Prop. 30 and classroom politics
Yesterday evening the provost’s office at my university sent the below email to all faculty. It’s about classroom advocacy and California’s Proposition 30, which if approved by voters on November 6 would raise taxes to fund public education, and if defeated would result in a $250 million cut to both the CSU and UC systems.
Dear Faculty Members,
The California State University Chancellor’s Office has asked Provosts to remind faculty that class time and classroom spaces should not be used for inappropriate political advocacy. Please bear in mind that under Cal. Gov. Code Section 8314, it is unlawful for any state employee to use or permit others to use state resources for a campaign activity. This includes making presentations about Proposition 30 unless a discussion of Proposition 30 is relevant to the regular course material. If you have any concerns about whether a discussion of Proposition 30 is relevant, please consult with your Dean before making any such presentation in class. This reminder from the Chancellor’s Office is consistent with the Faculty Rights and Responsibilities policy that was recently adopted by the Faculty Senate, particularly the policy entitled Faculty Responsibilities to Students in the Instructional Environment.
Thank you for your cooperation.
Charles W. Gossett, Ph.D.
Interim Provost & Vice President for Academic Affairs
California State University, Sacramento
Although this email doesn’t specify which kinds of advocacy are “inappropriate,” the author presumably disagrees with those who argue that faculty can use political advocacy in the classroom to promote the university’s intellectual goals. As long as faculty aren’t dogmatic, don’t stray too often from the course topic, and don’t pressure students to agree, political advocacy in the classroom can challenge assumptions and stimulate lively inquiry. If they proceed with care, and if their primary purpose remains intellectual rather than narrowly political, faculty can defend a political position and still inspire trust that they will grade everyone fairly regardless of their political beliefs.
Given how fragile such trust can be, I’ve tended to avoid political advocacy in the classroom. That’s easy when our topic is not overtly political, but it becomes more difficult when people disagree about whether a question is political in the first place. Is it political advocacy to say that anthropogenic climate change is occurring or that Mitt Romney’s economic plan doesn’t add up? For some it is, for others it’s not.
Whether or not students discern my political views (and if they read this blog I guess they will), it usually seems best to not argue my position in class, especially on questions that lie outside my expertise. And if I do argue my position, I try to argue the other side as well. I’m responsible for grading the students’ work, and even if — especially if — I were to have only one conservative student in a class full of liberals, or vice versa, that person would deserve every reassurance that I won’t penalize them for their political views.
But that doesn’t prevent me from introducing and moderating lively discussion of political issues. What we discuss is less important than how we discuss it. As long as classroom discussion gives a fair hearing to all reasonable perspectives, and as long as it serves the overall purpose of analysis and understanding, then lively debate is one of the best educational tools we have.
I checked the section of the California Code mentioned in the email we received yesterday, and it turns out that it doesn’t even refer to political advocacy. It states,
It is unlawful for any elected state or local officer, including any state or local appointee, employee, or consultant, to use or permit others to use public resources for a campaign activity, or personal or other purposes which are not authorized by law. (emphasis added)
The text goes on to define “campaign activity” as “an activity constituting a contribution as defined in Section 82015 or an expenditure as defined in Section 82025.” Those sections discuss financial payments and payments-in-kind, not political advocacy.
As a matter of fact, a few lines later in the same section, the California Code contradicts the provost’s statement that it would be unlawful for faculty to use state resources for “making presentations about Proposition 30” (as opposed to presentations in favor of Prop. 30; and this section of the Code does not say that such presentations would need to be “relevant to the regular course material”):
(d) Nothing in this section shall prohibit the use of public resources for providing information to the public about the possible effects of any bond issue or other ballot measure on state activities, operations, or policies, provided that (1) the informational activities are otherwise authorized by the constitution or laws of this state, and (2) the information provided constitutes a fair and impartial presentation of relevant facts to aid the electorate in reaching an informed judgment regarding the bond issue or ballot measure.
The policy on Faculty Responsibilities to Students in the Instructional Environment also doesn’t ban classroom political discussion. It quotes the AAUP “Statement on Freedom and Responsibility”:
it is improper for an instructor persistently to intrude material that has no relation to the subject, or to fail to present the subject matter of the course as announced to the students and as approved by the faculty in their collective responsibility for the curriculum. (emphasis added)
This says only that faculty may not “persistently” introduce off-topic material, not that they may never do so.
The policy goes on to specify a series of thoughtful guidelines for ensuring a fair instructional environment. The only guideline that may seem to impinge on classroom political discussion states:
h. Faculty will provide thoughtfully prepared and delivered curricula that are purposefully related to the stated objectives of the course in question, consonant with the description in the University catalog.
This statement also doesn’t prohibit brief and occasional discussion of political issues, regardless of the topic of the course.
