In this day and age it’s often easy to take the right of free speech for granted, especially in the press. But it’s clear that freedom of speech is not guaranteed at a small Catholic college in Maryland, where the school’s president has turned back the clock of progress by firing two professors after a student newspaper article reported on offensive remarks he made.
Several weeks ago, in a faculty meeting at Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, Md., school president Simon Newman suggested professors try and force out 20 to 25 struggling students well before the school year was underway, so it wouldn’t affect the school’s retention rate (retention rates help schools get better rankings). In that conversation, he compared the failing students to animals who should be killed.
“This is hard for you because you think of students as cuddly bunnies but you can’t,” Newman was quoted as saying in The Mountain Echo, the student newspaper. “You just have to drown the bunnies…put a Glock to their heads.”
One would think that after such an atrocious remark was publicized, Newman would be looking for another job. In fact, just the opposite happened: This week, two professors were fired: Ed Egan, the school newspaper’s adviser, and Thane M. Naberhaus, a tenured professor who had been critical of Newman’s appalling retention plan.
“We were really appalled by it,” Ryan Golden, one of the student reporters who wrote the Echo story, said to The New York Times about Egan’s firing. “He’s really a good mentor for a lot of students at this school. He absolutely encouraged us to pursue journalistic integrity, absolutely encouraged us to be ethical, to be fair, to be thorough, to be objective and to do the best work that we could.”
Other faculty members say they are scared to speak out now against the president for fear of retribution, according to Inside Higher Ed, even as advocates call Newman’s actions an infringement on the right to free speech. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education has started a letter-writing campaign to help ensure free speech protection at the school.