teacher Education
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Michalinos Zembylas
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This paper suggests that the phenomenon of 'cancel culture' has significant pedagogical implications for teacher education. In particular, the analysis problematises the phenomenon of cancel culture, focusing on how issues relating to race, racism and structural injustice are framed in social media. It is argued that for teacher education programs wrestling with how to guide teachers to deal with cancel culture, it is not enough to emphasise critical thinking, media literacy, debate and free speech. It is also important to avoid reproducing social media's framing of cancel culture as an individualised and psychologised phenomenon, and urge teachers to pay attention to structural issues of race, racism and injustice. It is suggested that despite the political or other risks involved, teacher education programs can make a valuable contribution to public debates by engaging cancel culture in ways that nurture vigilance and restorative justice measures.
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- 2024
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28. 'Special Concern'? A Mixed-Methods Examination of the Tension between Legal and Practical Conceptions of Academic Freedom
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Evan Sparks Ringel
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Academic freedom is an oft-invoked buzzword in debates about campus speech and the American university. But how have courts treated legal disputes where faculty members have invoked academic freedom as a potential constitutional interest? And how do faculty themselves conceptualize academic freedom? The similarities and differences between these two approaches to academic freedom are critical in a political and social climate where universities are a site of contestation. To examine these questions, this dissertation used a mixed-methods approach to academic freedom, drawing from both legal and social science research methods. The legal analysis found that federal courts have been inconsistent in how they consider academic freedom. Though the U.S. Supreme Court has spoken of academic freedom as a "special concern of the First Amendment," the Court has failed to definitively articulate whether academic freedom has constitutional protection. Lacking guidance, lower federal courts have applied academic freedom in contradictory ways. A survey of future university faculty members showed support for academic freedom in a variety of university contexts. Respondents also expressed concern that a lack of academic freedom has a chilling effect on university faculty. However, attitudes about academic freedom were tempered by politics--both in the partisan identity of the respondent and in the political content of a hypothetical professor's speech. Ultimately, this dissertation suggests that legal and professorial conceptions of academic freedom have multiple important differences. While courts have been reluctant to extend academic freedom protections to faculty governance, respondents felt that academic freedom was necessary in their interactions with colleagues and administrators. Conversely, while federal jurisprudence has held that public employee speech as a citizen on a matter of public concern is generally protected by the First Amendment, respondents were less likely to speak as citizens due to concerns about a lack of academic freedom. By blurring definitional boundaries, these differences may undercut the use of academic freedom as a primary justification for the protection of professorial speech. This dissertation concludes by emphasizing the limited nature of constitutional protection for academic freedom before offering avenues for future research. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]
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- 2024
29. A Phenomenological Exploration of Free Speech and Safe Space in Higher Education: The Experiences, Perceptions, and Sensemaking of Chancellors and Presidents at U.S. Public Universities
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Pamela A. Ferguson
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This qualitative study used an interpretative phenomenological analysis framework (Smith et al., 2012) to explore the ways in which U.S. public university chancellors and presidents experience campus free speech and safe space. Six public university leaders with campus free speech and safe space experience participated in semi-structured interviews in 2022. The resulting analyses included exploration of participants' perceptions and sensemaking, in addition to the double hermeneutic relative to researcher sensemaking (Smith et al., 2012). The findings indicated that participants viewed free speech as foundational to civilized society. Participants emphasized the academy's role in protecting and promoting free speech, while fostering safe spaces for learning and intentional dialogue. The impact of sociopolitical, geographic, and historical contexts on participants' free speech and safe space experiences, perceptions, and sensemaking was highlighted, in addition to the impact of university stakeholders. Additionally, participants demonstrated similarities in their sensemaking relative to campus free speech and safe space, often engaging characteristics of balancing, collaborating, leading, learning, mentoring, and responding. The findings suggest several implications for university leadership. The development of deep and diverse stakeholder relationships, in addition to support systems with others experienced in the presidential role, would be useful for informing leaders' free speech and safe space sensemaking and decision making. Additionally, the need for leadership training on issues related to balancing campus free speech and safe space considerations was also identified. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]
