Susan Crawford, a biologist and adjunct professor at the UVic, was denied contract renewal after fifteen years of employment. She alleges it was because of an incident in 2017 involving supposedly "politically incorrect" speech about climate science.
business.financialpost.com/opinion/was-th…
business.financialpost.com/opinion/was-th…
Specifically, she said in a public talk that contrary to some predictions, polar bears are doing fine and will not be driven to extinction by climate change. An audience member complained to UVic about this "lack of balance", which Crawford says led to her contract non-renewal.
This was an unpaid position for which she carried out no research or teaching, so many of the traditional reasons to value academic freedom are absent here. But not all. If she was "terminated" for extramural speech, that's a clear problem. Though we don't know if that's why.
Anyway, this is definitely one to watch. Hopefully more information will come out.
