Academic Freedom

Academic Freedom

By: Rommel S. Reyes

Most of my colleague in the academe does not know the real meaning of academic freedom I am not interpreting it in the negative but more of informative, let me explain more. In the 1987 Philippine Constitution particularly article XIV section 5 paragraph 2 the provision states that “Academic freedom shall be enjoyed in all institutions of higher learning”. But what does the provision means? There are two ways to interpret academic freedom, first, the academic freedom enjoyed by the different Colleges and Universities, and second, the academic freedom enjoyed by the individual faculty members.
For the institution, academic freedom grants the University the exclusive discretion to determine to whom among its graduates it shall confer academic recognition, based on its established standard. One of a known justice of the US Supreme Court and a former professor of the Harvard Law School referred to what he called the business of a university and the four essential freedoms in the following language: “It is the most business of a university to provide that atmosphere which is most conducive to speculation, experiment and creation. It is an atmosphere in which there prevail the four essential freedom of a university -to determine for itself on academic grounds who may teach, what may be taught, how it shall be taught and who may be admitted to study.”
For individual faculty members, one of the most authoritative definitions which are accepted by most of the educational world is the 1940 statement of principles of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). It states in part that academic freedom means that: “(a) The teacher is entitled to full freedom in research and in publication of the results, subject to adequate performance of his other academic duties. . . (b) The teacher is entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing his subjects, but he should be careful not to introduce into his teaching controversial matter which has no relation to his subject. . . (c) The college or university teacher is a citizen, a member of a learned profession, and an officer in an educational institution. When he speaks or writes as a citizen, he should be free from institutional censorship or discipline, but his special position in the community imposes special commitment. And as teacher, he should remember that the public may judge his profession and where he is employed he may be judge by the use of his utterances. He therefore, must be accurate and must exercise restraint and should show respect for the opinion of others and he must exert his effort that he is not an institutional spokesperson.
As to academic freedom of students, most of the jurisprudence decided by the Supreme Court academic freedom on their part is mainly as the right to enjoy in school the guarantees under the Bill of Rights particularly Article III section 4 of the 1987 Philippines Constitution.