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- 2024
30. Reexamining the Relationships of Religious Communities and the Public University: A Call-Back to Two Previous Scholars' Responses with New Lenses
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J. Cody Nielsen and Monica Sanford
- Abstract
Higher education in the 2020s remains deeply divided on the role of religion, or what the Council on the Advancement of Standards (CAS) in 2023 describes as "religious, secular, and spiritual identities." In two previous articles in this Journal, one 2010 article by the late Peter Magolda and one in 2014 by Perry Glanzer, detail the ways in which students and the student groups themselves should be considered in relationship with their institutions. However, ten years after those arguments, questions of how religious leadership should relate to and interact with the institution still remain. The ways in which institutions are utilizing critical religious pluralism theory are at the forefront of three relationship-minded considerations the authors wish to highlight. Initially, understanding the relationships requires reexamination of the ways interpretations of the First Amendment affect public and the private university settings for religious life. This article explores the relevance of professionalizing the relationship between religious leaders and the institution, the ways in which such a relationship can support stability of the religious communities themselves, and the importance of progressive Christian groups as a part of a more religiously diverse campus's pluralistic religious and spiritual ethos. The gaps in Magolda and Glanzer's arguments, plus the emergence of critical religious pluralism theory, offers new opportunities to consider higher education policies and practices related to "religious, secular, and spiritual" identities.
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- 2024
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31. Individualization and Citizenship-Shaping in the Chinese Education System: A Critical Qualitative Study of Chinese Elite University Graduates
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Yihao Li
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This dissertation aims to explore whether, amidst the significant trend of social individualization, Chinese citizenship education can achieve its goal of cultivating the so-called 'loyal socialist citizens'. Unlike citizenship education in Western democracies, which fosters constitutional patriotism, Chinese citizenship education seeks to transform the cultural spirit of collectivism among the Chinese populace into a political inclination towards communism and then to develop a socialist patriotism grounded in an ideological commitment to socialism and an institutional recognition on the Chinese party-state. A qualitative study was conducted through narrative interviews with twelve graduates from different elite Chinese universities. Interviews inquired about their perceptions of citizenship, the processes that have shaped their citizenship, and their perspectives on China's dominant narrative. Compared to the theoretical framework of citizenship for constitutional patriotism, which is centered on civic participation, this study finds the framework of citizenship for socialist patriotism has stronger explanatory power to account for the trajectory of Chinese social transformations and the potential typology of socialist citizenship. Despite the pronounced diversity of political attitudes and ideologies stances, the data suggest that real-life experiences have a more substantial impact on shaping their citizenship than formal ideological courses within the university setting. Furthermore, this dissertation proposes a four-step process for citizenship-shaping, identifying the 'suspicion moment' as a crucial point for prompting one's skepticism towards official discourse, transforming one's ideological thinking, and motivating one to rationalize and deconstruct the grand narrative and begin the self-construction of a worldview. Meanwhile, a new form of individualism that maintains horizontal collectivism but rejects vertical collectivism is identified among these interviewees; it preserves the Confucian ethos of 'the relational self' and a communitarian concern for collective interests. However, it also emphasizes the importance of personal boundaries to resist authoritarian interference. In conclusion, the dissertation posits that the expansion of higher education in China can facilitate the demystification of socialist ideology among the youth. Nonetheless, due to stringent censorship and speech control, dissent must be cautiously concealed. This necessity results in unquantifiable psychological stress and unresolved mental tensions, contributing to more uncertainties inherent in China's ongoing social transformations. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]
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- 2024
