Another View on Wanted: Conservatives (Not)

A student who has taken classes by a professor we wrote about three months ago has taken issue with our coverage of Dr. Robert Gorman, who teaches at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville [pictured]. That student’s response follows.

I saw your article entitled “Wanted Conservatives (Not)” dated 1/26/05 and would like to drop you a note. Dr. Robert Gorman does indeed teach courses and write books that bear a “leftist” bent, this is is area of study. I have taken two classes and plan to take another with Dr. Gorman next Fall and I can say that he would not apply his personal beliefs to the search for new faculty at the University of Tennssee. You are making an assumption based on his field of study that he would automatically strike any prospective faculty from a list if they espoused a “conservative” ideology. This view is very, very wrong and obviously made after only minimal research. Dr. Gorman is one of the most highly thought of instructors here at UT and welcomes debate and discourse no matter what ideology you happen to be. Please do not jump to conclusions. If I were applying for this position I would be confident that it was my Vita that stood not my ideology.

“Thanks for writing,” Accuracy in Academia’s executive director, the author of the piece, wrote to Dreyer.
”I have just one question for you, in all seriousness. How many conservative professors do you have teaching in the political science department, or in any other discipline?” Dreyer wrote back:

A few at UT. I can name two or three. Now, I will be honest, I have never had a problem with a professor over ideology. That’s pretty good for 9 years of school. At my old school there were Profs on both sides of the spectrum, then the ones who did not get involved with American Politics. In my experience card carrying conservatives and liberal are rare, and even then rarely show it in class. But that’s just my opinion and what I have seen and heard.

John Dreyer is a doctoral student at the Unversity of Tennessee-Knoxville.