Moreover, given that Prop. 30 will strongly affect the learning environment on campus, it’s arguably “related” to nearly any course. As the AAUP report on “Freedom in the Classroom” explains, “Whether material is relevant to a better understanding of a subject cannot be determined merely by looking at a course description.” Even the most esoteric sciences are not entirely isolated from society. Discussing Prop. 30 in a biology class, for example, would allow students to consider how changes in science funding are shaping research in their field.
I don’t think university faculty violate any of their professional obligations by introducing Prop. 30 as a topic of brief, fair, and open discussion in their classes.
But I could be mistaken. Maybe I’ll discuss the matter in class today with my students.
Whose University? 
Thanks for clearly expressing what many of the faculty are probably feeling right now. I had come to the same conclusion after reading our faculty responsibilites. I rarely bring informational topics like this to my classes, but felt that Prop 30 was relevant to all students, all classes, and all teachers, as well as to the professions toward which our students are heading. I had noticed the term “persistently to to intrude” in our responsibilities document, and felt just fine with a simple comment/discussion letting students know that there are issues on the ballot that they should learn and that have a direct effect on them. Thanks for the links to the California Code. A bit of a stretch to use that code to prohibit discussion.
I quite like how you set the record straight. The question this raises is what prompted the Provost to send out the email in the first place? It seems to me there are two possibilities:
1. He genuinely believed that raising Prop. 30 for discussion in class was somehow a violation the California Code and the Faculty Senate policies he cited. If that was his motivation, it further begs the question whether he thinks such an interpretation is in line with the principles of academic freedom and free speech generally.
2. Or, he fears some sort of backlash that would result if faculty did discuss Prop. 30 and doing so offended one side or the other. If this is the case, he was willfully misinterpreting the code and policy to bolster his effort to engage in administrative bullying. Who is he afraid of?
Either way, this is a fine example of why tenure is enormously important. Faculty without tenure, of which there are increasingly more as a percentage of the academic workforce (heck, my institution has exactly 0 tenured faculty), are for obvious reasons less likely to directly contradict the administration.
I am in complete agreement with Mark on this one. I very much appreciate that he went to the actual California codes so as to help clarify the legal issues concerning political advocacy. While initially I had some concerns about such advocacy in certain disciplines (for example, chemistry and mathematics), it is pretty clear after reading Mark’s discussion that classroom advocacy would be appropriate even there. Mark has even gone into the ethical issues that do not appear to be required by code such as presenting a fair and balanced discussion of issues.
As an aside, haven’t the faculty received a number of emails from Pres. Gonzalez that might be interpreted as political advocacy with regard to Proposition 30. Perhaps, the Provost should report the president to relevant authorities for possible prosecution. In fact, I would advise him to do just that.
It is interesting that proposition 30 was singled out where I would think the more controversial proposition with regard to advocacy at the University would be proposition 32. Where the effects on students and academic life of proposition 30 are immediate and direct, the effects of proposition 32 are far less direct and obvious. I would think that advocacy with regard to this proposition might be viewed as more controversial, even though Mark’s post has persuaded me that this sort of controversial advocacy should be permitted as well.
I can’t imagine how advocating for Prop. 30 to a classroom full of students could in anyway be ethical. It is one thing to bring up the issue of Prop. 30 in a fair and impartial way in a course for which the topic is relevant to the curriculum. It is an entirely different thing to urge students to vote in favor of the proposition. It not only would be an abuse of the instructor’s authority, but it would be a conflict of interest given that if Prop. 30 does not pass, the instructor would likely have to pay more for benefits and may have a salary decrease (or even lose his/her job, if we are to believe CFA).
Thanks for the comment. Good point on faculty conflict of interest, which faculty should acknowledge if they bring up Prop. 30. I agree that in the classroom faculty shouldn’t urge students to vote a certain way, but I think a professor could advocate a position on Prop. 30 and then turn around and advocate the other side and/or encourage students to do so, thereby ensuring that advocacy serves the purpose of open discussion. In that context, does it really matter whether students know where the professor stands on the issue? After all, students know that faculty expertise can’t provide answers to basic moral-political questions like whether to raise taxes (or if they don’t, we should tell them), so there’s little risk of us somehow indoctrinating them. The abuse of authority would occur if a professor were to evaluate students based on whether they express acceptance with the professor’s position.
My understanding is that, if proposition 30 does not pass, students will be presented with a 5% increase in their tuition starting Spring 2013, fewer classes to take and a more difficult road to graduation. In his previous post on the subject, Mark also brought up the point about the effect of not passing the proposition on the university as a whole and the opportunities it provides in all academic departments.
It is hard to see how understanding this information would not be relevant to students in any course that they enroll. While I agree that it would be inappropriate for a professor to tell the students to go out and vote for proposition 30, to inform them of the facts and the impact on their lives is essential information that students ought to know. In this particular case, the facts and advocacy are identical.