dministrators from establishing "official orthodoxies" that would inhibit or penalize professors for expressing unpopular opinions (Weidner, 2003). They also designed peer review and tenure procedures that reflected the idea that professors should not be considered university employees; instead, the AAUP described professors in the same manner as federal judgesùappointed to university positions but expected to offer independent thinking for the greater good (Weidner, 2003).
According to Weidner (2003), Dean of Florida State University's College of Law, the philosophical foundation supporting academic freedom for educators is the idea that students are best served in open and wide-ranging scholarly environments. He notes that since educational institutions are primary vehicles of knowledgeable citizenship, the freedom of teachers and students to examine and criticize ideas is a freedom that deserves protection. Other scholars argue that the freedom to examine and criticize is an esse
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