Policy Documents and Reports

Book excerpt: The essential guide to the AAUP's best practices and policies for higher education, now in its centennial edition. For the past century, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has developed standards for sound academic practice while working for the acceptance of these standards by the higher education community. The Association has long been viewed as the authoritative voice of the academic profession in this regard. The AAUP's Policy Documents and Reports (widely known as the Redbook because of the color of its cover) presents in convenient format a wide range of policies, in some instances formulated in cooperation with other educational organizations. The current edition, the eleventh, includes basic statements on academic freedom, tenure, and due process; academic governance; professional ethics; research and teaching; online and distance education; intellectual property; discrimination; collective bargaining; accreditation; and students' rights and freedoms. The new edition has been thoroughly updated and reorganized thematically. Brief historical introductions have been added to each section, along with an introductory essay on incorporating AAUP principles into faculty handbooks. Among the eighteen new reports included in this edition are statements on academic freedom and outside speakers, campus sexual assault, the inclusion of faculty on contingent appointments in academic governance, and salary-setting practices that unfairly disadvantage women faculty.