Blue Crab Boulevard

Students Prove Smarter Than Professor

Some students at the University of New Hampshire are proving they are smarter than one of the professors who is supposed to be teaching them. Or the university administration for that matter. They are gathering signatures on a petition asking for the removal of 9/11 denialist psychology professor William Woodward.

DURHAM, N.H. — A small group of students has started a petition to remove a University of New Hampshire professor who believes that Bush administration officials planned the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks or knew about them and allowed them to happen.

"Basically, we watch professors to just ensure they're doing their job … they're not biased in the classroom and are not teaching what they are not supposed to teach," said Bill Hunt, chairman of the newly formed and unrecognized organization Students for Academic Integrity.

The group has set its sights on psychology professor William Woodward for "pushing his personal agenda on … students."

The members have been gathering signatures for more than a week. Hunt did not say how many students have signed.

"There are some students who strongly support me and shake my hand and thank me for doing this," said Hunt. "Other people are in utter disbelief that (we) want this man fired."

Hunt said the Students for Academic Integrity are considering bringing audio and videotape recorders to class to prove their case.

"I've heard from several students that (Woodward is) indoctrinating them," he said. "He claims that he wants everyone to have an opinion. The fact is, he doesn't."

Woodward, a tenured professor, belongs to Scholars for 9/11 Truth, whose members question the official story about the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and contend that the U.S. government either had knowledge of the attacks or had a role in them.

Gov. John Lynch called Woodward's beliefs "completely crazy and offensive" and asked the trustees to investigate.

The administration apparently did investigate and didn't do anything about the situation. Hence the petition drive. As I have repeated pointed out, this is not a freedom of speech or academic freedom issue. This is a straight employment issue. To the extent the professor teaches his beliefs instead of the subject he is paid to teach, he is effectively stealing that time from the students and his employers. Would there be any doubt of that if he were teaching his religious beliefs? Or talking about auto repairs instead of psychology? His absurd 9/11 beliefs are not what he is paid to teach.

The only way his beliefs would be relevant is if he were using them as an example of how otherwise intelligent people can be stupid enough to fall into idiotic and dangerous beliefs. Abnormal psychology, then.

Insanity, The Ivory Tower | Gaius Friday, 29 September , 2006

By Kevin T. Keith, Friday, 29 September , 2006 @ 10:51 am

Except that there is no evidence that he is teaching this theory as part of his classes. The twerp who is gathering signatures to fire him for having the wrong opinion has apparently never taken the class in question - he says only that “several students have told me” that this has occurred - students he does not name, under circumstances he does not describe. The professor denies it, and the university has investigated his teaching and discovered no evidence to the contrary. In other words, there is absolutely no direct evidence that this professor has required students in class to listen to or believe anything far from the mainstream about the issue in question. The only evidence that is available suggests otherwise.

Nonetheless, the governor has explicitly called for him to be disciplined because of his views, not because the governor has any evidence he has abused his classroom position. And, again, the student who started the petition has no clear information to that effect and has clearly not experienced any such abuse himself - yet his petition is to have the professor fired, not even investigated.

It is - quite openly and explicitly - view-point-based censorship. If the university is to be a refuge for ideas and against imposed conformism, it must protect this professor against the self-confessed ignorance of the kooks and reactionaries who have targeted him.
By Gaius, Friday, 29 September , 2006 @ 11:02 am

It is not censorship, you should really understand what that word means and in what context it applies. It does not apply in this case at all. You also neglect the professors own words from the article:

“Woodward has said he does not push his views on his students but has mentioned it in his classroom in the spirit of full disclosure.”

Pushing of views is a very subtle thing. Do students who spout back the theories get better grades?
By ck, Friday, 29 September , 2006 @ 11:42 am

I wasn’t very smart when I was 19. I did figure out, for easy classes and good grades, there’s no substitute for the “social sciences”. Repeat what the perfesser believes and keep your parents off your back.PARTY!! That was 1971.
By Black Jack, Friday, 29 September , 2006 @ 12:36 pm

The guy teaches in the psych department, that means his stability is not something which can be taken for granted. There are professors of psychology who are well balanced and capable of reason, but I haven’t met many, although some have learned to make a good first impression.
By Kevin T. Keith, Friday, 29 September , 2006 @ 1:41 pm

It is not censorship, you should really understand what that word means and in what context it applies.

How is it not censorship when the state governor declares that you can’t believe or say specific things on pain of losing your job, or when the school authorities investigate faculty for precisely those reasons, or when professors actually are fired for those reasons?

Some attempt has been made in this case to frame it as a matter of exceeding the bounds of his terms of employment, but that is obviously disengenuous. The governor explicitly declared he should be fired for what he believed, not anything to do with classroom behavior, and the student complaining about classroom behavior has not been in this professor’s class. They’re reacting to what he believes, and threatening punishment as a means of preventing him from saying what he believes. The university went so far as to begin the punishment process, though at least had the decency to stop when their targeted investigation showed the charges were false.

That’s censorship.

â€œWoodward has said he does not push his views on his students but has mentioned it in his classroom in the spirit of full disclosure.â€

What was he supposed to do? Lie about it? If they asked him - students are constantly doing that, especially if a professor is known for certain beliefs - he’s entitled to answer, and they’re entitled to have their question answered. If the subject just happened to come up, there’s no reason he shouldn’t mention the range of beliefs on the topic - I constantly “mention” minority beliefs on controversial topics in my classes, and give thumbnail sketches of the evidence for and against them. The mere fact of mentioning them inherently forces the students to consider and evaluate what they believe is true about the subject - a vastly more important lesson in almost all cases than simply dictating to them the consensus opinion, even if it happens to be true.

The most important thing you can get out of an education is the realization that almost all claims are open to challenge; the second most important is that there are reasons for and against almost all claims, and those reasons can be better or worse. But you can’t teach either lesson by pretending there’s only one authorized belief on any given subject, nor can you do so if you know you’ll be fired for suggesting otherwise.

This Hunt dipshit needs to learn how to learn far more than he needs the truth about 9/11. He’s openly petitioning to keep himself from being exposed to new ideas. What a maroon. But what makes it worse is that he’s petitioning to keep everyone else from being told something they may not like, or (horrors!) may not even be true. That makes him beyond stupid - it makes him dangerous in a way that simply holding a false belief about 9/11 cannot be.

Pushing of views is a very subtle thing. Do students who spout back the theories get better grades?

I don’t know. Why don’t you ask the students? The university did, and found no evidence to back up the charges that, apparently, have only been made by people who haven’t been in that class.

As for “subtle pushing of views”, you have to put some responsibility on the students for doing their own thinking. It’s supposedly what college is for - or, perhaps, what colleges not attended by Bill Hunt and the governor of New Hampshire are for. How did this professor “push” students to conform? He “mentioned” that there are beliefs that the students don’t already hold. If that’s indoctrination, these students shouldn’t be let out in public - presumably they’d become paralyzed by the first “Stop” sign they encountered. In fact, I suspect that’s only Hunt’s problem. The rest of them can probably manage the trauma of being exposed to non-mainstream beliefs - if they’re allowed to.