"draws on his 20 years as a college president-first at SUNY New Paltz and then Carleton College-to offer guidelines for when university leaders should issue public statements on behalf of their institution and when they should remain quiet. A lawyer by training, Poskanzer is a firm proponent of First Amendment protections for free speech, but also believes that in general, higher education and society both benefit when top administrators practice reticence-except in a few key situations."
"In the 2010s, I started seeing more demands as a president for stances, including more letters circulated by my peers, saying, "Sign on to this." Social media added to it a lot. I also saw more ad hoc decisions being made in the heat of the moment-"Let's solve this particular problem by taking a stance on it"-with perhaps less thought about what the repercussions or the precedence of that would be."
University presidents are facing increasing demands to take public stances, amplified by peer-letter campaigns and social media. Frequent, ad hoc institutional statements create risky precedents and distract from core educational missions. Legal reasoning and attention to precedent highlight long-term consequences of reactive communications. Administrators should prioritize fidelity to institutional purpose and focus when deciding to speak with an institutional voice. Reticence generally benefits higher education and society, with speech reserved for circumstances tied to the institution's mission, legal responsibilities, or clear moral culpability.
#higher-education-leadership #first-amendmentfree-speech #institutional-communication #precedent-and-governance
Read at Inside Higher Ed | Higher Education News, Events and Jobs
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]