The College of DuPage Board of Trustees last night postponed a vote on several policy changes that had come under intense criticism from its faculty and organizations concerned with faculty rights and academic freedom.
The intense controversy surrounding the board’s efforts at a broad overhaul of the college’s policies appears far from settled, however.
Kory Atkinson, a board member who has played a central role in the policy overhaul, said today that the board acted “out of an abundance of caution” last night in postponing action on several especially controversial provisions until the college’s lawyer could review them. Dismissing many criticisms of the policies as having “no basis in fact,” he expressed optimism that the board would approve them when it meets again, on April 16.
Moreover, the trustees last night approved several other policies that the College of DuPage Faculty Association has criticized as infringing upon faculty governance, violating contractual agreements, or otherwise overstepping the board’s bounds. The association’s president, Nancy Stanko, said today she had sent the college’s president, Robert L. Breuder, a letter warning him that the association may challenge the policies as illegally violating fair labor practices.
The policies that the board put off considering were those that the Illinois Council of the American Association of University Professors had opposed, in a letter sent to the trustees this week, as “an extraordinary attack on academic freedom, shared governance, and intellectual liberty on campus.”
They included provisions dealing with academic freedom that were also opposed by the Illinois Community College Faculty Association, and several provisions that the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, a national organization based in Philadelphia, criticized in a letter sent to the board this week as infringing on free speech and free association.
Much of the controversy surrounding the proposed policy changes stemmed from their initial inclusion of language borrowed from an “academic bill of rights” drafted by the conservative activist David Horowitz. The college’s president removed most of that language before last night’s meeting, and Sara Dogan, national campus director of Students for Academic Freedom, a group affiliated with Mr. Horowitz, argued today that many of the criticisms of the policies before the board last night were disingenuous and intended to block broader reforms at the college. —Peter Schmidt
