on why there shouldn't be total academic freedom

Academic freedom is great when the educators are good but what if teachers are just downright idiots/sadists?

with academic freedom, they are free to continue their craziness.

In truth the spirit of Academic freedom is to enable educators to teach and tailor the presentation of the subject matter to his/her own students in a way he/she sees it best. I've been a student for about 14 years and that 14 years is more than enough for me, or for anyone to be convinced that academic freedom is being abused.

yeah, that's right, ABUSED (there are lots of exceptions of course).

That's why teachers who fancy themselves as being "terror teachers" exist. They can flunk students at will and with impunity. They can lord over the class as if within the 4 walls of the classroom they are inerrant and infallible. An example? how grade school teachers teach us lots of misconceptions with impunity. Like Napoleon is short (he's in truth, 5'7) or Magellan was the first to circumnavigate the globe (and when you start to ask "wasn't he killed by that Lapu-lapu dude here?" they'll stand with their perception still) or even that we have an angel and demon by our side influencing our moral decisions when in fact we are ruled by our consciences... then by high school, it's like we get our blindfolds off and start to see that most of what we've learned and paid for were actually just misconceptions.

That's why dumb teachers exist. Yes. reklamador has a long-standing tradition of brutal honesty. Yes. DUMB teachers. This is usually the case with unpopular subjects or subjects that are thought not to stir the gray matter inside our skulls. Like the Filipino subject (but of course, Filipino requires lots of brain matter to teach since it's a language subject that has its own peculiarities). I've only encountered decent ones in 6th grade, 3rd year and 4th year high school that have grasped the material in full and would entertain questions with enthusiasm and wouldn't code switch every now and then to another language. But now, in college, I don't know why my Filipino teacher is still employed or that if she actually has half a brain! I mean seriously.

1. She got schooled by her own student on what Kaganapan and Pokus is. Her excuse? College is not about grammar. BUT SHE'S A F*CKING FILIPINO TEACHER AND SHE DOESN'T HAVE A GOOD GRIP ON FILIPINO GRAMMAR?! WTF IS SHE HERE FOR?! Expletives aside, its true, language teachers can be at length in explaining literature since grammar is already innately mastered by them.

2. To add fuel to the fire and to show her incompetence not only in grammar but also in interpreting literature, she doesn't know how to interpret what "ang buwan ay iniluluwas ng karimlan" means! When I asked her about it since it was a crucial multiple choice question, she just said, in verbatim "you know we have answer key for this" so even in English she sucks! and she speaks English in Filipino class!

3. She also doesn't objectively follow criteria. She gave huge percentage on pronunciation and voice projection. I know I nailed these two factors both but how come, in our SPEECH contest, those who had sh*tty vernacular-accentuated Filipino who delivered in a declamatory style got 100 and I got a f*cking 88?! I approached her about it and asked for a breakdown of the points. She was UNABLE to give them and she held on to her given grade as being final and irreversible (maybe just to save face).

But of course, it's not about saving face. She should always strive towards the truth (veritas liberabit vos, anyone?) and by all means, she should admit her mistakes, admit her idiocy so that we get to the best answer.

This is a case of parasitism. She gets paid as a regular employee while all she does is speak English on a Filipino subject, give grades on a whim and just facilitate discussion. Is anyone benefiting from her? no. She gets paid by the university, we get to suffer. A big nail in the coffin of the claim that academic freedom isn't abused.

What I would recommend is not total autocracy when it comes to lessons. I still believe in the competency of my other teachers to tailor the concepts to us, the students. What I would like is regulated academic freedom. It's like still giving teachers freedom to teach students in the way they know best but within set parameters and an aggressive feedback mechanism. Set parameters are there so that there's a degree of regularity and speed in discussion which teachers can decide upon every start of the school year. Is there a need for an aggressive feedback mechanism? Yes. Why? Because evaluations are a total failure. Every evaluation, I am at length in explaining why I gave my teachers such ratings. But that single sheet of paper is inferior to the plethora of evaluation forms from most of my blockmates that are just complacent with having a Filipino teacher who speaks English in class, gives WTF grades, and is incompetent. They would like to finish it quickly so they can already go out of the classroom. They just blindly check the maximum rating in the hope of pleasing the teacher (and making him/her think she does a good job). So it is evident that evaluation forms are a complete FAIL and the only foolproof way of evaluating a teacher is to have a hidden recording of a class at random so that counts as a random sample of what's the teacher like and that's absolute proof against the teacher. Problematic teachers should undergo training again or get fired and someone on waitlist gets hired in his/her place.

But of course, that's just being idealistic of me. More likely, department chairs/deans/heads of faculty will not raise a finger to this usually since these people are endeared to their co-teachers and who the hell cares about students? besides, those in significant position are likely to be indebted to their co-workers for approving their promotion. so students? we're just a group of people that will come and go anyway. Those trainings meant to change these teachers without firing them? they think it's a waste of money anyway. so that won't work either.

What are we left with then?

The sh*tty teachers still. They continue this ruse for decades until they retire/die. Proof? My stupid Filipino teacher is a senior citizen. 65+ years old. She's still teaching. Still has a job. She survived multiple decades without being fired. She still continues practicing her pseudo-infallibility, pseudo-inerrancy, pseudo-competency to this very day.

So is there a foolproof and plausible way to thump abuses in academic freedom? I guess there is a lot but no one in authority would like to raise a finger. So should we accept it as part of the Philippine educational system same as burying children alive is accepted by Amazon River tribespeople?

Maybe.