The President of the University of Houston has decided that state law requires her to ask all faculty to affirm they are not “indoctrinating” students. Here are her letters to the faculty on the subject: first, second. The first letter states that, “Our responsibility is to give them the ability to form their own opinions, not to force a particular one on them. Our guiding principle is to teach them, not to indoctrinate them.” What counts as an “opinion”? One of our responsibilities is to increase their true beliefs about our subject matter. Is that “indoctrination”? I am not sure. This is unconstitutionally vague, and infringes on the First Amendment rights of faculty to academic freedom, including their right to exericise professional judgment about which differing perspectives deserve attention in a class, and which beliefs (“opinions”) are defensible.

Philosopher Christy Mag Uidhir, who flagged this for me, tells me that he has already informed his Dean that he will not complete the mandatory disclosure. I commend that decision. I hope the AFA and FIRE are already on this case, and will send appropriate letters to the University of Houston.