The Bell Curve -- Joseph N. Bell

I have followed the suspension and recent reinstatement of Orange

Coast College professor Kenneth Hearlson with special interest because of

my own teaching background.

Several things strike me about this affair, which was drawn out much

too long. First, it was mishandled by the administration, which should

have included the department faculty in an immediate hearing and thus

avoided the charges of abuse of power when Hearlson was suspended.

Second, the academic freedom question was a no-brainer from the

beginning, and allowing it to become an issue alienated groups that might

have been sympathetic to the administration on other grounds. And, third,

teachers who now say they are curtailing classroom debate because this

affair has had a “chilling effect” on teaching freedom are misreading

what took place. If anything, they probably have more latitude than they

had before, and if they don’t believe that, they should start pushing the

edges to find out.

Unfortunately, the issue of academic freedom can sometimes be used to

obscure the rational limits of classroom teaching behavior. That was the

real issue here and the reason for the administrative letter of

“reprimand” that followed Hearlson’s reinstatement. But the way this

affair played out, the letter simply acerbated all the bad feeling that

could have been mitigated early on by Hearlson’s peers working with the

administration.

I was teaching in the English Department at UC Irvine during the

chaotic campus period of the Vietnam War. We had several instances

similar to the Hearlson episode. There was a process in place to handle

them that began with faculty committees and ended with administrative

action in which faculty recommendations weighed heavily. And although

those decisions seldom left everyone happy, they did grow out of the

credibility of an established procedure.

But I find the review process both less important and less interesting

than the dynamics of teaching -- especially at the college level, where

very few classroom restrictions beyond command of the subject matter are

put on a qualified teacher. The almost unlimited possibilities for

crossing the line into some form of inappropriate classroom behavior are

entirely under the control of the teacher and his or her ethical

sensibilities.

There are few power trips more exhilarating than standing before a

classroom of college students to whom you represent knowledge they would

like to acquire and the wisdom and experience to put it in a workable

perspective. The teacher is on all the time, and it is almost impossible

to avoid a sense of performing. The recent play -- now on Broadway --

about Cal Tech’s Richard Feynman is a case in point. He was both an

outstanding teacher and a fine performer.

In this mix, the teacher’s biases are almost always apparent -- at

least at the college level. I’m sure none of my students had any doubt

about my political views. This adds seasoning to the teaching. But it can

also pose serious problems when the personal convictions of the teacher

make the leap from supportable opinions to Absolute Truth -- especially

if that truth is based heavily on emotional content. When that happens,

the students who don’t share the teacher’s opinions become nonbelievers

who need to be set straight.

My youngest daughter had a high school social science teacher to whom

the political teachings of the John Birch Society represented almost

religious dogma. He showed a JBS film to his students as historic fact

that was about 20% identifiable information and 80% hysterical nonsense.

When my daughter questioned some of the nonsense, he berated her. When

she told me about this, I went to the school, viewed the film and asked

that it be reviewed by a faculty committee. I suggested that it should

either be taught as propaganda, along with similar material from the

left, or dropped from use in the classroom. It was dropped. If this

interfered with the teacher’s academic freedom, no one made an issue of

it.

Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa wrote in the New York Times

recently: “The fanatic is what he is because he feels himself the owner

of a single truth, incompatible with any other, and thus in possession of

a right to abolish by any means any differences, creeds or convictions

that do not coincide with his own.” I think that is what OCC President

Margaret Gratton was talking about when she told the Los Angeles Times

that “academic freedom bears the responsibility of respectful and

objective discourse that is embedded in the faculty contract.”

I’ll go along with respectful, but objectivity can lead to brain

atrophy in the classroom. Waking students up by arguing a point of view

is disrespectful only when that point of view is sacrosanct and opposing

it is heresy.

I don’t know if Hearlson’s teaching crosses that line, but this quote

from him, highlighted in The Times, worries me a lot: “I teach

traditional values. The liberal point of view is already in the book. I’m

trying to put Christian values back in the classroom, which has been so

secular for so long.” Of course it has. It’s supposed to be.

The line between provocation and bullying is amorphous. It becomes,

finally, the ultimate responsibility of the teacher to decide if he is

crossing that line -- and to back off if he is. Because the handling of

the Hearlson matter was botched from the beginning, what might have cast

some light into the abyss between academic freedom and the parameters of

teaching behavior is going to end up in multiple lawsuits. How sad.

* JOSEPH N. BELL is a resident of Santa Ana Heights. His column

appears Thursdays.