Faculty Rights Handbook

The Jack Miller Center for the Teaching of America’s Founding Principles at the Intercollegiate Studies Institute has released a Faculty Rights Handbook. FIRE President Greg Lukianoff, among other legal and academic luminaries, contributed his expertise to the project.

The pamphlet is divided into four chapters. The first is practical advice on how faculty members can avoid common pitfalls on the path to tenure: what to do before accepting a position; understanding the tenure process; the role of the dean and president; and the review and appeal process. The second chapter contains an explanation of harassment claims and how to avoid them. The third chapter explains what a faculty member can say without university permission and the difference between speech by a faculty member in a teaching capacity and a faculty member in an administrative capacity. The fourth chapter covers controversial faculty speech about culture and society and what the courts have said about the expression of such speech. The end of the book has a list of court cases, law review articles, books, and web sites (including FIRE’s) that offer additional advice and aid to embattled faculty members.