32. Embodied Campus Geographies: Rehabilitating 'Safe Space' as a Threshold Condition for Transformative Higher Education with Subaltern Students
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Samantha Ha DiMuzio
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The heightened use of "safe space" in educational settings has been the subject of polarizing contemporary controversy and protested by conservative and progressive camps alike, raising concerns about whether "safe space" remains an educationally viable concept. In response to claims that safety is conflated with "coddling" students, censoring unpopular speech, or reinforcing privilege, this dissertation argues that safe spaces signify enduring pursuits of diversity, equity, and inclusion in higher education that are too important to be abandoned. Instead, this interdisciplinary, mixed methods project considers how safe spaces can be rehabilitated to best serve subaltern undergraduate students. Informed by the experiences of six of my former students, I investigate how predominantly White institutions (PWI), like Boston College, can be rehabilitated as places where risky, transformative education is possible. By integrating situated educational philosophy and participatory design research (PDR) that features artistic and embodied methods of relationality (self-portraits, walks, and interactive workshops), I offer a spatial turn in the safe space debates that reveals the ideologically laden 'normative geography' of university campuses. Attuning to safe space controversies as spatial struggles uncovers who and what is positioned as "in place" or "out of place" on campus, as well as subaltern students' transgressive acts of place-making--the quotidian tactics of making a hostile place more habitable for themselves. My dissertation therefore culminates by proposing a risky model of higher education, inspired by Judith Butler's proposal of ethical formation, that insists on a collective responsibility for inclusive campus place-making. In this iterative framework, safety serves not as a barrier to risk, but as a crucial, co-constructed threshold condition that makes educative risk-taking possible for all students. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]
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- 2024
33. Educator Perceptions of Appropriate Social Media Practices
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Amanda Hope Preece
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The purpose of this qualitative pilot study was to investigate the perceptions of educators regarding appropriate social media practices. Specific elements of appropriate social media use by teachers investigated include understanding of acceptable use policies and freedom of speech, the relationship between social media and professional development, and best practices for educators concerning their social media usage. Purposeful, convenience, and snowball sampling were used to select study participants. Study participants (N=24) were preservice teachers completing student teaching or mentor teachers for Marshall University College of Education and Professional Development. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 teacher candidates and 12 mentor teachers to gain their perspectives regarding appropriate social media usage by educators. Thematic analysis was used to organize and interpret the information collected. Findings suggest educators understand what are considered appropriate social media practices, including privacy settings, and professional language and communication between both students and parents. Further research suggestions include interviewing teacher candidates and mentor teachers from other states and universities, further investigating the difference in perspective of elementary and secondary teachers, and completing follow-up interviews with teacher candidates once employed. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]
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- 2024
34. The Implications of Principal Leadership Styles on Teachers' Organizational Commitment in the Israeli Arab Educational Minority
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Yasmin Abd El Qader and Pascale Benoliel
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The current study's purpose is to present a picture of the extent to and frequency at which Israeli Arab principals are perceived as displaying the leadership styles of participative leadership versus directive leadership and transformation versus transactional leadership and then investigating the relationship of these leadership styles to teachers' organizational commitment (OC). Data were collected from two sources: senior management team members and teachers to avoid same source and common method bias: 426 participants overall from 71 high schools in the Israeli Arab educational system. Unianova analysis and hierarchical regression analyses were used to test the proposed relationships. The results of the overall model indicated that although principals in the Arab society in Israel are perceived mostly as directive leaders, participative leadership was positively associated with teacher OC beyond the specific influence of directive leadership. Changes in teacher perceptions, toward freedom of self-expression and career advancement, seem to be reflected in the influence of principals' leadership styles on teachers' OC that are derived in part from cultural features of the school's environment. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.
