This article is part of a series in which the Teaching Center focuses on legal and political developments affecting higher education  . . .  and university teaching more specifically. Aiming to encourage informed dialogue by describing and explaining the issues that underpin significant events and trends, these pieces will support an enhanced classroom climate, one in which salient concerns do not remain invisible simply because they can be difficult to discuss.

By J.D. WRIGHT

Pitt’s Year of Discourse and Dialogue recognizes the importance of conversations across “diverse viewpoints,” including not only “myriad political viewpoints” but also an “array of religious and spiritual beliefs, theoretical assumptions and philosophical stances.”

Recognizing the value of intellectual exchange, this occasion implicitly celebrates the ideal of free expression and the more specialized right to academic freedom. Given recent headlines, it’s fitting to reflect on these values in the context of teaching.

As university-level faculty and other instructional personnel, we’re probably already familiar with the academic-freedom protections with which we ourselves are cloaked. But we should also consider the academic-freedom privileges that extend to our students as vital members of a community of teaching and learning, a community where knowledge is made, contested,and remade on both sides of the lectern.

This article doesn’t offer a definitive statement about what rights university students might have in narrowly defined instances. (And it doesn’t comment on the academic freedom of a university as an institution.) Rather, it outlines some important legal and policy contexts to bear in mind as we approach our teaching and some recommended best practices for engaging students in ways that recognize their academic freedom.

History and context

Although the modern concept of academic freedom — including academic freedom for the student — goes back as far the origins of the research university, the idea was formalized in words in 1915, when the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) emphasized the applicability of academic freedom to students as well as teachers.

In 1956, that notion found its way into U.S. law with the Supreme Court’s decision in Sweezy v. New Hampshire, which held that the First Amendment enshrined academic freedom as a constitutionally protected right. Only a few years later, the court in Tinker v. Des Moines Independent School District extended academic freedom to students, holding that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

Further extending this recognition to students at public institutions of higher education, Healy v. James held in 1972 that, because universities have a special role to play in the “marketplace of ideas,” students as well as faculty enjoy the legal protections associated with academic freedom

The following year saw the court refine this idea by articulating some broad limits on student freedoms. In Papish v. Board of Curators of the University of Missouri, the court rejected “common decency” as a standard for prohibiting offensive and profane student speech but affirmed the principle that reasonable restrictions on the time, place and manner of student expression are within a university’s purview as long as they remained viewpoint-neutral.

Back at the AAUP, the 1967 Joint Statement on the Rights and Freedoms of Students (subsequently reaffirmed) outlined three specific classroom-related student rights that instructors should recognize: the protection of free expression, protection against “prejudiced and capricious” academic evaluation, and protection against improper disclosures of student views or beliefs. One observer has likened this pronouncement to a “Magna Carta for student rights.”

Pitt’s 2003 Statement on Academic Freedom applies to “all members of the University” and declares academic freedom to be “a prerogative of the university as a whole.” One of the responsibilities attached to academic freedom for instructors is the duty “to treat all members of the community of scholars that constitutes the university, including students as scholars under instruction, with the dignity that respects all honestly held opinions and all cogently articulated arguments.”

In April 2022, the Faculty Assembly by a wide margin endorsed a memo by then-Provost Ann Cudd reaffirming the University’s commitment to academic freedom. Marika Kovacs, co-chair of the Tenure and Academic Freedom committee, stressed in 2022 that “academic freedom” at Pitt ought to include students as well. Meanwhile, public universities like Pitt continue to navigate the task of balancing and recognizing all students’ rights.

Recommended best practices

Balancing rights and interests involves a recognition that academic freedom isn’t a blank check, for us any more than for our students. Because these two brands of academic freedom — for faculty and for students —  work synergistically (and in concert with the institution’s rights) to advance knowledge and learning, be intentional about choices that might affect a student’s rights. Although it isn’t a definitive list of mandates and prohibitions, here are some ideas about how to begin.

1. Set guidelines for student engagement. Students, while responsible for learning assigned content and accountable for maintaining the standards of academic performance established in a course, may take “reasoned exception” to course material and even disagree with their instructors. As a result, involving students in designing widely accepted norms for discussion and disagreement at the outset of a course is a prudent move, particularly in courses that implicate controversial topics. Later in the semester, you can address “hot moments” by referring students back to those shared norms.

2. Plan for genuine dialogue across viewpoints. At the beginning of a class session that you might anticipate being contentious, encourage student metacognition about the elements of fruitful and civil disagreement and about what makes for a productive class or discussion. “What are we trying to accomplish in class today?” “What do you hope to take away from our work?” “What choices can we make to advance our learning?” These are all sound questions that can frame some initial meta-discourse about aims and expectations.

3. Defuse strife before it erupts. Again, in a case where you foresee possible issues, instead of retroactively clamping down on potentially inappropriate student contributions or behavior in a way that could make a student feel censored or squelched, set students up for successful dialogue with, for example, a brief ungraded or low-stakes writing exercise. By giving students an opportunity to express ideas privately and to consider them deliberately (with norms they have joined in crafting), you can foster dialogue that doesn’t boil over into problematic territory.

4. Encourage the open exchange of competing ideas. The single greatest predictor for democratic engagement in civic behavior after college is frequent dialogue across differences. Repressing ideological diversity leads to greater polarization, ossifies student opinion in an unchallenged state, and prevents students from learning how to work through their disagreements. Explicitly welcome contributions from the many perspectives and then guard against eruptions of personal bias that might seem to squelch student expression.

5. Observe the rights and dignity of all students. Free speech and academic freedom are not coextensive because the classroom is not a public forum; what may properly be said and done in our classrooms is not as broad as what may properly be said and done in front of the Cathedral. For instance, threats, harassment and discrimination — particularly against other students — cross the line between protected speech and that which we may restrict. Academic freedom need not preclude inclusivity, equity, and diversity. Develop reasonable limits in tandem with your students.

You have an important role to play as a locus of authority and responsibility in your course. While many types of speech might be constitutionally protected, there are boundaries and other interests, all of which need to be balanced. By considering some of these recommendations, you and your students can collectively nurture a shared space for dialogue and discourse.

Conclusion

If you need support addressing open-discourse concerns in the context of your teaching practices, contact the Teaching Center to schedule a consultation. Office of University Counsel provides “advice and counsel to the University of Pittsburgh community” on “legal and policy matters involving or affecting the University” (but not on personal legal issues); contact your school or department leadership if you face a policy-related concern that seems to be more than you can handle, and that team can in turn reach out to OUC in an appropriate case.

J. D. Wright, who earned his law degree from the College of William and Mary and his Ph.D. from Pitt, is a teaching consultant with the University Center for Teaching and Learning. He can be reached at jd_wright@pitt.edu.