Good read: FIRE on academic freedom versus transparency in Harvard’s Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review

In the latest post to the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review, FIRE weighs in on the tension between open records laws and academic freedom and offers insight on “Striking the Balance Between Academic Freedom and Transparency in Higher Education.”

“When outspoken professors become the subject of open records requests, the virtues of transparency and accountability must be balanced against academic freedom,” writes Zach Greenberg, a Justice Robert H. Jackson legal fellow at FIRE.

Zach offers a high-level view of the complicated issues at play and introduces FIRE’s model resolution and model exemptions for open records laws to ensure academic freedom is protected, while not “unduly shield[ing] university employees from public scrutiny.”

It’s is a concise and interesting piece on a timely topic — and it’s worth a full read.