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- 2024
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35. The First Amendment and Transformational Leadership: Religious Rights in American Education
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Constantine Vlahos
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This mixed methods study, which implemented an explanatory sequential research design, investigated the role that the First Amendment Religious Rights (i.e., the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause) have in American Education. The researcher attempted to find out how well versed or not educational leaders were when facing First Amendment religious rights issues and how to best prepare current and future educational leaders for confrontations, disputes, and issues with these religious rights. The target population included 10 educational leaders from a mid-Atlantic state serving schools in the suburbs of a major metropolis. These 10 participants included a variety of superintendents, principals, assistant principals, curriculum supervisors, and other school administrators. The researcher randomly selected five participants for a control group and five participants for an experimental group, which means that this study also implemented a pretest-posttest control group design. Several themes emerged which showed how the participants in the experimental group demonstrated positive changes in their awareness, attitudes, behaviors, motivation, and capacity when compared to the control group. The experimental group participants also expressed a higher level of confidence and competence when confronted with a religious rights concern. Implications for theory and practice, the limitations of the study, and recommendations for future research are also included. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]
- Published
- 2024
36. Report of a Special Committee: Political Interference and Academic Freedom in Florida's Public Higher Education System
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American Association of University Professors (AAUP)
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In November 2022, Florida governor Ronald DeSantis, won reelection by a decisive margin and the Republican party gained supermajorities in both houses of the state legislature. During the governor's first term and after reelection, the Florida House and Senate passed legislation and the DeSantis administration took executive actions that further aimed to censor the teaching and learning of certain historical topics; potentially criminalize some discussions of race, gender, and sexuality; stigmatize, marginalize, and exclude transgender people. In the wake of these developments, it quickly became apparent that the governor's education program, which initially focused on K-12 schools, had ominous and direct consequences for public higher education as well. The threat to higher education and, more specifically, to foundational principles of shared governance and academic freedom, intensified in early January 2023 when the governor appointed six new trustees to the board of New College of Florida, an alternative liberal arts college within the Florida public higher education system. Responding to these developments, the AAUP in January 2023 announced the formation of the undersigned special committee to inquire into what the Association described as an "apparent pattern of politically, racially, and ideologically motivated attacks on public higher education" and to prepare a report of its findings and issued a preliminary report (see Related Records). Incorporating material from the preliminary report, this final report reaffirms those findings and expands upon them. It also considers more explicitly how AAUP-supported principles and standards are implicated. And it broadens the scope of inquiry not only to cover subsequent events but also to incorporate the perspectives of many additional interviewees.
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- 2023
37. We Should Have Seen It Coming: The 'Mahanoy' Decision Considered
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Waggoner, Charles R.
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Electronic communication plays a significant role in most schools and in all of our personal lives as well. The legal question of what is acceptable and what is not acceptable electronic speech for students that is constructed and delivered totally off-campus on such platforms such as Snapchat, Tic Toc, Facebook or Meta, U-Tube, and regular email, to name just a few, begs the question of when school officials may intervene and penalize students for electronic communication? With electronic communication having such a significant role in schools, a new array of legal issues has surfaced for off-campus speech. The U.S. Supreme Court in the landmark case of "Tinker v. Des Moines" and subsequent cases clarified the various parameters of appropriate student speech on campus and when school officials may take corrective action to curtail that speech. The "Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L." decision by the Supreme Court in 2021 offers some limited guidance on how student off-campus electronic speech may be contemplated by school officials. How do prospective principal candidates view off-campus posts in light of the "Mahanoy" decision?
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- 2022
38. Free Speech at West Virginia Colleges and Universities: Peril and Promise
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James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), Kissel, Adam, Laura Beltz, and Robinson, Jenna A.
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The U.S. and West Virginia constitutions acknowledge the right to free speech, which must be protected at public colleges, but Senate Bill 657, which became law in 2021, requires that public colleges protect "any lawful verbal and nonverbal speech." Furthermore, many private colleges also promise free speech to their students. However a campus-climate survey published by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) in 2021 found that 5-in-6 college students have self-censored because of how they perceived other students, a professor, or the college administration would respond. Two-thirds of college students agreed that it was acceptable to shout down a campus speaker or to try to prevent them from speaking. FIRE reviewed the restrictions on free speech at 17 public or private colleges and universities in West Virginia and found 92 policies that restrict freedom of speech. This report reviews FIRE's ratings, gives examples of restrictive policies, and recommends ways to improve students' free speech rights. [The report was written in partnership with the Cardinal Institute for West Virginia Policy.]
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- 2022
39. The Outsourcing of Discrimination: Another SCOTUS Earthquake?
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University of Colorado at Boulder, National Education Policy Center and Welner, Kevin G.
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This policy memo examines some fundamental shifts, along with their real-world implications, within the past 60 years of Supreme Court jurisprudence, up to and including the current "Carson v. Makin" case. The Supreme Court is just a few small steps away from transforming every charter school law in the U.S. into a private-school voucher policy. Further, the nation may be facing a future of religious organizations proselytizing through charter schools that have been freed from obeying anti-discrimination laws--with LGBTQ+ community members being the most likely victims.
