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The Professors? What about the Students?
By Kevin Montgomery, in the Brandeis Hoot (April 7, 2006)
In an editorial published recently in the Brandeis Hoot, Kevin Montgomery brings a new perspective to the debate about “intellectual diversity” in the classroom. Montgomery, an undergraduate at Brandeis University, notes that attacks on the academy from the right have frequently targeted professors in major programs such as peace studies, women’s studies, and African American studies. While these fields can be “overtly political,” he argues, this does not mean that higher education is indoctrinating students.
What conservative commentators like David Horowitz fail to take into account, Montgomery suggests, are students themselves. Programs such as African American studies exist not because of leftist professors but because students demand them, Montgomery says. “Everything regarding college is a choice,” he writes. “We choose to go to college. We pick our major, our classes, our advisers, and even our professors.” Students choose traditionally “conservative” majors like business and economics as well “liberal” majors like peace studies. Yet Horowitz does not call for bringing more liberal professors into conservative fields, Montgomery says: “On the contrary, all Horowitz wants is to stifle the choices afforded to students who want to pursue the study of the liberal arts.”
The full text of Kevin Montgomery’s editorial is available online. AAC&U recently released a Statement on Academic Freedom and Educational Responsibility appropriate for both faculty and student dialogues on this topic.
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