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University Leaders to Assist FBI
By Wendi Maloney
A new advisory board has been formed to improve communication between higher education and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI director Robert S. Mueller III announced last September. The board, consisting of college and university presidents and chancellors, will advise the bureau on the culture of higher education, including the traditions of academic freedom and international collaboration. Its recommendations are meant to support the FBI’s work on terrorism, counterintelligence, and homeland security. Graham Spanier, president of Pennsylvania State University, will chair the board.
“As we do our work,” Mueller says, “we wish to be sensitive to university concerns about international students, visas, technology export policy, and the special culture of colleges and universities. We also want to foster exchanges between academia and the FBI in order to develop curricula which will aid in attracting the best and brightest students to careers in the law enforcement and intelligence communities.”
“Among the many pressing issues this new board must address, the AAUP hopes that the board will forcefully remind those outside the academic world of the imperative value of the freedom to teach and to inquire,” says Jonathan Knight, director of the AAUP’s department of academic freedom and governance. “The board consists of well-known and respected administrators. It is striking, however, that no faculty members, whose teaching and research are vital to the educational health of every college and university, were appointed to the board.
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