University of South Dakota inviting faculty to discuss Intellectual Diversity, and “what might happen in the future.”

@SoDakCampaigns

The University of South Dakota, home of the Hawaiian.. er, home of the Beach Day Party, apparently has some faculty members a bit nervous on losing their campus monopoly on speech.

In the wake of the legislature taking aim at intellectual diversity, “members of the USD campus community have raised questions and concerns about what has happened thus far and what might happen in the future,” triggering University of South Dakota President Sheila Gestring to host and send out an all-staff invite to “an open forum to address questions and concerns about free speech and intellectual diversity” on Friday, September 6th.

Interestingly, this e-mail on an “Intellectual Diversity Public Conversation” is directed to staff.. with not much of a mention as to whether students will be invited. In fact, I don’t note any mention of it on the University of South Dakota website, or the website’s public calendar of events in the week and a half since the e-mail blast went out .

If it’s a “Public Conversation” as the e-mail blast from President Gestring claims, the University is keeping the “public conversation” pretty darned quiet.

But, why would USD want that public conversation to actually include the students they serve? Considering their past track record on speech issues, an actual public conversation with all of the public they serve might be a little too uncomfortable for some.

As to what might happen in the future.. I think we’ll know more after the 2020 Legislative Session.

45 thoughts on “University of South Dakota inviting faculty to discuss Intellectual Diversity, and “what might happen in the future.””

  1. The liberals controlling campus will never reform themselves unless there are massive budget cut threats. I know where to start

      1. Who is in control then? We are speaking specifically of the campus of pooblic universities.

  2. Buzz in Pierre is that unless the university presidents take this seriously and make major changes they’ll be fired for defying the law

  3. Sounds like the new USD President is pro-active in free speech. Hawaiian Day topic would be a good question for Tulsi.

  4. Regents have handled this terribly too. Very poorly managed. The Oklahoma dude is on the chopping block. Others to follow.

  5. Liberals created this problem by purging all nonliberals from higher education. Now the deserved reckoning.

    1. Excuse me Queen Bee, but the Republicans have been in control of education for over 40 years. Might want to point the finger at the people in charge.

      1. Tara, Queen Bee said ‘liberal’, not Democrat. You injected Republican into the conversation. Not all Republicans are conservative. For many, many years Harvey Jewett was chm of the BOR and Tad Parry was ED for them. Both were Republicans but were seen as liberal. Also, Jim Abbott who recently retired as USD president was a Democrat gov candidate, who was appointed to the position by a Republican. QB was right by saying Liberals.

        1. Their are many definitions of the word liberal. So maybe it would be better to address the issue and stop with the name calling. These words are always changing. How about just say I am for Free Speech or you could be for Government injecting another law on free speech.

          1. Or how about I am for free speech, let the USD students express their views . . . and you could be for the University stifling the students free speech.

              1. Hawaiian Days . . . Had to be changed to Beach Party Days . . . freedom of expression was denied.

      2. The Republicans have been in control in Pierre, but if you don’t think that liberals have a stranglehold on the universities then you are fooling yourself (but not the rest of us). Queen Bee is right that on the campus the left has been in control and has put forth their hideous agenda.

      3. the republicans only ‘control’ which persons steeped in the u-s public education establishment will be placed in grade school and college supervisory roles. federal requirements are what control schools. phil jensen nonwithstanding.

  7. Who created the problem? The Dems have no power. It’s all on the Republican party. Got to keep you guys honest.

  8. I’d be thrilled to find a state university where the teaching faculty was 45% liberal, 30% conservative, and 25% independent. It’s hard to know what those words mean, but (in this context) a working definition of “liberal” might be a professor who’s not voted for a republican presidential candidate in the last 20 years. An independent might be one who’s voted for at least one democratic presidential candidate AND at least one republican presidential candidate over the last 20 years. Etc. Devout libertarians count as independents.

    Another decent inquiry might be to ask each professor if he, she, or xe supports federally mandated affirmative action. Should more than 70% of professors and administrators say “yes”… time to hire conservatives! Same outcome if > 70% support taxpayer funded late term abortion.

    Just some ideas.

      1. Generally not, although I’m open to recruiting a good teacher fleeing the disaster our once-great ivy league has become.

        I’m open to someone exceptional, perhaps a STEM professor, who matriculated at an ivy league school 15+ years ago — before the league’s academic standards *really* went down the drain. And I don’t mean to imply that all sub-par graduates are liberals. Jared Kushner’s parents bought his admission. Neither Al Gore nor George Bush was admitted on the basis of his test scores. The list goes on and on.

  9. The governor needs to fire the current presidents who are dead wood protecting more dead wood. Time to bring in some serious reformers. People with spines who are ready to act decisively

  10. The intellectual diversity bill passed by huge margins. Why are presidents trying to break this law? They’re playing a dangerous game

    1. Can you give me an example how university presidents are trying to break this law?

  11. All my usd prof did was spout about how great Bernie Sanders is. Glad legislators passed this bill

    2. And this professor is trying to teach other people how to think? He is obviously anti-American, anti-capitalism, and anti-liberty; a typical leftwing prof.

      1. It can happen with the rightwing too. I am sure these professors let students argue their points.

  12. As a recent USD Law graduate, I can say, at least in classrooms, there was an active effort to seek a diversity of opinion. For example, in environmental law, I was always asked for the “conservative view” and good discussion carried from that point – was not condescending or derogatory, rather debating differing positions. However, at the administration level, there was genuine disconnect on what the administration chose to support, and which it did not. No institution will be free of pure ideological differences, but suppressing one view, and propping up another is the deeper issue.

    1. Prof. Kammer was one of my favorite professors. Even though we were on polar opposites of the political spectrum. The vast majority of professors at USD Law are liberal, however, I never once felt chastised or spoken down to for having a conservative view of the issue at hand. I also did not feel the professors were trying to push liberal views on us. That is a completely different story though when talking about the administration though. There is absolutely, 100%, a push for liberal ideology from the administration. And until that changes, USD Law will not see another dime from me.

  13. With the bar exam unchanged the law school will be gone within a few years. Kids are not going to Minnesota to law school. SD did a great job making sure our kids leave the state.

    1. You might have to eat some crow on that statement. 2018 had an “unofficial” pass rate of 80%.

  14. Why isn’t anyone talking about Thune supporting red flag gun control legislation?

    1. What’s to talk about? Should have been passed decades ago but GOP is just coming around now. Talk is cheap though.

    3. Because anything negative about the Republican Party can’t be talked about on here. Much like PP calls out CH, at least CH has the guts to call out his own people. Not so much with the “Paid for by” press release blog.

  16. My son tells horror stories about the liberal indoctrination that goes on in the classroom at SDSU that he had to pay for. It’s a real problem. I can’t believe some people are so stupid they don’t know how liberal academics are.

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