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- 2022
40. Free Speech, Cancel Culture, Race, Privilege, and Higher Education: An Intersectional Analysis of Netflix's 'The Chair'
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Esposito, Jennifer
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A Netflix original six-episode series, "The Chair," examines the experiences of a woman faculty of color department chair at the fictional Pembroke College. One of the many stressors she must navigate is a response to an incompetent white male faculty (who is also her love interest) after he makes a Nazi salute during a lecture in class. By watching this series, many viewers learned about how higher education administrators may respond to situations where a faculty member engages in questionable speech. The ensuing drama that occurs on campus in response to the Nazi salute and the students' perceptions that the administration will and can do nothing of consequence to the professor showcases the messiness and intricacies of what has been termed "cancel culture." In this paper, I use intersectional analysis to examine "The Chair" and the messages it sends about race, privilege, and cancel culture in higher education.
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- 2023
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41. How Can Universities Prepare for the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act?
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Universities UK (UUK) (United Kingdom)
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This briefing is intended to support Universities UK (UUK) members ahead of the implementation of the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act. The government introduced the Act with the intention of strengthening freedom of speech and academic freedom in higher education in England, and received Royal Assent in May 2023. The legislation will have a wide-ranging impact on universities in England, as well as the role and remit of the Office for Students (OfS), including: (1) a new strengthened duty to promote freedom of speech and academic freedom; (2) new OfS condition(s) of registration; (3) requirements for codes of practice; (4) regulation of students' unions on freedom of speech; (5) the introduction of a statutory tort; (6) establishment of a free speech complaints scheme; (7) creation of the role of the Director for Freedom of Speech and Academic Freedom; (8) monitoring of overseas funding in relation to risks to academic freedom and freedom of speech; and (9) prohibition of non-disclosure agreements in complaints relating to harassment and sexual misconduct. This briefing sets out the legal landscape around freedom of speech and academic freedom, listing the other legal duties on universities that are relevant to freedom of speech and academic freedom. This includes the European Convention on Human Rights, the Human Rights Act 1998, the Prevent duty, the Equality Act 2010 and the public sector equality duty. It also covers what universities may wish to consider when updating existing codes of practice on freedom of speech and academic freedom and offers suggestions of other steps universities can take to prepare for their new duties, including reviewing other governing documents. [This briefing was developed with Shakespeare Martineau.]
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- 2023
42. U.S. Student Media Associations' Mission Statements Provide Discursive Leadership in Support of Civic Culture
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Vogts, Todd R.
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As political division and polarization continually increases in the United States, civic knowledge faces decline. Journalism education provides a potential remedy for these democracy-endangering harms by imparting valuable instruction regarding civics and the role of the media in society. However, with no standardization in the country, individual educators and school districts largely must develop their own curricula. Luckily, student media associations provide support and leadership to student media programs, which is articulated through their mission statements. Filling a gap in the existing research, this study conducted a thematic analysis and found discursive leadership within the mission statements of such associations.
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- 2023
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43. When Are Universities Followers or Leaders in Society? A Framework for a Contemporary Assessment. Research & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.1.2022
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University of California, Berkeley. Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE) and Douglass, John Aubrey
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In assessing the current and future role of universities in the nation-states in which they are chartered and funded, it is useful to ask, When are universities societal leaders as societal and constructive change agents, and when are they followers, reinforcing the existing political order? As discussed in the book, "Neo-Nationalism and Universities: Populists, Autocrats and the Future of Higher Education," the national political history and contemporary context is the dominant factor for shaping the leadership or follower role of universities -- what I call a political determinist interpretation. We often think of contemporary universities, and their students and faculty, as catalysts for societal progress -- the Free Speech and Civil Rights movements, Vietnam War protests, the anti-Apartheid movement, Tiananmen Square, and more recently the pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong. Universities can be, and have been, the locus for not only educating enlightened future leaders, but also for opposing oppression and dictatorships. But universities have also proved over their history to be tools for serving the privileged, and reinforcing the social class divisions of a society; they also have been factories for errant theories that reinforce the worst of nationalist tendencies. Universities are both unique environments for educating and mentoring free thinkers, entrepreneurs, and citizens with, for example, a devotion to social change, or for creating conformists -- or all of the above. How might we assess whether universities are followers or leaders in their societies? This essay considers this question, offering a framework for evaluating the follower or leader role, and with particular attention to the emergence or, in some cases, re-emergence of neonationalist leaders and autocratic governments.
