teachers’ competence

Academic Freedom refers to the right of teachers and researchers, particularly in colleges and universities, to investigate their respective fields of knowledge and express their views without fear of restraint or dismissal from office. The right rests on the assumption that open and free inquiry within a teacher’s or researcher’s field of study is essential to the pursuit of knowledge and to the performance of his or her proper educational function. At present this right is observed generally in countries in which education is regarded as a means not only of pouring in established views but also of enlarging the existing body of knowledge. The concept of academic freedom implies also that a teacher’s employment depends primarily on the competence of teachers in their fields rather than on irrelevant considerations such as political or religious beliefs or attachments.
    The concept and practice of academic freedom, as recognized presently in Western civilization, date roughly from the 17th century. Before the 17th century, intellectual activities at universities were restricted largely by theological considerations, and opinions or conclusions that conflicted with religious doctrines were likely to be condemned as heretical. In the late 17th century the work of such men as the English philosophers John Locke and Thomas Hobbes helped pave the way for academic freedom in the modern sense. Their writings demonstrated the need for unlimited inquiry in the sciences and for a general approach to learning unrestrained by preconceptions of any kind. In the 18th and 19th centuries, universities in Western Europe and the United States enjoyed increasing academic freedom as acceptance of the experimental methods of the sciences became more widespread and as control of institutions by religious denominations became less rigorous. In Britain, however, religious tests for graduation, fellowships, and teaching positions were not abolished until the late 19th century.
    During the second half of the 20th century academic freedom was recognized broadly in most Western countries. However, violations of the right increased as dictatorship emerged in various countries, notably in Germany, Italy, and Russia. Educators in Italy were forced to pledge support to the Fascist regime. Similar restrictions, including the teaching of racist theories in some fields, were enforced in German universities under National Socialism.
    Violations of academic freedom also occurred in the United States in the 20th century. A notable example was the Scopes trial, held in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925. A high school teacher was accused and convicted of violating a state law that forbade the teaching of the theory of evolution in the public schools. This legislation was abolished in 1967.
    In the early 1950s, largely because of congressional investigations of communism in the U. S. , many institutions of higher learning adopted regulations requiring loyalty oaths from university teachers. Some of these oaths, insofar as they were required only of teachers, were declared unconstitutional in some state courts. All professional associations of teachers and administrators, including the National Education Association, the American Association of Colleges, and the American Association of University Professors, are opposed to special loyalty oaths and to all violations of academic freedom.
    The 1960s and early 1970s were marked by protest and violence on college campuses o-ver United States involvement in the war in Vietnam. In some places professors were dismissed or arrested for protesting American participation in the war. This turmoil reached a tragic climax in 1970 with the killing of several students during campus demonstrations. In the long run, however, these disturbances led to a broad recognition of the legitimate concerns of students about the quality of higher education, and of the responsibility of universities, rather than the public or the government, to maintain essential academic order.
    By 1973, when U. S. troops were withdrawn from Vietnam, a general growth in higher education was under way. Significant increase in enrollments and expansion of faculties, as well as a broadening of the makeup of both student and faculty populations, contributed to a vast enrichment of the academic curriculum, to increasing faculty control over the content of programs, and, overall, to the enhancement of the freedom to teach and to learn in colleges and universities.
    Beginning in the early 1970s in the United States (and somewhat later in other countries such as Canada and the United Kingdom), however, institutions of higher education were faced with serious financial problems which also harmed academic freedom. For example, the rise in irregular faculty appointments, intended to save money, created a virtual underclass of teachers lacking the employment security generally considered necessary for the exercise of academic freedom.
    Threats to and violations of academic freedom continued in the 1980s. The U. S. government, in the name of national security, imposed severe restraints on the publication of research results. The influence of resurgent religious conservatism was felt in some areas in effort to introduce religious teachings in elementary and secondary schools, and in limits on free expression at church-affiliated colleges and universities.