FAQs on Academic Freedom
and Freedom of Speech
for Rutgers-New Brunswick
Faculty and Staff

Academic freedom is the right of faculty, when engaged in teaching or research within their academic discipline, to express their ideas and challenge the ideas of others without concerns about retribution. It also serves as the basis for faculty input in institutional governance and derives from shared professional expertise and training.

• Freedom of research and publication. Faculty enjoy freedom in the topics they pursue in their research and creative scholarship and in disseminating their results, within the standards of accountability established by their profession and individual disciplines. This freedom follows from the basic commitment of faculty to advance knowledge and understanding.
• Freedom of teaching. Faculty must be able to disseminate the results of their research and the research of others in their profession. Instruction may occur in an atmosphere of controversy so long as what is taught remains, in a broad sense, educationally relevant, and assists students in mastering or appreciating the significance of the subject.
• Freedom of internal criticism. Because of their education and institutional knowledge, faculty play a role as participants in university decision-making. By virtue of this role, generally, faculty are entitled to comment on University policies or decisions, either individually or through institutions of faculty governance.
• Freedom to participate in public debate. Both within and beyond their areas of professional expertise, generally, faculty are entitled to participate as citizens in public forums and debates without fear of institutional discipline or restraint, so long as it is clear that they are not acting on behalf of or speaking for the University and so long as it is within the bounds of the law.

Yes. University Policy 60.5.1 sets forth the commitment to academic freedom and provides the Statement of Professional Ethics adopted by the American Association of University Professors.

The American Association of University Professors defines academic freedom in teaching as including “the right of the faculty to select the materials, determine the approach to the subject, make the assignments, and assess student academic performance in teaching activities for which faculty members are individually responsible.”

There are, however, limits to what is considered academic freedom in teaching.  Class discussions and materials must be educationally relevant to the subject matter of the course.  According to the American Association of University Professors, “Faculty members are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matters which are unrelated to their subject, or to persistently introduce material which has no relation to the subject. This doesn’t mean teachers should avoid all controversial materials. As long as the material stimulates debate and learning that is germane to the subject matter, it is protected by freedom in the classroom.”

The American Association of University Professors provides FAQs on academic freedom. See also the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure with 1970 Interpretive Comments, Association of American University Professors Policy Documents and Reports, 1995.

The First Amendment guarantees the rights of free expression. All members of the Rutgers community enjoy these rights. Speech is a broad term: it encompasses, for example, the spoken word, the written word, visual arts, music, drama, dance and forms of symbolic expression. As long as such speech is within the bounds of the law, it is protected from government and university interference.

Categories of speech excluded from protection by the Supreme Court include, among others, defamation, invasion of privacy, fraudulent misrepresentation, obscenity, advocacy of imminent lawless behavior and fighting words, as well as speech that disrupts university operations or creates a hostile environment.

According to the American Association of University Professors, “free speech is not a good model for understanding academic freedom because

• The First Amendment is premised on an “equality of status in the field of ideas.” All expressions are given equal protection under the law.
• Academic knowledge is premised on an inequality of status between differing ideas. Faculty members routinely reject certain ideas as lesser than others, and train their students to do the same. Without this process of designating certain ideas as less worthy than others, knowledge would not progress.
• Academic freedom does not protect some speech that may be protected by the First Amendment—for example, that which manifests disciplinary incompetence.
• First Amendment rights are focused on the individual.
• Academic freedom rights are regulated by the collective--peers determine what constitutes disciplinary competence.”

Creating a safe and inclusive learning environment requires planning ahead for difficult discussions.  Even before a course begins, the instructor should set the tone for a welcoming course environment through the design of the course syllabus, course site, and initial messaging to students. Instructors should also establish norms of behavior for class discussions to foster respectful dialogue and student engagement.

The Institute for Teaching, Innovation, and Inclusive Pedagogy (TIIP) has prepared a digital resource to support instructors in these efforts – Preparing for the Upcoming Semester: Fostering Inclusive Learning Environments.

Policy 80.1.6 Communications and Relations with the News Media outlines the rules governing faculty interactions with news media. When communicating with members of the media on behalf of the University, faculty and staff should follow the guidelines provided by University Communications and Marketing.

Faculty and staff are free to speak to the media as part of their scholarly duties or as private citizens; they should, however, make clear when they are speaking as individuals and not as representatives of the University. As the policy states, “Nothing in this policy is intended to affect the responsibilities of faculty members for their scholarly activities and personal involvement in community activities, nor is it intended to affect individual employees’ rights to express personal views about the University or non-University issues as long as they make it clear that they do so as individuals and do not represent the official position of the University either directly or indirectly.”