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Dear Colleague,
In the last several months, we’ve seen a disturbing new effort to take control of education away from educators. From the appalling takeover of the New College of Florida to the College Board’s decision to revise the content of its Advanced Placement African American Studies course, these actions represent a grievous threat to academic freedom and shared governance.
These encroachments are related to the work of the humanities in promoting liberal learning and critical thinking, especially critical thinking about race. I’m writing to ask you to join the MLA in fighting back against this alarming trend. The MLA has written to the Florida Commissioner of Education in protest of the overhaul of New College, and I encourage you to read through the MLA’s professional standards on academic freedom and shared governance, including the MLA Statement on Academic Freedom (2014), Tool Kit on Academic Freedom, and Tool Kit on Shared Governance.
We urge you to use the standards and guidelines of the profession to shore up shared governance on your own campus and to ensure that faculty members and administrators work together to maintain academic freedom and build equitable practices both on your campus and across higher education.
Thank you for your help in this fight.
Sincerely,
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