I remember how it was -- JR
Stanford University president promises to 'safeguard' free speech in blistering attack on woke law students after federal judges said they will refuse to hire them as clerks in wake of ambush on conservative member of the bench
The president of Stanford Law School is promising to 'safeguard' free speech after an embarrassing protest by a woke student mob - joined by the school's dean of 'equity' - at a Trump-appointed judge's speaking engagement at the school.
Marc Tessier-Lavigne - who previously published a public apology to Judge Kyle Duncan - also promised 'new initiatives to safeguard and strengthen' campus freedom of speech.
Duncan, from the fifth circuit of appeals, was ambushed by associate dean of equity, diversity and inclusion Tirien Steinbach during a discussion in early March.
Steinbach - a former ACLU lawyer who previously defended free speech - initially claimed Duncan had a right to express his views. But she then launched into an impassioned six minute speech - which she had written down - condemning his life's work.
Tessier-Lavigne cited the talk - which now has federal judges promising not to hire Stanford Law students as clerks - as a 'deeply disappointing event' and believed that the school must 'reject such corrosive conduct.'
In the letter, Tessier-Lavigne continues: 'We all navigate disagreements and differences with the people that we live and work with every day. As members of a university community, we are called on to extend our empathy beyond our close personal relationships – to see one another as people with complexity, not as partisan types.'
He also promised that freshman students would be given workshops that would teach them how to discuss contentious issues in a constructive manner.
'We must continue building understanding and active dialogue about both the opportunities and the expectations of being members of this community, including shared commitments to both free expression and to dignity and integrity in our interactions.'
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Muzzling Free Expression on Campus Causes Self-Censorship
Societies advance through the creation, expression, and evaluation of alternative ideas. Therefore, for almost a millennium, we have had universities where ideas and discoveries are born and different perspectives are debated in “marketplaces of ideas” or “learning communities.” Yet there has been a decline in rational, reasonable discourse on issues of the day on modern campuses. This has been demonstrated by numerous suppressions of speakers, including one recently—and most shockingly—at the Stanford Law School, where a federal judge, Stuart Kyle Duncan, was prevented from speaking by a student protest, aided and abetted by the law school’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) dean.
The university’s own administration was helping to lead the suppression of speech and ideas. It is incidents like this one that have made members of university communities afraid to express themselves, fearing potential negative outcomes (e.g., insults, attacks on character, possible physical attack, or efforts to dismiss) from individuals opposed to their viewpoints. Hence, expressed viewpoint diversity is on a notable decline. We are moving at least partway in the direction of universities in 20th-century totalitarian societies like Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union. And this movement has spread to the broader society.
Individuals are increasingly engaging in self-censorship—the consequences of using an inappropriate word become too costly, so we muzzle our expression. One recent example came courtesy of Whoopi Goldberg, who is hardly a paragon of reactionary anti-woke thinking. She recently was pressured into apologizing for suggesting that some people had been “gypped”—a synonym for “cheated” or “ripped off.” Goldberg has profusely apologized for using a word that some apparently find offensive. Why? It turns out that the word may be thought to imply that Roma people (commonly referred to as “gypsies”) are untrustworthy. These individuals, constituting a tiny fraction of one percent of the world’s population, live predominantly in Europe but are found throughout the world. Words that came into colloquial usage hundreds of years ago become verboten as decreed by a woke aristocracy increasingly funded by universities and supported by their DEI offices. As we economists say, “The cost of expressing an opinion outside the prevailing progressive academic mainstream has risen sharply.”
Let me offer the personal observation of an octogenarian whose higher education experiences span eight decades—from the 1950s as a young undergraduate through the 2020s as a professor. Throughout the first five of those decades, the last half of the 20th century, I felt that I could pretty much say what I wanted, protected most of the time by academic tenure. I sometimes was outspoken. In the 1980s, Ohio Gov. Richard Celeste attacked me publicly because, through op-ed writings, I promoted a voter referendum to roll back a massive income tax increase that Celeste advocated and the legislature approved. The president of my university was pressured by prominent politicians to fire me, but he appropriately said, “Professor Vedder has tenure, and, moreover, we believe in freedom of expression.”
I survived. However, if I had been born several decades later and the tax increase had taken place in, say, 2015 or 2020, would I have publicly spoken up? I doubt it. I would have censored myself, remaining quiet rather than writing op-eds opposing the governor. Why? Because I believe that the university administration very possibly would have joined politicians in condemning my behavior, perhaps even firing me. I likely would be further condemned by the faculty senate, and some DEI administrators might call a rally condemning my efforts to restrict taxation as hurtful to minorities and thus morally, if not legally, forbidden.
Although difficult to precisely quantify, I think the gap between the political perspective of university faculty and the general electorate has widened over time, mainly reflecting an increasingly progressive faculty orientation. The ivory tower has always been perceived as being a bit flakier and more leftist than the real world, but that difference now is huge. Today’s faculty are generally highly aware that they are, in effect, wards of the state, as their schools are dependent on governments not only for direct subsidies and research grants but also indirectly for funds from tuition fees artificially inflated over time by various federal student assistance programs.
