UUP has risen to the defense of one of its members, and to the principle of academic freedom.

The situation was this: Longtime faculty member Sally Dear denounced the Binghamton University administration for allegedly giving special treatment to basketball players in a number of ways, including grading. In what UUP asserts was an act of retaliation, Dear’s part-time course load was reduced, and then she was told her term appointment was not being renewed after 11 years at the university.

The administration’s actions drew the ire of UUP delegates, who resoundingly supported a resolution that condemned the acts as a “frontal assault on academic freedom” and called on UUP to fight to get her job back.

According to the resolution passed during the 2009 Fall Delegate Assembly in Rochester, the administration’s actions “have cast a pall over free speech, faculty governance and effective teaching, not to mention academic standards. This is a direct attack on academic freedom, the bedrock of the academy.”

And it’s unacceptable.

UUP responded by sending letters to its state and national affiliates, urging them to lend their voices to the restoration of academic integrity, and to use whatever influence they can bring to bear so that Binghamton University restores Dear to her position.

— Karen L. Mattison