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- 2022
44. Editing for Change: From Global Bibliometrics to a Decolonial Aporetics of Form in South African Journal Publishing
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Froneman, Willemien and Muller, Stephanus
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The scholarly journal is an increasingly homogenised global institution marked by pro forma writing, standardised processes of review and production and uniform design aesthetics. Recognising that this model does not necessarily serve the interdisciplinary agenda of a small community of music scholars in South Africa, the journal South African Music Studies has resisted absorption into large corporate publishing houses. The importance of remaining independent became clear in 2015 and 2016 when the most important student revolts since 1976 forced the editors to reconsider the responsibility of the journal to publish content that responded in interesting and significant ways to the national #FeesMustFall crisis. This paper discusses some of the strategies followed by the editors to foreground -- and indeed, to privilege -- Africa-centred modes of writing and reasoning during this turbulent time. These decolonial strategies included reconceptualising the role of editor as a proactive figure and employing novel modes of structural and visual design. Not without its pitfalls, this editorial approach and its resultant controversies raised important legal questions about freedom of expression and about the scholarly journal as an institution of knowledge production and transformation in Africa.
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- 2022
45. Political Hate Speech of the Far Right on Twitter in Latin America
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Díez-Gutiérrez, Enrique-Javier, Verdeja, María, Sarrión-Andaluz, José, Buendía, Luis, and Macías-Tovar, Julián
- Abstract
The purpose of this research was to study the spreading of political hate speech by the far right through Twitter. A mixed methodology was employed, combining both quantitative and qualitative tools, within the framework of digital ethnography. Five characteristic cases of campaigns linked to political hate speech were chosen, meeting the four criteria set: Latin American scope with representativeness in terms of breadth and impact, political motivation, more than 100,000 tweets, and massive use of fake accounts. The analysis was performed with T-Hoarder, Gephi and MAXQDA. The conclusions drawn are that these campaigns do not occur spontaneously. Rather, a destabilizing political intention lies behind them, sponsored by organizations with considerable ability to disseminate messages and with extensive funds. The massive presence of false accounts, the repetition of certain spelling errors in identical form and the striking increase in the number of accounts just before campaigns are evidence of the automation of these processes. The constant use of aggressive and disparaging terms associated with hatred triggers extreme polarization and a climate of tension, threatening the building and consolidation of democracy itself. Apart from punitive measures, there is a need to implement educational proposals.
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- 2022
46. Free Your Campus, Free Your Mind. Campus Freedom Toolkit. Campus Freedom Initiative
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American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA)
- Abstract
Universities are indispensable for a free and prosperous society. Their mission depends on a campus culture of free expression and intellectual diversity. The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) seeks to hold American colleges and universities accountable to their missions. ACTA now provides a blueprint to help higher education regain and live by the core principle of free expression. The ACTA Gold Standard for Freedom of Expression provides clear guidance for institutions to create a culture of free thought on their campuses. Steps ranging from adopting new institutional guidelines, to creating new on-campus initiatives, to eliminating abusive and unconstitutional rules can help colleges and universities reclaim their place as leaders within the American liberal democracy. This report provides information on: (1) the ACTA Gold Standard for Freedom of Expression; (2) Reports, both classic and contemporary, that lay out the principles and practices of campus free expression; and (3) ACTA publications that provide best practices for fostering civil discourse, cultivating intellectual diversity, breaking down barriers to free expression, and advancing leadership accountability.
