LightNews — News, ranked by scholars

AAUP

@aaup.org

A coalition of AAUP chapters in Atlanta stood up today for the future of higher education and marched from Morehouse College to Clark Atlanta University!

@neatoday.bsky.social

#defendacademicfreedom

November 7, 2025 at 9:32 PM

AAUP chapter @UT Austin

@utaustinaaup.bsky.social

We stand in solidarity with colleagues and students at Texas A&M. #DefendAcademicFreedom #LetFacultyTeach #LetStudentsLearn

Texas AFT @texasaft.org · Jan 29

We’re gathered on A&M’s campus to remind Texas that academic freedom is foundational for success for both student and professor ✊ @texasaaup.bsky.social @aaup.org @tamu-aaup.bsky.social

January 30, 2026 at 3:06 PM

AAUP chapter @UT Austin

@utaustinaaup.bsky.social

Come on, Texas Tech! Consult your dictionary! To mention is not to advocate! When we mention the words “censorship” or “brainwashing” or “indoctrination” or “retaliation,” we are doing the opposite of advocating for those practices! #DefendAcademicFreedom #LetStudentsLearn #LetTeachersTeach

Texas Conference of the AAUP @texasaaup.bsky.social · Feb 4

🚨On widespread censorship at Texas Tech: “When they say faculty aren’t allowed to advocate for something, what we read that as is, they aren’t allowed to mention it,” said one academic adviser, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliatory discipline.

www.texastribune.org/2026/02/04/t...

Texas Tech struggles with new policy on gender, race

The system’s chancellor meant to instill clarity and accountability, but three weeks into the spring semester, some instructors say the standards have led to “censorship.”

www.texastribune.org

February 5, 2026 at 12:57 PM

Jon Minton - Author

@jonmintonbooks.com

Defend your right to learn on #InternationalAcademicFreedomDay!
www.facebook.com/share/p/18wB...

#DefendAcademicFreedom #FreedomToThink #StandWithScholars #EducationIsPower #independentauthors #bookstoread #jonmintonbooks

May 20, 2026 at 11:36 AM

AAUP chapter @UT Austin

@utaustinaaup.bsky.social

Just to be clear, even under the reactionary Senate Bill 37, teaching about gender identity is not illegal in the state of Texas. This lecturer was teaching adult students in the area of her expertise and was politically targeted. Keep tuned for a lawsuit against Texas A&M. #DefendAcademicFreedom

Texas Tribune @texastribune.org · Dec 24

Texas A&M University will not reinstate a lecturer who was fired after a video of her teaching about gender identity in a children’s literature class went viral, despite a faculty appeals panel unanimously concluding that her dismissal was not justified.

Texas A&M won’t reinstate fired lecturer despite findings

A vice chancellor upheld the firing of Melissa McCoul, seen in a viral video being confronted by a student on her gender identity teachings, saying the termination was done with “good cause.”

www.texastribune.org

December 29, 2025 at 12:40 PM

AAUP Texas A&M-College Station Chapter

@tamu-aaup.bsky.social

“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”

#DefendAcademicFreedom

March 20, 2026 at 3:57 PM

Dr. Gita Gnanadesikan

@ggnanadesikan.bsky.social

Thank you, President Eisgruber!
🐯 #StandUpForScience #DefendAcademicFreedom

www.npr.org/2025/04/06/n...

How Princeton University is navigating the loss of federal funding

www.npr.org

April 7, 2025 at 7:25 PM

Hans E. Offerdal

@hofferdal.bsky.social

Unbelievable and incredible sad...

#DefendDemocracy #DefendAcademicFreedom #DefendFreedomOfThinking
#FreeToThink

@scholarsatrisk.bsky.social
@eua.eu @coimbragroup.bsky.social @sciencecouncil.bsky.social @erc.europa.eu @uniworldnews.bsky.social @indexoncensorship.org @iucdubrovnik.bsky.social

AAUP @aaup.org · Apr 27

Texas public university systems have restricted how faculty teach gender, sexuality & race.

The universities' accreditor, Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, refuses to take action despite these flagrant violations of academic freedom.

Accreditor Mum as Texas Politicians Take Curricular Control

Texas public universities are restricting what faculty can teach and graduate students can research. Although they appear to violate its standards, SACS hasn’t responded.

www.insidehighered.com

April 27, 2026 at 6:25 PM

Hans E. Offerdal

@hofferdal.bsky.social

Incredible that such measures are needed. One should think that this is needed for students unable to study in #China, #Hungary, #Iran, #Nicaragua, #NorthKorea, #Russia or any other autocratic regime, but is is the #USA in 2025!!!

#DefendAcademicFreedom
#Liberty #FightFascism
#SaveUniversities #CEU

University World News @uniworldnews.bsky.social · Jul 2

2 US universities partner with institutions in Toronto and London to offer academic shelter to students unable to study in the US due to new stringent #studentvisa regulations, Nathan Greenfield reports
@uarizona.bsky.social #Harvard #MunkSchool
www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?sto...

US universities plan refuge for blocked foreign students

Two US universities find partner institutions in Toronto and London to offer academic shelter to students who are unable to study in America due to th...

www.universityworldnews.com

July 2, 2025 at 4:56 PM

Vanessa Svihla

@vsvihla.bsky.social

#HigherEd #EngineeringEducation #DEI #AcademicFreedom #NSF #EquityInSTEM #RadicalHope #WeWillNotBeSilenced #ProtectDEI #DefendAcademicFreedom

We updated the title of our ASEE paper to: "Community of Transformation to Support Inclusive and Equitable Change in Engineering: An Unlawfully-Terminated NSF IUSE Project." Our amazing leadership team includes Nadia Kellam, Vanessa Svihla, Susannah Davis, Katharine Getz, Kristen Ferris, and Earl E. Lee.

Our project, along with hundreds of others, was unlawfully terminated under political pressure targeting DEI-focused research. Now, the NSF is not just minimizing the harm—it is actively reframing these terminations as efforts to "safeguard our nation’s security" in their recent Updates on NSF Priorities. In reality, these actions undermine the very goals they claim to support.

Suppressing equity-centered research weakens scientific progress, exacerbates inequities, and threatens our collective future. Ending research that builds inclusive and just systems is not safeguarding national security—it is abandoning it.

We refuse to be erased.

We are renaming our work, reclaiming our narrative, and resisting the political suppression of academic freedom and equity in STEM.

If your NSF grant was terminated, we encourage you to revise your paper titles too. Visibility is resistance.

They may have terminated our grants, but they will not terminate our impact.

April 29, 2025 at 3:53 PM

Science and Sanity Silicon Valley

@scienceandsanity.bsky.social

#DefendUCLA #DefendAcademicFreedom #MutualDefensePacts

Our Universities and colleges need to form mutual defense pacts immediately else they will be decimated one by one. The UC Santa Cruz faculty senate called for a mutual defense pact of the UC's. Now!

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/01/u...