Liberal Bias in Education: Campus, Classroom & College

This article discusses the many studies purporting a liberal bias in academia and specifically addresses the AFT study which seeks to refute this notion. Robinson declares that the AFT study spends an overt amount of time nit-picking the studies that acknowledge the presence of liberal bias in academia. Interestingly enough, the AFT survey apparently offers the...

In a response to an accusation that conservative think tanks like Cato are biased, Andrew Coulson points out the fact that there are many other academic institutions that often reflect an extremely liberal bias. Coulson notes that the information produced by these liberal academic institutions is often accepted as fact without question, while the information...

In reporting on the emergence of a study claiming extreme liberal bias in academia, Cathy Young declares that the "lack of intellectual diversity endangers the very purpose of the academy." According to Young, liberals acknowledge that they are the prevalent force in academia, but attribute this fact to ideas such as their own superiority in intellectual open-...

In Hassett’s eyes, the recent event of "Climategate" simply reveals the longstanding, but overwhelmingly unbalanced nature of academia. The author backs up this claim by citing several surveys, which find that some universities have more professors who hold to the principles of Marxism than to conservatism. Hassett gives several suggestions for reform in this area...

Stanley Fish, dean of the University of Illinois at Chicago, declares that college professors should only advocate truth and solid academic values in their classrooms. According to Fish, political grandstanding is out of place and unprofessional in the university setting, and as such, should be contained to personal ventures outside of the workplace.

"Law schools hire more openly liberal professors than openly conservative ones, but the plum jobs at the most prestigious schools don't appear to be going solely to the liberals. That's the conclusion reached by researchers from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law who analyzed the ideology of recently hired law professors. Their study, 'Ideological...

This article reports on the HERI study entitled, "The American College Teacher: National Norms for 2001-2002." One of the major findings in this report confirms the liberal bias amongst college professors, and particularly notes that female professors tend toward liberalism more than men.

"The old arguments about why there are so few conservative college professors got a new twist recently. Neil Gross, professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia and Ethan Fosse, a doctoral student at Harvard, argued in a paper (available on Professor Gross' website) that the key reason why few conservatives go into the teaching profession is...

The above chart shows the personal views of college professors on certain ideological issues. "As Table 3 demonstrates, they [professors] fill out the self-designations with a substantive portrait of the attitudes of American college faculty on a range of social and political controversies. The differences in attitudes are located not in the extent of agreement so...

This study seeks to discover whether or not student perceptions of a professor’s political views influence the evaluation ratings a professor receives. The authors claim that there is a direct correlation between these two things, and because both students and professors tend to be on the liberal end of the political spectrum, the authors opine that liberal professors often receive more...

Like many other researchers studying this issue, Tobin and Weinberg come to the conclusion that liberal ideologies amongst college faculty are far more prevalent than conservative ones. This finding causes the authors to express concern for the well-being of American universities; a lack of diverse viewpoints and ideologies on college campuses will inevitably...

This report provides a detailed breakdown of college students and their views regarding political inferences in the classroom. As with other studies of its kind, this report demonstrates that there are a higher percentage of liberal students and liberal ideologies on university campuses. Many students also state that their professors make demeaning comments about...

This report acknowledges that the campus exchange of ideas has been heavily weighted toward one side of the political spectrum, and as such, this study suggests a variety of ways in which to change this bias. The ACTA suggests that college leaders would be wise to institute "intellectual diversity," for without the free exchange of a variety of viewpoints and ideas...

Among other things, this report find that "Being a college professor alters one’s worldview on propositions involving education, economics, religion, and America. If two people share the same basic characteristics, the one who has taught at the college level is more likely to agree that:

• America corrupts otherwise good people;
• The Ten Commandments are irrelevant...

"Ms. MacDonald and Ms. Satel discussed their recent books about the real-world consequences of what they term bad ideas. Ms. MacDonald is the author of The Burden of Bad Ideas: How Modern Intellectuals Misshape Our Society, published by Ivan R. Dee. In her book and talk, she criticizes so-called cultural elites for advocating ideas that undermine the importance of...

"Speeches include 'British Higher Education under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher,' 'The State of Higher Education & How to Reform It,' 'Founding New Institutions of Higher Learning,' 'From Public Policy to Public Philosophy - Do Ideas Still have Consequences?'"

The Academic Bill of Rights seeks to promote the basic rights of students and faculty to operate in a climate that encourages free speech and a diversity of ideas. It strongly opposes those who use the university setting to stifle debate and individuals with ideas contrary to the norm. According to the...

This piece of proposed legislation seeks to protect students and faculty members from other students and professors who seek to belittle minority religious or political viewpoints. This bill provides for the fair distribution of student fees, seeks to encourage professors to give equal time to a wide variety of intellectual ideas, and condemns the dismissal of...

"A careful, piercing analysis of recent protests by minority groups, feminists, and gays on our nation's campuses--and of the startling effects these have had on admissions, curricula, and student life. According to D'Souza… --a former White House domestic policy analyst and currently a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute--a 'victim's revolution...

"Against the backdrop of today's increasingly multicultural society, are America's elite colleges admitting and successfully educating a diverse student body? No Longer Separate, Not Yet Equal pulls back the curtain on the selective college experience and takes a rigorous and comprehensive look at how race and social class impact each stage--from application and...

"For anyone who has wondered about the declining quality of American education, here is a fiercely argued, often infuriating, book that goes to the heart of the modern university's problem: the professors. He charges that teaching has become a lucrative racket, where persistent corruption runs rampant."

"The Politically Correct University shows how the universities' quest for 'diversity' has produced in too many departments a stifling uniformity of thought. Required reading for those who want American universities to eschew political correctness." — Michael Barone, American Enterprise Institute

"The mission of FIRE is to defend and sustain individual rights at America's colleges and universities. These rights include freedom of speech, legal equality, due process, religious liberty, and sanctity of conscience — the essential qualities of individual liberty and dignity. FIRE's core mission is to protect the...