Give Me Liberty, Or . . . forget it
Founded by Michael Farris, a leader in Virginia's home school movement who was the GOP's unsuccessful nominee for lieutenant governor in 2001, Patrick Henry isn't exactly a mainstream institution: it prohibits"PDAs," or physical displays of affection, by students. The school also offers a bizarre, though unusually frank, definition of academic freedom:"the freedom for scholars holding similar worldviews to associate and in so doing to form a community of scholars actively pursuing truth in a collegial and cooperative fashion," since, after all,"Would a politically left-leaning feminist seek to be a contributing member of a community of conservative Thomists? Or vice versa?"
Religious institutions, of course, have no obligation to uphold academic freedom--but it also should be clear that, upon doing so, they aren't really institutions of higher learning.
Previous Cliopatria discussions on academic freedom have featured occasional commentors (Anthony Paul Smith comes to mind) noting that the lack of interllectual diversity at many major college campuses is balanced by the similar lack of intellectual diversity at religious schools. And during the dispositions battle, NCATE's spokesperson noted that the criteria was used by right-leaning religious schools such as BYU and Oral Roberts, who were, presumably, free to use their own politicized version of"social justice" to exclude liberal and moderate Ed students from becoming teachers.
But I'd like to think that the academy as a whole holds itself to higher standards than Patrick Henry College, or BYU. The Post blogger notes,"Even where leftist perspectives seem to have the upper hand [on college campuses], there is at least lip service paid to the idea of being open to and probing any and all views." It would be nice to see mainstream colleges pay more than lip service to the issue.