Academic freedom does not protect your "freedom" not to do your job

It cheapens the value of academic freedom for professors to invoke it as protecting their right not to teach their classes in "solidarity" with what they deem a worthy social movement.    Academic freedom does not cover failure to discharge professional duties; indeed, just the opposite.  Faculty who consistently fail to carry out their professional duties--whether teaching or research--can be terminated consistent with academic freedom. 

Academic freedom protects the freedom of faculty in their teaching and research, subject only to standards of disciplinary competence as assessed by their peers in the discipline.  That means faculty can design their classes as they see fit, and can explore any directions in their research--in both cases, subject only to the constraints imposed by their disciplinary competence.  A sociologist can certainly choose to focus on issues of race in their teaching and research, as long as what they're doing is competent sociology.  But a sociologist teaching a class on race in American society can't cancel class to make a political statement:  academic freedom does not cover that choice.

Under the AAUP definition, academic freedom also protects the extramural speech of faculty on matters of public interest, precluding their employer from disciplining or sanctioning them for their political speech.  But it does not protect a faculty member's decision to "strike" in solidarity with Black Lives Matter by not teaching their scheduled classes.   This is not even a close case, and it speaks volumes about he ignorance of academics about what academic freedom is and is not that any professor would invoke it in this context.  (These academics seem to believe that "academic freedom" is the freedom of academics to say and do what they want:  it isn't.   They could start by reading this.)

In the two cases at issue here--one at Texas A&M, and one at Mississippi--it's quite clear that the university and official responses are wildly disproportionate to the infraction.   The faculty who failed to teach their classes could certainly be docked pay or issued a warning and reprimand in their personnel files.  But these are not firing offenses.