Academic Bias In Academia

Academic Bias Bias in academia has been going on for years; this is an issue that does not seem to have an answer but argued all the time. Michael Bloomberg, former mayor of New York City, made a commencement speech at Harvard’s 2014 spring graduation with an unexpected message; he claims that there is Liberal academia bias on college campuses and that this issue is not allowing their students to expand their thinking. Ron Christie, a government relations expert, wrote about Bloomberg’s speech in his article “Bloomberg’s Surprising Harvard Commencement Address Attacks Campus Ideologues” and completely agrees with Bloomberg; he was able to relate to what was spoken because he has seen this issue take place in classrooms before. Cathy Young, …show more content…
A. Lee Frischler wrote an article “The New Climate of Timidity on Campuses” and is discussing exactly what Bloomberg, Christie, and Young wanted to get across: it is imperative to have ideas freely discussed so students are able to expand their horizons; you can not expect a student to expand their thinking if they are only taught one-sided. Frischler comments on critics, “[…] the critics are correct that universities have been victimized by the phenomenon of ‘closed minds,’ […] The core values of universities are openness and diversity in thinking and expression” the community will lose value if we take away people’s abilities to speak on their own beliefs (2). I agree with Frischler that people are becoming more timid to share their ideas and that the universities need to make sure that their professors are not promoting one-sided ideas in their classrooms. Darren L. Linvill also spoke on the subject in his article “The Bias Fallacy” written in 2013. Linvill goes more in depth about how the bias teaching is affecting the students, he states “[…] from my discussion with students that a student’s classroom experience can be affected when he or she sees the instructor as biased. One student told me of an instructor he disagreed with ideologically, saying, ‘you feel like you’re in the corner, you feel like you’re the underdog’” (4). I am happy he was talking about the affects on students because a teacher who wont let you have your own opinion can affect a student and how they learn. Mark Baurelein wrote “How Academe Shortchanges Conservative Thinking” speaking about how important it is to keep the Conservative ideology around. He says, “[…] the conservative tradition remains a vital resource of ideas and theories, a heritage that claims world triumphs. […] We need more than conservative pundits on television or in