In the first faculty senate meeting of 2025, Northeastern faculty continued to criticize the university’s handling of its academic freedom policies, a topic that defined the majority of the senate’s sessions in the fall 2024 semester. 

Louise Walker, a senator for the College of Social Sciences and Humanities, asked the university at the Jan. 15 virtual meeting to publicly denounce the past version of the “Safe Campuses, Civil Discourse” FAQ that included wording many faculty members said posed a threat to Northeastern community members’ ability to express themselves and peacefully protest. 

Senators also discussed a policy presented by Dee Spencer, secretary of the Senate Agenda Committee, that would increase the number of terms senators can serve from two to three successive two-year terms. Currently, after serving two two-year terms on the faculty senate, senators must wait a year before re-running. 

“It’s a tremendous amount of work, and it’s very, very important work, and we are seeing turnover at those levels,” Spencer said of being a faculty senator. “And just when a faculty senator starts to really get comfortable and feel their legs under them, they have to go off the faculty senate for a year.”

Joshua Stefanik, a senator for the Bouvé College of Health Sciences, read aloud feedback on the proposed increase in successive terms sent to him by a faculty member. The unnamed faculty member expressed concerns about three terms potentially hampering new voices from being heard, saying that “this is not good practice in any organization or governance structure.” The unnamed faculty member went on to say that senate meetings being open to faculty provide “ample” opportunity to connect with their representatives and voice their opinions. 

The meeting reignited discussions and concerns regarding university policy on faculty freedom of expression that marked faculty senate meetings last semester. The meeting began with Walker asking the authors and approvers of a FAQ on university freedom of expression policies — which is run by the university’s office of external affairs — to disavow a past version of the page. In September 2024, the university laid out these policies in the “Safe Campuses, Civil Discourse” FAQ, which generated pushback to Northeastern administration. 

The policies, which The Huntington News first reported Oct. 5, imposed strict regulations and punishments for unauthorized on-campus protests. An update to the FAQ page said faculty wishing to both organize and participate in on-campus demonstrations must “seek approval from the Office of the Provost.” The university later changed the wording of the FAQ, removing the regulations that prompted debate among faculty. 

Michael Armini, Northeastern’s senior vice president for external affairs whose office runs the FAQ page, called the past wording of the FAQ — which was later changed following faculty objection — “upsetting” at an Oct. 30 faculty senate meeting. Faculty also expressed concern that the past version of the FAQ provided students with resources to report faculty demonstrating “political advocacy or bias.”

“I have heard from professors since then, and faculty are worried that the senior leadership administration won’t stand up for the rights of academic freedom and free expression,” Walker said. “These worries, my impression is, are connected to the changing of the political guard in America and what faculty might face in the coming years.”

At the Jan. 15 meeting, Walker asked that the FAQ’s authors and approvers “apologize” and “disavow” the past wording of it. 

Walker directly addressed David Madigan, Northeastern’s provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, asking, “Is there something you can do, David, with the senior leadership team to get the authors and approvers who’ve done so much damage to apologize for it and also disavow the content of it?”

In response, Madigan referenced a November 2024 interview he did with the university-run media outlet Northeastern Global News, which hosts the FAQ page. In the interview, which was conducted by Northeastern’s director of media training and strategic initiatives, Madigan answered questions about academic freedom and freedom of expression.

“My preferred approach is what I’ve been doing, what we’ve been doing, which is just to reaffirm our principles and our commitments to these core principles,” Madigan said at the senate meeting. “Academic freedom and freedom of expression is a core bedrock principle by which the university operates. It is loud and clear in the Faculty Handbook, and of course we might improve it.”

In the interview with Northeastern Global News, Madigan said that demonstrations fall under the “rubric” of freedom of expression. However, he added, any demonstration on campus requires approval from administration. 

“What I’ve heard from colleagues since the interview you did with the PR unit is that the reaffirmations are certainly welcome, and do go some way,” Walker said. “But unless it comes with a disavowal of what was in that FAQ, there’s a concern that the FAQ represents again, what one professor commented, ‘What they really think.’”

Jonathan Kahn, one of two senators representing Northeastern School of Law, said that he would prefer that administration elucidate the connection of the FAQ to the university’s principles.  

“For me, the important thing is just the clarification about the relationship with the FAQ to the articulated principles,” Kahn said. “And I don’t want to rake any individuals over the coals or anything, but for me, that’s the sort of critical issue.” 

Faculty also discussed amending the faculty handbook bylaws that outline the officers of the senate. Among other changes, the proposed amendment would switch the chair of the faculty senate from Northeastern’s provost and senior vice president — Madigan — to the chair of the Senate Agenda Committee, currently Heidi Kevoe-Feldman, an associate professor of communication studies. Madigan, who previously supported the change, said he had changed his mind, saying that close ties with administration are important for faculty governance. 

The Jan. 15 meeting came a day before the university announced that Madigan is stepping down from his position in June.