On Feb 23, @aaup.org hosts a conversation about activism and academic freedom, inspired by legacy of Chandler Davis (fired after upholding his 1A rights). Featuring Isaac Kamola, Henry Reichman, Marjorie Heins + Melanie Tanielian #academicfreedom @isaackamola.bsky.social @hankreichman.bsky.social

Union membership is on the rise — and our ranks in AAUP are growing as part of this trend. Organizers across sectors and in higher ed are building the infrastructure to accomplish major wins in the future. See below for more on 2025 as a banner year for membership growth in the AAUP:

NEW: AAUP President Todd Wolfson & council member Chenjerai Kumanyika sat down with the hosts of the excellent Citations Needed podcast to discuss the acceleration of Trump's assaults on American higher education & how the AAUP is fighting back. Check it out here:

"Let's be clear, the strain on higher education is not a failure of our students or our faculty and staff. It is a result of policy choices." "Connecticut has the resources to do better. What we need is the political will." -- Valerie Duffy, president of @uconnaaup.bsky.social

"given...the Trump administration’s efforts to use allegations of antisemitism to discipline, defund, and attack academic institutions, we should assume that the proposed task force could only serve as a welcome mat to MAGA politicians to target Connecticut schools" -- Isaac Kamola, @aaup.org

"Our newly launched academic freedom campaign will create opportunities for faculty from every rank and every corner of the university to share their experiences of why academic freedom matters" -- Daniel HoSang @yaleaaup.bsky.social

The Wesleyan Argus reports on a Middletown ICE protest and rally organized by a coalition of student advocacy groups called “ICE Out" alongside other Middletown, student, and faculty groups including Wesleyan University's AAUP chapter @wesleyanaaup.bsky.social

Dr. Hank Reichman, former chair of AAUP's Committee on Academic Freedom and Tenure, emphasizes that the struggle to protect academic freedom and the rights of faculty is part of a larger struggle to defend the rights for everybody in a democratic society.

@biblioracle.bsky.social has a great interview with @mattseybold.bsky.social on techno-feudalism, mass surveillance, Ed Tech, and what this means for academic freedom, and higher ED more generally. A chilling read. @aaup.org academicfreedomontheline.substack.com/p/the-techno...

Our new #Academe issue highlights articles on organizing efforts in academic labor, artificial intelligence, and contingency and graduate student labor, as well as several book reviews and a profile of the AAUP’s University of Scranton Faculty Affiars Council. Check out the issue below⬇️

New in Academe: "How Academic Workers Have Reenergized the Labor Movement" by Gary Rhoades: www.aaup.org/issue/winter...

Congratulations to the newly formed AAUP chapter at Williams College! “An overwhelming number of faculty decided that it would behoove us to have more independent organization & to try to stand up for faculty governance, for having our voice heard in the governance of this institution."

Struggling with #HigherEd costs? Affiliated #union members and families have access to exclusive nat'l & state #scholarship grants: aftct.org/scholarships #StrengthInUnity @aft.org @aftteach.bsky.social @afthighered.bsky.social @psrp-aft.bsky.social @afthealthcare.bsky.social @aaup.org

"In a moment of intensifying attacks on higher education...we all want to believe that Yale’s historical commitments are sufficient... They are not." David P. Watts & Tarren Andrews on strengthening academic freedom and faculty governance in the Faculty Handbook. @yaleaaup.bsky.social

We’re educating Connecticut’s workforce, we’re educating Connecticut’s leaders and we want to make sure that education is affordable.” @csuaaup.bsky.social's Jessica Schofield on AAUP priorities for the new CT legislation session

want to get involved in state-level AAUP work? RUN FOR OFFICER of the CT State Conference AAUP! nominations & self-noms due March 14 more info: ctsc-aaup.org/2026-28-ct-s... @aftct.bsky.social @csuaaup.bsky.social @uconnaaup.bsky.social @wesleyanaaup.bsky.social @yaleaaup.bsky.social

Excited about the launch of the @alliancehighered.bsky.social to defend higher education as a sector. To protect academic freedom, institutional autonomy, and a higher education that is inclusive of all. @aaup.org @michaelhgavin.bsky.social

Thanks to @isaackamola.bsky.social for this generous endorsement of In the Spirit of H. Chandler Davis. Released today! Available everywhere. To order > disobediencepress.com

Care about Academic Freedom in Connecticut? Join us! We will hear from experts from Connecticut on what academic freedom is, why it is so important, and how we can take action in Connecticut. Register here: aftct-org.zoom.us/meeting/regi... @aaup.org @aftct.bsky.social

Excellent explanation of why you should care about the effort to undermine independent accreditation, from our colleagues at @higheredlabor.bsky.social higheredlaborunited.org/2026/01/26/a...

This is a huge win for higher ed! Unfortunately, many institutions complied in advance and already folded many of their DEI efforts. This is an example of why it’s so important to resist until there is no other option. Most of the programs that were terminated won’t be resurrected. What a loss.

Education is a public good for all. When politicians censor classroom teaching in order to narrow the field of topics that students can engage in, they rob them of a stellar world class education. This is what is happening at Texas A&M & other institutions in the state. 🧵

“There is a deep sense of sadness that this university is going down this path…Whether the regents understand this or not, it’s going to have a devastating effect.” Texas A&M Ends Women’s Studies and Overhauls Classes Over Race and Gender www.nytimes.com/2026/01/30/u...

