Framing this argument as a war is absurd. There is no war. It's a board of trustees who don't care abt higher ed and are trying to take away the right to free speech. That's all. Faculty have no power and the admin has control of all the financial resources. www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...

Vanderbilt’s Board Declares War Against Academic Freedom

A new policy punishes faculty for speech the trustees deem strays from the core purpose of the university.

insidehighered.com

They also don't want comp around cause comp/rhet has been responsible for publishing scholarship on the realities of teaching writing. Like writing takes time & practice & can't be assessed well w tests, which admin don't like cause it means $ for resources like small classes & good pay for NTTs.

This is the argument I open my classes with to convince students not to use AI to complete their writing classes. Maybe people don't care about stealing intellectual property, but they do seemingly care about a clean glass of water and sound pollution from data centers.

Dianne Dupuis@iamfreetobeme.bsky.social · 3d ago

A data center in Wyoming has contaminated the water supply.

I would imagine NCTE cutting out writing studies from its council would be like an academic math council or organization cutting algebra teachers and pedagogy. I really don't know what the right analogy is for this.

Almost every paper I've ever submitted for publication came w feedback that went basically like this: Reviewer 1: This is not the way. You need to make the following 78 revisions and resubmit. Reviewer 2: WTF is this? Get your shiz together. Tighten it up. Here are 93 comments to consider.

Dr. Sarah Parcak @indyfromspace.bsky.social · 5d ago

It's incredible is how little folks understand about academe. Peer review is brutal. Academic Q+A is Troy level slaughter. Bros attacking a lady academic for a fair review would shit themselves on stage after a paper and break down into toddler tears after their first conference paper w a mean Q+A.

There's no $$ for Head Start or for anything that actually helps people, but there is $120+ billion for missiles while everyone struggles to buy overpriced gas and food.

For AY 26-27, donations to any NCTE affiliated fund will no longer be accepted to list a job on rhetmap. I checked the spreadsheet, and there have been approximately 240 donations to the CCCC Assistance Fund for Contingent Faculty Fund in the last decade. I'd like to make sure those donations are..

2) The conference should provide space for CCCC members to continue the organizing work already underway so they can explore what an independent organization outside of NCTE might look like. 10/21

I was candid with both of them about the level of anger many people feel toward NCTE and acknowledged that there are likely relationships that cannot be repaired. 4/21

Update on CCCC 2027 I just got off a call with Antero Garcia and Emily Kirkpatrick. 1/21

There is no AI without stealing intellectual property. That's the business model. Take everyone's work, build AI tools, dismantle access to knowledge, force people to pay to use AI. www.reuters.com/world/german...

German court rules AI music firm Suno broke copyright rules

A German ​court ruled on Friday that AI music firm Suno violated ​copyrights and has to disclose illicit revenue, part of a wider ⁠legal battle by artists and publishers against technology firms.

reuters.com

There is a well-funded, national movement to eliminate writing classes and support for teaching writing and replace them with AI. This country doesn't want people to learn how to write so they have to use AI to do all their writing and thinking. Cut all the writing support and force them to use AI.

NCTE is now just the No Composition Teaching Ever council.

I wonder why there's no money in this country to invest in education, healthcare, and the environment. www.reuters.com/business/aer...

US strikes $58.6 billion Patriot missile deal amid rising stockpile concerns

The U.S. Army awarded Lockheed Martin a contract worth up to $58.6 billion to produce Patriot interceptor missiles, the Pentagon ​said on Wednesday, as conflicts in Iran and Ukraine strain U.S. weapon...

reuters.com

I dislike when they offer a discount in the summer to register for a conference in the fall, when no one has access to their PD $$$ yet. And definitely don't charge a late fee to register. Discounts for early registration are cool, but getting $$ from a college for a conference is very complicated.

It's possible other schools will follow its lead and dismantle & ruin an amazing resource students need & have relied on for decades for writing advice. It's almost like there is a national movement in higher ed to dismantle writing pedagogy/resources so AI can take over the writing classroom

Mary Lewis@profmarylewis.bsky.social · last wk.

It‘s quite possible that with this move, @harvard.edu could become the only Ivy League university without a writing center. www.thecrimson.com/article/2026...

All these higher ed orgs & councils have been taken over by academic grifters who are taking advantage of political momentum to displace & remove people & programs they don't like or want to manage. Higher ed is being inundated w new types of bad actors trying to dismantle learning from the inside.

