Weekly Briefing: His Contract Was Terminated After Complaints About Teaching Racial Justice

In Florida, a parent complained that a professor's lessons were "indoctrinating students." ADVERTISEMENT [Weekly Briefing Logo]( Did someone forward you this newsletter? [Sign up free]( to receive your own copy. You can now read The Chronicle on [Apple News]( [Flipboard]( and [Google News](. A professor lost his job after complaints about his racial-justice lessons. The contract of Samuel Joeckel, who taught English for more than 20 years at Palm Beach Atlantic University, in Florida, was terminated this month, after a parent complained to the institution’s president about a racial-justice unit in the professor’s composition course. Joeckel had been in his position at the Christian college since 2002, but Palm Beach Atlantic doesn’t offer tenure. Instead, faculty members can enter into two- and three-year letters of agreement that roll over automatically if the faculty member shows “ongoing exemplary service.” His dismissal reveals how academic-freedom issues have become more complex as tensions (and [legislative actions]( ramp up over teaching about race. On February 15, the provost and a dean met Joeckel outside his classroom to tell him that his contract wouldn’t be renewed until administrators reviewed materials from his composition class. Joeckel said that the dean used the word “indoctrinating” when the professor asked about the nature of the complaint regarding a racial-justice unit in his course, but the dean cut off that conversation by saying he had to get ready for Gov. Ron DeSantis’s [campus event]( that evening. Two days later, Joeckel said, he attended a meeting with the dean and a human-resources representative from the university. The dean reviewed the professor’s syllabus and asked questions about his pedagogy, Joeckel said. Specifically, the pair asked why he spent so much time talking about racial justice in his writing-composition class. Joeckel told them that he devotes an equal amount of time to each of his course units — comedy and humor, gothic and horror, gender equality, and racial justice. According to his syllabus, Joeckel devoted two class sessions in late January and early February to racial justice. The topics at the center of his “Composition II” are at the professors’ discretion, he said. At the end of the semester, students are asked to write a research essay on one of the four units. The point is for students to fine-tune their writing skills, he says. The course description states that students will refine their analytical-reading skills, develop an informed approach to the research paper, and apply the rules and conventions of English prose. In mid-March Joeckel learned that his contract would not be renewed and he was being terminated early — his last day was March 15. In February, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression defended Joeckel [in a letter]( sent to President Debra A. Schwinn of Palm Beach Atlantic, saying that the university had violated its own policy to express “a firm belief in the rights of a teacher to teach, investigate, and publish freely,” and that the university was bound by its accreditor to uphold that policy. Joeckel said he is pursuing legal action against the institution. The university did not respond to a request for comment. [Read our Megan Zahneis’s full story here](. ADVERTISEMENT NEWSLETTER [Sign Up for the Teaching Newsletter]( Find insights to improve teaching and learning across your campus. Delivered on Thursdays. To read this newsletter as soon as it sends, [sign up]( to receive it in your email inbox. Lagniappe. - Read. 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