BU Professors Publish in Medium and the Conversation, and BU is in the News

One month after sending our open letter to Boston University’s leaders and the university community, my department colleague Russell Powell and I have published an opinion piece in Medium that has its distant origins in that letter: Colleges Must Not Compel People to Teach In Person During the Pandemic. Please share our Medium piece with people who might be interested in it.

Neta C. Crawford, Chair of the Department of Political Science at Boston University, and also an ethicist, today published an article in The Conversation: Ethical Challenges Loom Over Decisions to Resume In-Person College Classes. There is much to agree with and think about in this piece. I voiced a concern in the first comment published below it.

Two days ago, The Washington Post published an article where faculty discontent with BU’s plans for the Fall is mentioned and Russell Powell is quoted: As Young People Drive Infection Spikes, College Faculty Members Fight for the Right to Teach Remotely. Today, The New York Times caught up: Colleges Face Rising Revolts by Professors. Sadly, our petition isn’t mentioned in the Times article, even though petitions at a number of other colleges are mentioned. This is a little odd, given that back on June 11, The Boston Globe led the way for others to follow with Faculty Grow Uneasy as Universities Scramble to Bring Students Back to Campus, which mentions both our petition and a petition at the University of Notre Dame (and, in an odd choice for the Globe, features a photograph of yours truly, looking pensive). Still, the important thing is that the newspapers are reporting on faculty discontent. Speaking of petitions, one can find out which universities have them by looking at this list of university petitions online. It’s maintained, I believe, by PhD candidate Cait S. Kirby, who features in this article in The Chronicle of Higher Education.