2025 AAUP Updates

Institutional neutrality is neither a necessary condition for academic freedom nor categorically incompatible with it. The statement calls for principles of academic freedom and shared governance to be chief considerations in the issuing of institutional and departmental statements as well as decisions on financial investments and campus protest policies.

The AAUP, along with the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education and other plaintiffs has filed a lawsuit to block Trump’s unlawful and unconstitutional DEI executive orders, which threaten academic freedom and access to higher education for all. The lawsuit argues that Trump's orders exceed his legal authority, are overly vague, and fail to define such terms as “DEI,” “equity,” and “illegal DEIA."

Earlier this week, President Trump’s administration hit the National Institutes of Health (NIH) with a debilitating freeze to hiring, travel, meetings, and communication. This freeze includes reviewing and approving critical biomedical research on cancer treatment, heart disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and other public health concerns.

While administrators and faculty members may have to comply with legislation and court orders, even where these run counter to our values and to professional and constitutional principles, we are free to register our disagreement. Under no circumstances should an institution go further than the law demands.

The AAUP has hired Mia McIver as our new executive director. McIver brings to the AAUP a wealth of experience in organizing faculty members and a record of enacting legal, political, and media strategies that empower all higher education workers. A long-time member of the AAUP, she is committed to supporting staff, AAUP chapters, and state conferences in vigorously promoting the AAUP’s core values of shared governance and academic freedom. McIver will work from both Washington, DC, and Los Angeles in order to strengthen the AAUP from coast to coast.

More than a third of respondents to a survey reported a decline in their academic freedom, while over half expressed concern about teaching "divisive concepts" in recent years following state-level efforts to restrict them.