Thus, colleges have been increasingly allied to progressive interests favoring governmental solutions to problems and denigrating private or market-derived ways of solving social issues. Moreover, within colleges and universities, the balance of power has shifted away from faculty, favoring non-academic administrators who are less imbued with the collegiate traditions of open and free inquiry embodied in such documents as the First Amendment or even the “Chicago Principles” (and related “Kalven Report”), which some prominent schools (e.g., Princeton, Columbia, Chicago, North Carolina, and Purdue) have explicitly adopted.
The recent case of Amy Wax, an eminent tenured University of Pennsylvania law professor, personifies why self-censorship is on the rise. In May, Penn will have a hearing that could lead to her dismissal. What is Professor Wax’s great alleged crime? Did she neglect teaching classes or verbally attack individual students? Is she extremely deficient in publication or research? No, Wax has won teaching awards and publishes frequently. She is being sanctioned for her expression of views in writings on issues like immigration or the advantages of traditional two-parent marriages. How can academics avoid the Wax nightmare? Keep your views to yourself—self-censor.
The move toward what Johns Hopkins political scientist Benjamin Ginsberg perceptively called “the all-administrative university” has been augmented by a pronounced increase in the power of the federal bureaucracy, especially the Department of Education. The balance of collegiate power has passed from a once largely dispassionate faculty highly respectful of First Amendment values and civil debate to a bureaucracy both within the universities and beyond that views its job, to borrow from a British royalty job description, as “defender of the Faith.” The “Faith” is the woke ideology prevalent in the academy, the media, and amongst many politicians. Dialogues are being replaced by ideologues.
Reducing fear of self-expression may be a positive effect of a surging national movement to suppress DEI initiatives in the universities and, perhaps, stop the excessive use of them in private business. Practices such as requiring employees to sign allegiance to diversity practices are inimical to free expression, and initiatives in many states—including large ones like Texas, Florida, and Ohio—to restrict or even outlaw DEI bureaucracies could end campus efforts to enforce viewpoint conformity. If, as I suspect, DEI becomes a political—and, thus, a potentially severe financial—liability for state universities, freedom of campus speech will likely eventually become rejuvenated, enhancing a vital intellectual life characterized by robust but civilized debate.
https://www.independent.org/news/article.asp?id=14464&omhide=true&trk=title
*********************************************University cheats on notice after launch of ChatGPT detection software
Australia’s universities will gain access to new technology designed to crack down on cheats using ChatGPT but some top institutions are shunning the software as teachers look to redesign tests to combat the rise of artificial intelligence.
Most universities nationwide will on Wednesday have the option of using popular anti-plagiarism software service Turnitin to detect whether a student has used a chatbot to help write an essay or complete an assessment.
But some of the country’s biggest institutions including the University of Sydney, Monash University and Deakin University have said they will not use the software – at least initially – and are instead ramping up other detection methods to catch students using ChatGPT to write papers.
Academic integrity expert at the University of NSW, Cath Ellis, said there is a “real fear” the detection tool could lead universities to falsely accusing students of using ChatGPT to do their work.
“We could also end up with a massive tidal wave of referrals coming through from academics that we can’t handle, many that could be false accusations,” she said.
“Turnitin are releasing this tool, but the perception among the higher education sector is that the type of testing that has been done hasn’t been effectively communicated.”
James Thorley, regional vice president of Turnitin, claims the company’s new tool can identify if a student has used an AI chatbot in their work with 98 per cent confidence. He said about 780 high schools in Australia used Turnitin and will have access to the new tool.
“Banning ChatGPT isn’t feasible long-term,” said Thorley. “This detector isn’t just about maintaining academic integrity but is also about understanding how AI writing tools are changing the future of assessment,” he said.
However, Benjamin Miller, an English lecturer at Sydney University, said he is opting to redesign assessments for his first year students to deal with chatbots.
“I immediately started thinking about the ethics of using ChatGPT in academic writing, and I was surprised how well it could write and how widespread its use is,” he said.
“I now give students a sample of writing that ChatGPT has created, and they will be tested on how well it analyses and demonstrates critical thinking. They are also tested on how they exceed the capabilities of a chatbot.”
“ChatGPT isn’t great at analysis and evaluation, and often doesn’t connect ideas across paragraphs, so you can often pick up if it’s been used that way.”
A spokesperson for Sydney University said the institution would not be using Turnitin’s new AI detection feature immediately.
“We aim to avoid making major changes to our systems mid-semester, and without adequate testing or visibility, or time to prepare staff,” they said.
‘We could also end up with a massive tidal wave of referrals coming through from academics that we can’t handle, many that could be false accusations.’
Cath Ellis, Academic integrity expert at the University of NSW
The university said it would be reviewing the feature’s capability to see if it would help markers when assessing if a student’s work was original.
The university is also ramping up face-to-face supervision during oral exams and more pen-and-paper assessments.
Monash University has also decided against using Turnitin’s tool “given the technology is in its infancy”.
Deakin University said claims Turnitin’s tool has a 98 per cent accuracy rate in the detection of AI-generated text have not been verified by the institution, and flagged concerns it had been trained using out-of-date AI text generator models.
“Until the university can test its efficacy, Deakin has chosen not to apply the tool in the marking of student assessments,” said Associate Professor Trish McCluskey, Director, Digital Learning.
“This is to protect student data and is in line with the approach adopted by a growing list of global education providers, and we expect many Australian universities will follow our lead.”
However, UNSW said the feature would be available for academics to consider cautiously, but that staff would not be relying on it in any way.
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My other blogs: Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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