GUEST COMMENTARY: IS OUR COMMUNITY READY FOR FREE THINKING?

Two professors were talking recently about changes we have seen in our 30 years at Southeast Missouri State University. We agreed that most of these changes have been for the better. More of our programs are approaching excellence now. Others are just a stride or two away. Our University Studies program is quite good, and should class sizes get down to what we had originally hoped, it would be excellent. Several departmental major areas of study are now recognized as meeting or exceeding the recommendations of their professional societies. "Old timers" on the faculty are noticing improvements in written and oral communication skills of our present students in comparison to those of the past. This should continue as the caliber of our entering freshmen gets better each year.

As our university strives to grow in stature, we hope it becomes even more a truly free, dynamic, inquiring, serving university. We are already blessed with many outstanding teachers. We hope we can attract even more of the best teachers, the best researchers and the best administrators to our classroom, laboratories and offices.

But we see a potential problem. This problem is probably one that every university that has aspired to be among the best must have resolved. The problem is simply that new faculty will increasingly come from more diverse backgrounds and cultures than present faculty. Teaching styles will vary. Good teachers at all levels have always used strategies designed to inspire, to coax, or even to threaten students to think and to learn. Many good teachers prowl and scowl, they may point and shout, they often question and critique, and they may lavish praise on their students. The objective is always to lead students to explore and to astound themselves as they discover and sharpen their intellectual powers. But every college student is not initially receptive to each of these teaching strategies. A few students may take offense at a strategy the teacher is using. All teachers have experienced this, especially those who have been most successful at challenging their classes. All this leads to our point: that as the university evolves, we can expect more criticisms of teachers. The more diverse our faculty become, the more criticisms we can expect.

This leads to some serious questions: Is our community really ready for this? Would our service area prefer a quiet, low profile faculty that makes few waves? Will our citizens accept the greater number of "waves" or will more and more of them be telephoning the university president's office, demanding that this or that teacher be disciplined or fired?

As the university continues to evolve, faculty will be expected to engage in a high-quality research program. Even now, it is very difficult for a Southeast faculty member in some disciplines to achieve tenure or promotion without publications of research in scholarly journals. And this trend will intensify. But this also creates potential problems. In order to conduct unbiased, objective research, every investigator must feel free to report what he/she finds. Any intimidation based on political correctness is death to the spirit of research. Researchers need assurances that his/her right to investigate is unfettered by politics and will be defended by university administrators and by community and service leaders. Remember, every new research result represents a minority view. All ideas begin with one individual.

Unfortunately, there will always be some scholars in any field that consider new ideas as threats to ideas they espouse, or as threats to their research turfs. A few of these will try to stamp out the "heresy", even to the point of trying to get the heretic fired. This kind of politics will increase as more faculty conduct research, some of which will inevitably lead to disputed results. Larger numbers of young, not-yet-tenured faculty and a growing number of eager, idealistic graduate students will increase the number of incidents that attract this kind of attention. Some members of the local community and service area will consider such attention-getting faculty activities to be negative, even harmful, to the university. The university president's phone will ring. A few callers may urge that the "troublemakers" be removed.

This leads to further serious questions: Are we ready for this? Has the old teachers college evolved to become a true liberal arts university? Will a new spirit be allowed to flourish? Will this very conservative area tolerate a wider range of views? Will our newspapers, radio stations and television stations show tolerance for the breadth of opinions and research findings that inevitably accompany a true university? Do media officials feel an obligation to serve as watchdogs of free speech, even for those with whom they disagree? How many citizens in southeast Missouri truly believe that the right to express and publish findings and opinions, even if different from theirs, is the most priceless component of a living, dynamic, vibrant university?

We believe Southeast Missouri State University finds itself at a major crossroad. Which way will it go?

Ray Knox and C.E. Williams teach in the department of geosciences at Southeast Missouri State University. Combined, they have taught for a total of 60 years.