"Yale has more resources than 99% of institutions in higher education" Daniel Martinez HoSang of @yaleaaup.bsky.social on how cuts to Yale's Ph.D. programs threaten critical university research

"if the university is asking instructors and professors to teach the same way in the classroom with fewer resources and with less support, they're living in a fantasy world." Jeremy Pressman, UConn-AAUP @uconnaaup.bsky.social

“finding ways to outsource teaching to machines" -- at Old Dominion University, faculty say they are being told to use AI to compress 16-week courses into eight-week online courses for the 2026 fall semester. Where is academic freedom?

Do Teachers Have Free Speech? CT Panel Grapples With The Issue At Education Summit

call out to the Palestinian Solidarity Working Group of the CSU-AAUP @csuaaup.bsky.social -- one of a growing number of Palestinian solidarity groups in Connecticut

"If you have a business person saying, 'No, I’d prefer that you not teach that version of American history, but I prefer that you teach the one that I like,' you’re going to get teaching that is nothing short of ideology" -- @isaackamola.bsky.social on ‘intellectual freedom centers’

Ready to scale up your defense of #AcademicFreedom? Join us for a workshop on securing vital legislative protections for #HigherEd faculty & staff: aftct.org/event/higher... #StrengthInUnity #StrengthInUnity @aft.org @afthighered.bsky.social @afthealthcare.bsky.social @aaup.org @ct-aaup.bsky.social

"How effective is protesting? According to historians and political scientists: very" Check out this take on what protesting can accomplish, featuring @uconnaaup.bsky.social AAUP member Jeremy Pressman

Check out this report documenting censorship in higher education in the US. It chronicles record-breaking numbers of state bills that directly or indirectly censor classroom speech and an unprecedented federal campaign to exert ideological control over research, teaching, and campus life.

I'm really proud of this academic freedom syllabus language that the @aaup.org CDAF fellows developed. Having language like this opens up an opportunity to talk with your students about what academic freedom is (and is not). If you add it to your syllabus this semester let me know how it goes!

The scale and speed of state censorship of campus really is amazing. More than half of America's college students attend institutions in states that have passed laws censoring higher education since 2021. From @penamerica.bsky.social pen.org/report/ameri...

“It seems to me that we now have the ideological arm of the Trump admin giving out money to support the production of knowledge in ways that they approve of. In a way, the NEH has become a parallel institution to the Koch Foundation.” — Joan Scott, AAUP Committee on Academic Freedom & Tenure

Don't miss out: join your fellow AAUP members to learn essential organizing skills that will strengthen your chapter in our Core Skills Training for the spring, a program part of our Organize Every Campus initiative. Details for registering at link below 👇

This garbage bill would: --remove research from the review of non-STEM faculty, making tenure decisions based exclusively on teaching --require a 3-3 teaching load --prioritize “American Constitutionalism and Western Civilization” --give politicians and political appointees oversight of research

Happening now: #union members join ‪ @blumenthal.senate.gov to denounce fed @dol.gov's move to deprofessionalize RN degree programs, escalate #StudentDebt crisis. #CodeREDCT @aft.org @afthealthcare.bsky.social @afthighered.bsky.social @aaup.org @seiu.org @democrats.senate.gov‬

AAUP is livestreaming the rally and press conference against extreme austerity measures and the proposed termination of 40% of full-time faculty at The New School right now. Watch here: www.youtube.com/live/iT2HhjU...

“I think it’s even more important for UConn to be a place of free exchange of ideas, to live up to its ideal as a higher education institution” -- Chen Chen (UConn AAUP) @uconnaaup.bsky.social

"Many faculty feel kind of in the dark about these processes" --Daniel Martinez HoSang (President of Yale AAUP), calling for more participation from faculty, students, and staff in budget priorities, as Yale considers potential layoffs @yaleaaup.bsky.social

The AAUP Ad Hoc committee on AI and Academic Professions & colleagues will discuss ongoing strategy building in the movement for tech justice and freedom from surveillance. We also want to hear from you – what you are thinking about, your needs & how you engage with the topic of AI in education.

AI is not inevitable: A conversation with educators, unions, and the Collaborative Research Center for Resilience! Join your colleagues from across pre-K-12 and higher ed for a webinar on exercising worker power in the age of AI. December 11, 4-5 p.m. ET on Zoom Link to register below👇

Hey UConn, protect academic freedom now! @aaup.org #adminsofragile

"At the end of the day, defending academic freedom is defending democracy. UConn must be a marketplace of ideas, not a walled garden for the ivory tower." @uconnaaup.bsky.social

Curtailment of faculty authority in governing higher education institutions today will not only undermine professional freedoms--it will spoil the fruits of those freedoms: an independent, intellectually rigorous, and incorruptible education for future generations -- Afshan Jafar (Conn AAUP)

"An important lesson we can draw from the new report is that our failure in higher education to defend, without giving any ground, pro-Palestinian speech has proven to be not just costly, but nothing less than an existential threat." Dan Segal on the AAUP-MESA Report. wp.me/p8xr4h-dit