In her yearly address to Cornell staff, President Pollack addressed recently-passed legislation in states across the country intended to curtail the teaching of so-called “woke” ideology in universities, public schools, and businesses.
Pollack’s remarks, given last Monday on the ground floor of the Biotechnology Building, covered everything from ChatGPT to faculty bonuses and TCAT’s struggles. However, her comments on academic freedom flew under the radar.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ “Stop W.O.K.E. Act” was indirectly referenced during the President’s Address. Responding to the legislation, Pollack called such efforts “incredibly dangerous … to academia” and to democracy itself. Pollack’s rationale was that these statutes threaten “academic freedom, which is the ability of university faculty to choose what and how they teach…” Without academic freedom, Pollack fears for the future of the university, for “academic freedom is … fundamentally essential to the functioning of academic institutions.”
Specifically, Pollack stated her concern that faculty and students could be constrained from exploring their fields of study due to restrictive legislation. Pollack is not alone in her concerns. Free-speech advocacy organizations, including the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE)—which the Review has recently partnered with for an event on campus—have also criticized the law.
Adam Steinbaugh, a FIRE litigation attorney, remarked that “faculty are hired to speak from their expertise, not to convey the state’s own message.” In short, concern about the Stop W.O.K.E. Act and other such new laws comes from across the political spectrum. However, Pollack’s remarks were not limited to Florida statute alone.
The Cornell president’s fears are not just relegated to professors’ freedom to teach what they may. Indeed, she views “anti-woke” legislation as antithetical to free speech itself. “This is not a matter of the left or the right,” Pollack stated, “free speech more broadly … is under attack from both ends of the political spectrum.” It is possible that Pollack is referring to the infamous Coulter incident just several months ago, wherein a group of allegedly left-wing disruptors shut down Ann Coulter ‘84’s scheduled speech.
Pollack promised that her administration is “working … quite diligently on programs that might” protect free speech “for our student body.”
However, Pollack is evidently unconcerned with a different kind of limitation on academic freedom: bias of the faculty itself. While individual professors at Cornell excel in teaching all sides of the issues, the fact remains that 98% of political donations made by Cornell employees go to Democrats.
President Pollack expressed fears that professors might be stopped from teaching students what they know; however, does the almost universally-liberal faculty at this University not also restrict what students can learn? What of the borderline compelled speech of land acknowledgements and administration-endorsed political messaging that have become routine at Cornell? Both of these infringe on faculty and students’ ability to form opinions separate from the powers that be telling them what to believe.
Cornell’s administration has a long record of interjecting in active political debates. As the Review has documented, President Pollack has published statements on January 6th, the Russia-Ukraine war, hate crimes against Asian-Americans in Atlanta, and many more stories that have no clear relation to Cornell. Most egregious of all, the day of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson, all Cornellians received an email from the Dean of Weill Cornell Medicine calling the ruling “deeply disappointing.”
While many, if not most, Cornellians might agree on the issues upon which Pollack and her administration choose to pontificate, the question is whether they should be doing so at all. The office of the Presidency carries weight; when Pollack attaches her name to an open political question, it discourages discourse. It is not the role of university administrators to decide what is suitable for debate. It is certainly not their role to opine. Universities are the forum for these debates; if not here, where?
And what of the act of disruption itself? After promising consequences for those who shut down Coulter ‘84 last semester, the administration went radio-silent. While Cornell has a policy on free speech and disruption, the administration’s commitment to upholding those rules—specifically in defense of conservative speech—is less certain. That the university has only selectively commented on free speech only adds to the confusion.
Instead of focusing on legislation in far-away Florida that has little to no chance of coming to New York, Cornell’s administration might realize that there are plenty of free speech concerns far closer to home. And while Pollack’s statement fell short of recognizing how desperate the situation is at Cornell, at least she believes in, and unapologetically defends, free speech. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for far too many of our institutions today.
