Ind. May Reject Degrees That Don’t Commit to American “Values”

Indiana may reject proposed degree programs at public institutions that don’t “cultivate civic responsibility and commitment to the core values of American society.” Earlier this month, the Indiana Commission for Higher Education introduced a question on “civic responsibility and commitment” in its new degree proposal form, Indiana Public Media reported Friday.

Prominent faculty leaders told Inside Higher Ed they weren’t consulted about the change, which they denounced as a curtailment of academic freedom and an echo of President Trump’s proposed Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education.

The commission confirmed in an email to Inside Higher Ed on Monday that it made the changes. The civics-related question “will be required for all forthcoming academic program approvals and reviews,” communications director Emily Price said.

The document gives one example of how to answer the question, saying institutions can explain how the program’s curriculum would “emphasize civic engagement and the duties of citizenship in a free society.” Beyond that, it doesn’t further explain what “civic responsibility” or American “core values” mean.

Heather Akou, president-elect of the Indiana University at Bloomington Faculty Council, said faculty became aware of the change Friday after a dean said in a meeting that proposed programs must demonstrate commitment to American values. “This obviously raised some alarm bells,” she said.

The governor-appointed commission claims it wants faculty to educate students about civic engagement, Akou said, yet “this provision was added in a rather undemocratic way.” She called the “requirement” to demonstrate “commitment to the core values of American society” a “racist and xenophobic dog whistle,” and questioned how she, a fashion design professor, would be expected to meet the criterion if her program were being newly proposed.

“Only politicians could think it’s a good idea that everyone at a university should teach some version of political science,” she said. “We do actually teach a lot of other things.”

Noor O’Neill, president of the Indiana Conference of the American Association of University Professors, said “it’s a shock. We are dismayed.”

“This is yet another rollback of academic freedom and shared governance,” O’Neill said. “It’s not the place of a state—it’s not the place of politicians—to tell faculty such things, and it opens a door for political reprisal, for other ways to limit academic freedom.”