By Julianne Siegfriedt, PhD., Assistant Professor in Sociology and Women & Gender Studies, University of Southern Maine. All views are expressed as her own.
Unions across the country are fighting with school administrators about their rights to post and protest, to stand up for our students, to critique what is going on, and to try to fulfill our roles as educators in society. Should that also be the goal of all school and system administrations?
University administrators, including within the University of Maine System, have vowed to remain “institutionally neutral” about these “political” issues resulting in silence from university administrators.
This academic year, I taught a required sociology course focused on critical thinking and social issues and used the course to explore questions of academic freedom and institutional neutrality with my students.
Students examined different arguments, shared and gathered evidence, and learned how to ask critical questions about institutional neutrality and the role of higher education in society. They also heard guest lectures from USM faculty and the University President, giving them space to ask their own questions and form their own views on institutional neutrality at our university and in higher education.
To do that, students had to first understand what institutional neutrality and academic freedom mean. As we worked through these ideas together, I found myself learning so much from them. Their insights deepened my own understanding of the role we all play as educators, students, staff, and administrators.
Key Lessons
When those in power suppress knowledge and spread disinformation, educators and researchers become a threat for advancing evidence-based truths. Actions such as executive orders expanding surveillance of campus expression, cutting research funding, detaining international students for protected protest, and reviewing library collections exemplify what PEN America describes as “authoritarian control of higher education.”
As the federal government puts pressure on universities to adopt institutional neutrality—the idea that university administrators should avoid taking positions on social and political issues–supporters argue that this approach protects academic freedom by keeping university leaders, including presidents, from speaking on behalf of the entire campus.
After investigating institutional neutrality this semester, most of my students found little evidence to support the idea that institutional neutrality protects academic freedom. Instead, they concluded it can harm vulnerable students by making administrators hesitant to address issues like ICE around campus, trans visibility, and genocide.
Their concern is not abstract. During the Spring Semester, a USM student and several community members were detained by ICE, and an academic conference on Palestine lost its reserved USM event space just one week before it was scheduled.
Academic freedom is defined as the autonomy of academics to study and teach who and what they want as they are accountable to not only their institutions but their disciplines as well. They are free to conduct research, create scholarship, and teach content based on the academic discipline they were trained in.
Institutional neutrality is defined as the expectation for a university administrator/administration to refrain from making statements about “political or social issues” in order to protect academic freedom of those who do not need to remain neutral: faculty and students.
Functions of the university is defined as the creation (research) and dissemination (teaching) of knowledge in a society.
Check out the student arguments from both semesters on our informational website on institutional neutrality
bit.ly/instneutrality
Key Takeaways from Our Discussions:
Through our recent class conversations, several themes emerged.
1. We agree more than I thought we did. The most shocking outcome was how much we agreed that academic freedom is essential to higher education’s core mission. Across political and ideological differences, scholars such as Angela Davis, Audre Lorde, Paolo Friere, and Martin Luther King Jr. have used higher education as a tool for social change. This shows that academic work is rarely neutral but deeply connected to the world around us.
2. Look out for Ambiguities. Unclear language was one of the biggest challenges that students faced. Until we defined terms like “academic freedom” and “institutional neutrality” as a class, there was often misunderstanding and confusion in our discussions.
Academic freedom is not, as many believe, the right to an education. It is the freedom of faculty to reach, research, and share ideas without fear. Students also learned that institutional neutrality does not mean silence across the university. Instead, neutrality applies only to the administrators—not faculty or students—and is meant to protect open teaching and expression.
3. Does institutional neutrality protect academic freedom? Is it possible for an institution to be neutral? Since institutional neutrality is widely accepted in higher education and promoted by the federal government, we expected to find evidence that it protects academic freedom. Yet despite broad agreement on the importance of academic freedom, we discovered less consensus on whether institutional neutrality achieves it.
Instead, students and faculty found little evidence linking institutional neutrality to academic freedom and questioned whether true neutrality is achievable. Pointing to examples from the University of Maine System, including financial investments, influence in public policy, and Chancellor Malloy’s selective response condemning political violence, they argued that institutions often fall short of neutrality. This raises questions about whether neutrality is an attainable or worthwhile goal.
4. Who benefits from institutional neutrality and who is harmed? Legal scholars and higher education advocates warn that this push may curb campus speech, especially on issues of race and gender—and weaken university independence. In fact, students found the strongest evidence of this in political pressure from the federal administration to adopt institutional neutrality or face consequences for noncompliance.
When the government labels issues of identity and humanity as “political” and bars university presidents from making statements on such topics when harm occurs, the result is silence. This silence from those in positions of power can send a chilling message to students whose safety is at risk, especially students of color, immigrant, trans and queer, and disabled students.
5. Unions and the bigger fight. I assumed the tenured and tenure-track faculty would feel more protected in their academic freedom, but I was surprised how often unions came up in discussions. Faculty emphasized to students that unions hold a key role in protecting their academic freedom, especially when it means critiquing the university by safeguarding their time to teach, conduct research, and serve the community. Given USM’s history, including recent cuts to tenured faculty positions, this raises an important question: Why do faculty feel more protected by their unions than by university administration?
When Unions Protect What Institutions Won’t
Unions across the country are defending faculty rights to speak up, protest, support students, and critique institutions–core responsibilities of educators. Shouldn’t these be priorities for all school and university leadership?
Meanwhile, our universities remain silent as trans students face violence and exclusion, immigrant students live in fear, and rising costs of living outpace wages. Supporting the rights of students, staff, and faculty to a safe and welcoming learning environment should be neither problematic nor political. University leadership should stand with all — regardless of identity, status, or beliefs—to ensure they can learn, live, and work on campus without fear.
Looking Ahead
I believe universities and educational institutions should approach their role with a sense of responsibility and accountability. Educators understand the power we hold in our classrooms, and institutions should recognize their responsibility to protect open inquiry rather than retreat behind neutrality.
Academic freedom exists so that knowledge-producers, like myself, can speak without fear of interference or retaliation. Policies built on disinformation are why academic institutions are under pressure. After two semesters of collecting evidence, learning, and having critical conversations with my students, I can’t support institutional neutrality as a means of protecting academic freedom.
As the American Association of University Professors reminds us, “[t]he defense of academic freedom has never been a neutral act.”
We have power in our educational roles, and I believe we should all take responsibility for the authorities we hold.
