As the Trump administration seeks to pressure universities such as Columbia and Harvard to abandon DEI and “woke” ideologies, the faculty of Furman University have laid down a line they will not cross.
An April 23 statement from Furman’s Faculty Council is titled, “The Lines Furman Must Not Cross.”
Richard Furman
Founded in 1826, Furman University, located in Greenville, S.C., is the oldest private university in South Carolina and among the 75 oldest institutions of higher education in operation nationally. The university is named for Richard Furman, among the most important Baptist clergyman during the early decades of the new nation and an influential advocate of educational institutions throughout the country.
In 1990, Furman’s board of trustees began a process that separated the school from control of the South Carolina Baptist Convention. Today, the university is governed by an autonomous board, but its roots remain in the Baptist tradition.
Despite the state Baptist convention’s lack of support for integration in 1965, Furman admitted three African American students into its graduate education program and one into its undergraduate student body. In 1969, the university first offered a course in African American history and hired its first African American faculty member for the summer session.
Today, diversity and inclusion are part of the university’s mission.
Thus the faculty in their statement reaffirmed “Furman’s mission to support ‘rigorous inquiry, transformative experiences, and deep reflection.’ This mission calls us to preserve a community where freedom of thought and expression is actively defended, even when doing so is costly.”
Today, they noted, “We are gravely concerned that our mission is in danger. Growing political pressures seek to curtail international education, narrow institutional autonomy, restrict academic freedom, and suppress open discourse. These pressures — whether through legislation, policy threats or public intimidation — undermine the core values of the liberal arts and the very foundation of higher education. The coercive tactics used to enforce such restrictions jeopardize not only our institutional mission but also the well-being of individuals who contribute to it — students, employees and the communities we serve.”
Furman’s faculty expressed concern seeing other institutions “respond to these pressures by compromising their values, narrowing the boundaries of inquiry, and chilling protected speech. Furman must not follow this path.”
“We will not permit external pressures to determine what or how we teach, whom we hire or the direction of our research.”
The faculty called on university leaders to “continue to support policies that safeguard expression, uphold human dignity and foster inclusive dialogue.”
The letter lists four commitments:
- “Academic freedom is nonpartisan and nonnegotiable: We will not permit external pressures to determine what or how we teach, whom we hire or the direction of our research. Furman’s academic mission exists not to serve ideology, but to pursue truth through open, critical and disciplined inquiry.”
- “Free inquiry is foundational to a learning community: … We commit to defending the right of all members of the Furman community to express differing — even controversial — views without fear. Offense is not a sufficient justification for censorship.”
- “Dignity, respect and inclusion enhance — not inhibit — freedom of thought: We affirm the worth of every individual and the necessity of diverse voices in the search for understanding. We reject any effort to pit freedom of expression against the dignity of persons; both are essential to a thriving community.”
- “Solidarity with vulnerable members of our community: We will advocate for and protect students, faculty and staff who may be targeted due to their political beliefs, immigration status or identity. Furman must remain a place of open and active inquiry — not surveillance or exclusion. Faculty will use our academic freedom and resources to push for legal protection and other support for any of our campus community who requests it in the face of bullying and intimidation.”
The letter was inspired by a similar document approved April 15 by the faculty council of Emory University, a school historically related to The United Methodist Church.
Also on April 22, the American Association of Colleges and Universities released a statement against government intrusion into higher education signed by 523 presidents and deans of its member schools.
“We speak with one voice against the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education.”
“As leaders of America’s colleges, universities and scholarly societies, we speak with one voice against the unprecedented government overreach and political interference now endangering American higher education,” the statement begins. “We are open to constructive reform and do not oppose legitimate government oversight. However, we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live and work on our campuses. We will always seek effective and fair financial practices, but we must reject the coercive use of public research funding.
The education leaders declare: “American institutions of higher learning have in common the essential freedom to determine, on academic grounds, whom to admit and what is taught, how, and by whom. Our colleges and universities share a commitment to serve as centers of open inquiry where, in their pursuit of truth, faculty, students and staff are free to exchange ideas and opinions across a full range of viewpoints without fear of retribution, censorship or deportation.”
The statement concludes: “The price of abridging the defining freedoms of American higher education will be paid by our students and our society. On behalf of our current and future students, and all who work at and benefit from our institutions, we call for constructive engagement that improves our institutions and serves our republic.”
Of note, the signatories include Claire Shipman, acting president of Columbia University, a school roundly criticized for acceding to demands of the Trump administration. While the signers range from presidents of Ivy League schools to smaller private schools, one group notably missing is the presidents of historically faith-based schools in the evangelical tradition. Some of them are not members of AACU, but others are.
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