Dan Libertz@dlib24.bsky.social · last wk.

Why did NCTE and CCCC officers have to sign NDAs? Do we have trade secrets about semicolons? I don’t understand. What a rotten organization NCTE is…we are educators and not defense contractors or Coca-Cola. Ridiculous. No NDAs for our new org #teamrhetoric

My home library will be priceless in a decade. I was trained on pre 2022 print publications.

Sacrifice! At the Harvest Festival@theharvestmaid.bsky.social · last wk.

Why is everything so transparently evil now?

What do you call a country that continues to punish people for simply disagreeing with its leadership and corporate fascism? futurism.com/artificial-i...

High School Teacher Arrested for Clapping in Support of Anti-Data Center Activists

A local high school physics teacher was hauled out by four police officers for clapping six times during a city commission meeting.

futurism.com

I just finished an assessment report for comp and had to contextualize the assessment data for the department and then share it with faculty so they can consider the assessment when teaching those courses. That's difficult work to complete without comp/rhet scholarship, conferences, and discussions.

Dan Martin@danmartin7.bsky.social · 2w ago

It's wild because comp is the most widely offered course at any university across the nation & many faculty across all English fields teach comp more than they teach in their expertise. 1000s of people who don't even study comp rely on the CCCCs for resources and conversations abt teaching writing.

Every single raise I've ever earned has been accompanied by an increase in insurance, taxes, and food costs so I've never really had a raise. Safeway and the insurance companies usually take my raises.

Crowsa Luxemburg@quendergeer.bsky.social · 2w ago

chart for dinner

It's wild because comp is the most widely offered course at any university across the nation & many faculty across all English fields teach comp more than they teach in their expertise. 1000s of people who don't even study comp rely on the CCCCs for resources and conversations abt teaching writing.

Writing studies needs its own council & org, managed by people in the field, so we don't have to wonder when the rug will get pulled out from under us. That has happened for 60+ years. We need to own the rug. This is also why stand alone writing departments exist.

From Kathleen Blake Yancey with clearest info about possible actions: docs.google.com/document/d/1...

CCCC Kathleen Blake yancey

About CCCC. ****Please share widely.**** It is my understanding that the full NCTE Executive Committee has NOT voted to dissolve CCCC. It is my understanding that the NCTE Executive Committee is meet...

docs.google.com

Dan Libertz@dlib24.bsky.social · 2w ago

I still can’t totally understand this. They can just…eliminate us in the middle of summer without any deliberation? This reeks of cowardice. They acted fast bc they feel threatened

This is basically the same story of comp/rhet in English departments for decades. It's why we needed the CCCC. "The department looks forward to involving writing studies in the future of the department if possible." Did seven English department chairs from the 1980s write this memo?

Michelle Chen@michellechn.bsky.social · 2w ago

NCTE: We look forward to continuing to involve the composition, rhetoric, and writing communities as we move forward. The Entire CCCC Membership: new Cs who dis

It reads like the NCTE had been trying to find a way to de-charter the CCCC's for years so there must have been a group of scholars pushing for and organizing this move for years.

Humanities organizations dismantling humanities organizations means the humanities are now being dismantled from the inside. Humanists are now fighting each other because, and this is the kicker, they don't understand each other's scholarship, especially if it has political commentary. 😔

They just carved out $95 billion to keep the Iran war going while everyone struggles at the grocery store. There's also no money for higher ed or health care or anything else that actually makes living easier and enjoyable. You can literally drown yourself on AI, gambling, or war to make it go away.

The state & federal government shifted the burden for paying for college onto students & they privatized the loan system so it's a nightmare to manage repayment. It doesn't have to be this way. They just spent $40 billion last week on war instead of higher ed. www.washingtonpost.com/education/20...

Americans say four-year colleges cost too much

But they still want to keep sending their children, new poll shows.

washingtonpost.com

These are the same people who support low paying jobs & labor exploitation. They don't want students to see the value of higher ed beyond employment. Being educated & learning gives people joy & a way to grow. Reading, writing, thinking, and creating are what it means to be alive and human.

NPR@npr.org · 3w ago

If an undergraduate program's graduates don't earn more than workers who never went to college, that program could be cut off from federal student loans. But is a degree just about making more money?