The Faculty Voice

Organized.
Principled.
Faculty-Led.

For over fifty years, the OU-AAUP has been the collective voice of Oakland University’s full-time and part-time faculty at the bargaining table and in the halls of shared governance.

Become a Member

Bargaining Diary Opens During Bargaining Season

OU-AAUP members in red shirts gathered in front of a campus arch

What We Defend

Academic Freedom, Defined

AAUP · 1940 Statement of Principles

The AAUP’s 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure identifies three constitutive elements of academic freedom: research, teaching, and extramural speech. It also sets out specific restrictions for each.

The Elements

01 Research
02 Teaching
03 Extramural Speech
04 Intramural Speech Proposed

01

Freedom of Research

Faculty are free to investigate and to publish their results, subject to the adequate performance of their other academic duties.

Source: Anita Levy, AAUP Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure, and Governance

“Teachers are entitled to full freedom in research and in the publication of the results, subject to the adequate performance of their other academic duties; but research for pecuniary return should be based upon an understanding with the authorities of the institution.”
— 1940 Statement

02

Freedom in the Classroom

Faculty are free to discuss their subject in the classroom, while keeping controversial matter unrelated to that subject out of their teaching.

Source: Anita Levy, AAUP Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure, and Governance

“Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matter which has no relation to their subject.”
— 1940 Statement

“The passage serves to underscore the need for teachers to avoid persistently intruding material which has no relation to their subject.”
— 1970 Interpretive Comment

03

Extramural Speech

As citizens, faculty are free to speak and write in public free from institutional censorship or discipline, while making clear they do not speak for the institution.

Source: Anita Levy, AAUP Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure, and Governance

“College and university teachers are citizens, members of a learned profession, and officers of an educational institution. When they speak or write as citizens, they should be free from institutional censorship or discipline, but their special position in the community imposes special obligations… they should make every effort to indicate that they are not speaking for the institution.”
— 1940 Statement

04

Intramural Speech

Not in the 1940 Statement

Speech on how the institution is governed. Not named in 1940, but the AAUP urges institutions to recognize it as a fourth constitutive element.

While the 1940 Statement does not explicitly recognize speech on governance as a constitutive element of academic freedom, several AAUP investigative reports from the 1920s and 1930s do recognize intramural speech as within the ambit of academic freedom.

Questions about academic freedom, or know a colleague who needs assistance?

academicfreedom@aaup.org

Four OU-AAUP members in red shirts seated at a table

Who We Are

A Union of Colleagues, Built on Solidarity.

The OU-AAUP bargaining unit represents the full-time and part-time faculty at Oakland University. By an overwhelming margin, our colleagues understand the value not only of union representation, but of union membership.

We negotiate the contract that protects salary, workload, and academic freedom, and we stand with members when it matters most.