I went to the first National Association of Scholars (NAS) Arkansas Affiliate meeting last Monday night, which was held at the University of Arkansas Department of Education Reform, and it looks as though everything is a go. What is NAS, you ask? Well, let me tell you. Better yet, let NAS tell you:
NAS is also a network of scholars united by their commitments to academic freedom, disinterested scholarship, and a free society. Several decades ago, these were the common currency of American higher education. But no more. Today, scholars committed to the classic ideals of academic excellence, the republican virtues of ordered liberty, civic duty, and self-restraint, and the liberal principles of freedom of thought and expression often find themselves on uncertain or even hostile ground.
College administrations are often more committed to diversity than to the pursuit of truth. Academic departments often watch for any unwelcome sign of intellectual independence. Many professors master the art of bland non-disclosure for fear of being stuck with a label suggesting less than ardent support for one campus orthodoxy or another. Or worse, they may be cornered into expressing support for views against which they privately harbor significant reservations….
…If this type of experience sounds familiar, NAS may be the organization for you. We offer the chance to meet and work with other scholars who have had similar experiences and who have found ways to resist the petty — and sometimes not so petty — tyranny of the PC campus. We are not of one mold. Our members include mainstream liberals and conservatives, secularists and the religiously committed, senior scholars and graduate students, women and men, citizens and international visitors –united by a concern that the tradition of academic freedom in the United States is imperiled by the abuses of some and the complacency of many.
Read the rest of it to find out more, including who can join and what issues are currently being addressed.
If you would like to join the NAS Arkansas Affiliate, e-mail me (at freeman-dot-hunt-at-gmail-dot-com), and I will send you the e-mail addresses where you can submit your name and contact information. I would post those addresses here, but then the nice people running the show would be deluged with spam from email harvesters. And, of course, please pass this information on to anyone who you think might be interested.
