PROFS
LightNews LightNews
banner
profsuwmadison.bsky.social
PROFS
@profsuwmadison.bsky.social
240 followers 220 following 390 posts
PROFS is a UW-Madison faculty advocacy organization supported entirely through voluntary faculty contributions. Reposts are not endorsements.
Posts Replies Media Videos
profsuwmadison.bsky.social
Our statement is here: profs.wisc.edu?p=10069
PROFS has registered against Senate Bill 498, which purports to provide First Amendment protections at University of Wisconsin institutions, and which allows any individual who believes their expressive rights to have been violated to sue the University. PROFS believes that this bill is yet another instance of legislative overreach, a wild overreaction to a very small number of anecdotal reports of free speech violations on college campuses outside the state of Wisconsin, and that it creates a vigilante system of reporting alleged violations of the law – not unlike the vigilante system set up under Texas’s anti-reproductive rights bill. It is unclear why those bringing these bills forward believe there is a free speech problem at the Universities of Wisconsin. The universities themselves have put into place policies that ensure that free speech is protected and promoted on their campuses, and they have made sure that faculty members have the academic freedom necessary to provide access to the disciplinary knowledge necessary for democratic competence. University of Wisconsin-Madison policy allows faculty to “enjoy and exercise all rights secured to them by the Constitution of the United States and the State of Wisconsin,” free speech included. In 2015, the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents adopted a statement of commitment to the principles of free speech and academic freedom, part of which reads that free speech involves the right to discuss all matters both inside and outside the classroom, and that it isn’t the proper role of the university to “shield individuals from ideas and opinions they, or others, find unwelcome, disagreeable, or even deeply offensive.” There is no free speech problem at the University of Wisconsin; the university has, quite to the contrary, declared in very strong terms that not only must there be free speech on its campuses, but that the capacity to speak freely is one of its central aims. There is no evidence that freedom of speech is threatened on UW campuses. A survey conducted a couple of years ago showed that students were comfortable sharing their opinions, and for those who didn’t, it was more likely that they were concerned with what their peers would think of them, not because of concern over unfair treatment by their professors. The bill is redundant: it enumerates a list of actions the universities may not take, including restrictions of speech allowed under the First Amendment; time, place, and manner restrictions on expression in public areas; designation of free speech zones; and sanctioning individuals for harassment that doesn’t meet the threshold of severity, pervasiveness, or protected class status. All of these provisions are already well established in constitutional law through decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court and the Wisconsin Supreme Court... There is a strong culture of free speech at the state’s public universities, and especially at UW-Madison. University faculty understand that fostering and encouraging free speech is necessary for their students to hone their abilities to learn, to critically engage with ideas, and to obtain the disciplinary knowledge they’ll need to productively participate as citizens in both the workplace and in democratic self-governance. The Board of Regents and the universities have already adopted policies that reiterate that commitment to free speech, and put into place reasonable sanctions when that commitment falls short. The Board’s and UW-Madison’s actions are consistent with the idea that institutions of higher education should have the autonomy to address their own speech issues; appropriate institutional autonomy is itself an important aspect of academic freedom. Given all of this, we register against Senate Bill 498, which seeks to address a free speech “problem” in the state’s public universities, since we don’t believe there is one.
October 16, 2025 at 8:40 PM
profsuwmadison.bsky.social
@acls1919.bsky.social: "Under financial and political pressure, university leadership...may be tempted to sign and try to mitigate the damage later...No institution that is committed to the free pursuit of knowledge should submit to the degradation of autonomy and academic freedom contained in it."
ACLS Statement Regarding White House “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education”
ACLS stands firmly against this latest White House effort to divide faculties by giving special privileges to students in “hard science programs” and its demand that institutions abolish “units that p...
www.acls.org
October 7, 2025 at 6:45 PM
profsuwmadison.bsky.social
@aacu.org: "...college and university presidents cannot bargain with the essential freedom of colleges and universities to determine, on academic grounds, whom to admit and what is taught, how, and by whom. They cannot trade academic freedom for federal funding—and should not be asked to do so.
AAC&U Statement on the Trump Administration’s “Compact for… | AAC&U
AAC&U Statement on the Trump Administration’s “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education”
www.aacu.org
October 7, 2025 at 6:42 PM