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- 2022
47. Freedom of Expression at Davidson College: Is There a Problem? Answers from the Fall 2021 Survey of Davidson College Students
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American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA)
- Abstract
The alumni group Davidsonians for Freedom of Thought and Discourse (DFTD) was founded in 2018 to monitor the state of free expression, diversity of viewpoints, and ideological balance at Davidson College. DFTD was also founded to undertake research to help clarify whether perceived problems in these key areas are real. Fall 2021 survey of major donors to Davidson College, virtually all of whom are alumni, revealed an urgent problem: Only 20% answered that it is "extremely" or "very clear" to them that the college administration protects free speech on campus, and 94% said that Davidson's next president should make campus freedom of speech and open, civil discourse a priority. But do Davidson's major donors have it right? Is there in reality a problem that needs to be addressed? To help answer this question, DFTD commissioned College Pulse--an online survey and analytics company dedicated to understanding the attitudes, preferences, and behaviors of today's college students--to conduct an independent, anonymous survey of Davidson students. The following summary of the Fall 2021 Davidson student survey findings presents the first available empirical data on the extent to which obstacles to freedom of expression are real and pervasive at Davidson. The findings also include insights from students on what they believe the priorities for Davidson's next president should be. The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) commends this report to the close attention of Davidson's Board of Trustees and of the Presidential Search Committee that is now working to identify Davidson's next president.
- Published
- 2021
48. Anticipating Controversy: What's the Problem Represented to Be in Australian Policies for the Selection of Learning Resources?
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Cairns, Rebecca
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Teachers' decision-making about resource selection is made more complex when resources are appraised for their potential to raise controversial issues or cause offence to others within school communities. Debates around the use of trigger warnings, freedom of speech and the impact of exclusionary practices further complicate these processes. In this article, Bacchi's (Bacchi, 2012; Bacchi & Goodwin, 2016) What's the problem represented to be? (WPR) approach is applied to the critical policy analysis of five Australian policy texts that deal with resource selection and controversial issues in schools. By comparing the ways these policies represent certain kinds of 'problems', it highlights the tendency of government departments to problematise this as a process that must be managed for the purpose of mitigating contestation. An examination of dominant and alternative policy constructions also prompts reflection on the discursive effects of policy and why resource selection should be re-problematised as a pedagogical opportunity and inclusionary practice.
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- 2023
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49. Contending with Censorship in Canadian-Accredited Schools Abroad
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Smith, Lee
- Abstract
In this study, one current and three former British Columbia (BC) offshore school principals were interviewed to seek their insights on how they contended with being compelled to censor material and disallow topics of conversation while administering a Canadian curriculum in an international context. Using a research design consistent with an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) methodological framework, the data were interpreted using three reduction cycles to generate five categories: disillusionment, anger, struggle, expedience, and subversion. The participants' responses were synthesized through the five categories in light of the phenomenon of moral distress, which occurs when a person is hindered from following a course of action consonant with their own moral judgement. Participants' reflections on leading Canadian high schools outside of Canada offered meaningful insights into their lived experiences abroad and provided a basis for a more robust consideration of how principals make sense of morally distressing situations in their schools.
- Published
- 2023
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
50. Listening to Muslim Students' Voices on the Prevent Duty in British Universities: A Qualitative Study
- Author
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Zempi, Irene and Tripli, Athina
- Abstract
The Prevent Duty requires universities in the United Kingdom to identify and report students who might be seen as 'vulnerable' to radicalisation. Since its introduction in 2015, the duty has been subject to increasing empirical research in the education sector. However, there has been limited research that specifically explores Muslim students' perceptions of Prevent in British universities. This paper directly addresses this gap in research by drawing upon the qualitative experiences of 25 university students who self-identified as 'British Muslims'. Individual, semi-structured interviews were transcribed and analysed using Thematic Analysis. The findings demonstrate the securitisation of higher education and 'policing' of Muslim students. The paper draws on Pantazis and Pemberton's use of the 'new suspect community' thesis in order to examine participants' views and experiences. When analysing the data, three particular themes are especially prominent: as a tool of 'surveillance', Prevent hampers freedom of speech, threatens student activism and forces Muslim students to hide their Muslim identity to avoid being labelled as 'radical' or 'vulnerable' to terrorism. It will be concluded that the 'surveillance' function of Prevent is problematic on the grounds that it renders universities 'modern-day panopticons'.
- Published
- 2023
- Full Text
- View/download PDF
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