Virginia Tech Chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP)

AAUP Members:

The Virginia Tech chapter of the AAUP will gather on Zoom for a discussion of ideas and experiences around academic freedom.  This will be a member’s only gathering and will not be recorded.  

To seed the conversion we ask that you read this editorial from the Washington Post. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2021/06/09/its-time-an-overhaul-academic-freedom/
In addition you’ll be invited to share any experiences you’ve had around the topic, or thoughts about particular aspects of academic freedom that are of concern for you. 

We are slowly coming out from under cover hiding from THE virus. We have a ways to go, and we would like you to join us November 5 for a very relevant Zoom meeting: Tuesday, November 2 from 4:00 – 5:00 pm we will gather on Zoom for the next in our series on Emerging from the Pandemic: Challenges and Lessons Learned with MikeMulhare. Our speaker is Assistant Vice President for emergency management and he is a knowledgeable and compelling presenter. He will speak for ~ 25 minutes, and then we’ll have a 25 minute Q and A. This meeting will be held on Zoom and be open to the entire campus community. Mike will focus on institutional and individual resiliency as we emerge from the pandemic. What have we learned that is useful? What do individual faculty members need to understand about our current circumstances? Don’t miss this informative session. Please publicize to your own department and consider specifically inviting a few colleagues.

The officers and executive committee members of the VT chapter will be dividing the labor a bit differently for the next several months.  We have learned that that job of secretary-treasurer might be best divided into two positions so we can do a better job of communicating with and serving our members.  We will be working on a revision to thechapter’s bylaws and we will bring that to you for discussion and a vote in the spring . . . but in the meantime I write to let you know that Joe Merola (currently an executive committee member) will be handling the communications portion of the work. Please look for emails from him about our activities. Kris Hite will continue to serve as the chapter’s treasurer. 
We hope that this stopgap action will be acceptable to all of you. If you have any concerns, please reach out to Patty Raun.
I hope this shift in duties will make the roles of the officer’s in the VT Chapter more manageable (and perhaps more attractive to any of you that would like to play a larger role in the organization).  Although some of your current officers and committee members may be running again, we will hold elections for all organizational positions in the spring. 
Thanks so much for all you do!

Thurs. Sept. 9 from 5 – 6:30

We had hoped to gather in person next week but because of the Covid rates in the county the Executive Committee has decided to move the meeting online.

Please join us online for community and conversation. We promise to make it joyful, engaging, and informative. Zoom Meeting https://virginiatech.zoom.us/j/842551336953

We are anxious to hear from VT faculty and grad students about your experiences this fall, and will use this time to get to know each other. The Executive Committee will listen to any concerns. 4. VT AAUP members are encouraged to join us and to share the link for this meeting with potential members

Our meeting on 2/11/21 from 4 – 5 pm will be on the subject of Academic Freedom: What it is and what it isn’t. Our guest speaker will be Robert Quinn, Executive Director of Scholars at Risk 

We encourage you to read this article by Mr. Quinn before the meeting https://www.aaup.org/article/fighting-protect—and-define—academic-freedom#.X_jV7S2cbHc. He will speak to the gathered group for 20 minutes or so and then he’ll take questions that will facilitate our future discussions about Academic Freedom at Virginia Tech.

ROBERT QUINN BIO:
Our speaker on Feb. 11, 4 – 5 pm will be Robert Quinn who is the founding Executive Director of the Scholars at Risk Network, an independent not-for-profit corporation based at New York University. Mr. Quinnformerly served as a member of the Council of the Magna Charta Observatory, based in Bologna, Italy; Executive Director of the Institute of International Education’s Scholar Rescue Fund; on the Steering Committee of the Network for Education and Academic Rights (NEAR), based in London, UK; a member of the Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility of the American Association for the Advancement of Science; a member of the Scientific Committee of Pax Academica, an online journal on academic freedom in Africa published by CODESRIA from Dakar, Senegal; a fellow with the Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellows Program in Washington, DC. He received an A.B. cum laude from Princeton in 1988, a J.D. cum laude from Fordham in 1994, and an honorary doctorate from Illinois Wesleyan University in 2010. In 2012, Mr. Quinn and Scholars at Risk received the University of Oslo’s human rights award, the Lisl and Leo Eitinger Prize, for “relentless work to protect the human rights of academics and for having inspired and engaged others to stress the importance of academic freedom.”

The VT AAUP Chapter is hosting an event! An Interactive Conversation: Our Campus Community and Coronavirus

When: 4:30 – 5:30, Wednesday, July 1

Why: The executive committee of the VT AAUP wants to build the community of scholars, researchers, creative artists, and teachers at Virginia Tech. We invite you to share your hopes and concerns, whatever is in your hearts, or on your minds. You’ll meet folks that are not in your discipline and discover perspectives that you may not have considered.

Who: All Virginia Tech faculty or graduate students involved in the education, research, Extension, and service missions of Virginia Tech. This is an open meeting for our community.

How: Please register on EventBrite http://post.spmailtechnol.com/…/RgRgzM9dP0TKaHR0cHM6Ly93d3c… and you will be sent the Zoom information closer to the event.

The VT chapter of the AAUP has recently been refreshed with a new slate of leaders, and we look forward to partnering with faculty and graduate students across Virginia Tech to find ways to support and preserve teaching and research missions of the institution. The new leaders are:

Patty Raun, President, Virginia Tech Chapter of the AAUP
Uwe Tauber, Vice-President
Kristopher Hite, Secretary-Treasurer
Joe Merola, executive committee member
Chad Proudfoot, executive committee member
Richard Shryock, executive committee member

Virginia Tech’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors stands ready to work to support the interests of our constituents and our institution in these challenging times. We act to support AAUP’s mission to “advance academic freedom and shared governance; to define fundamental professional values and standards for higher education; to promote the economic security of faculty, academic professionals, graduate students, post‐doctoral fellows, and all those engaged in teaching and research in higher education; . . . and to ensure higher education’s contribution to the common We will represent faculty and graduate students on matters related to the physical, intellectual, and emotional health and the economic security of our community as the university moves forward in this next unpredictable period. We believe that the value of faculty participation in institutional decision-making has become urgently important given the current and future health and economic impacts of the COVID 19 pandemic on Virginia Tech.

VT AAUP Cross-College Faculty-Deans Dialogue, part II
A conversation between faculty & administrators, featuring Dean Blieszner (Liberal Arts & Human Sciences) and Dean Ross (Engineering)

Wednesday 4 April, 2018
3:00-5:00 pm
220 New Classroom Building

Please join us for a second conversation between faculty and deans. How can faculty best work with deans, so that we are collaborating toward common goals? Shared governance is a core value of the AAUP. To effectively share in governance, faculty need to understand the challenges faced by administrators. Grad students welcome also.

A conversation between faculty & administrators, featuring Deans Winistorfer and Morton. For all faculty & graduate students, all colleges.

Friday 26 January 2018
3:00 – 5:00 pm
Newman Library Multipurpose Room

President Sands has stated many conversations need to take place across the university, as we transition into the implementation phase of the many new initiatives underway.

We wish to open up a dialogue about how faculty can best work with and support deans, so that we are working together toward common goals. We do not mean to overstep department chairs or heads, but we have less opportunity for informal conversations at the deconal level.

Shared governance is a core value of the AAUP, and in order to effectively share in governance, faculty need to understand the challenges faced by administrators.

Next member meeting:

Monday 18 September 2017
5:30-7 pm
Ceritano’s back room

Main order of business: officer elections. Please consider nominating yourself for President, Vice President, Secretary-Treasurer, Executive Committee.