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In the provocatively titled Indoctrination U., David Horowitz argues that radical members of college faculties have "intruded a political agenda into the academic curriculum," engaging in propaganda rather than scholarship and indoctrinating students rather than teaching them (Horowitz 2007, xi). Although allegations of liberal bias in academia are nothing new, the issue has gained increased attention as the result of efforts by Horowitz and the Center for the Study of the Popular Culture (CSPC) to promote the Academic Bill of Rights for American colleges and universities.1
According to Horowitz, the goal of the Academic Bill of Rights is to inspire college officials "to enforce the rules that were meant to ensure the fairness and objectivity of the college classroom" (Horowitz 2007, 2).2 Supporters argue that an Academic Bill of Rights is needed to "protect students from onesided liberal propaganda ... [and] to safeguard a student's right to get an education rather than an indoctrination."3 Opponents of the initiative, including the American Association of University Professors, have characterized the Academic Bill of Rights as an assault on academic freedom (Jacoby 2005; Schrecker 2006) that is based on exaggerated claims of anti-conservative bias (Ehrlich and Colby 2004; Wiener 2005; Jacobson 2006a; 2006e; Jaschik 2006e).4
Although a growing body of social science research indicates that college faculties are disproportionately liberal and Democratic, at least when compared with the population in general (Brookings 2001; HERI 2002; Klein and Western 2005; Jaschik 2005b; Klein and Stern 2005a; 2005b; 2006; Rothman, Lichter, and Nevitte 2005) there has been very little systematic research on whether faculty members' political leanings actually affect the ideological views of the students they teach. If students' political views are being changed by a leftleaning professoriate, we should be able to see evidence of that influence; indeed, we would expect that changes in political orientation would be most dramatic among students at more ideologically liberal institutions.
This study utilizes empirical evidence from the CIRP Freshman Survey, the College Student Survey, and the Higher Education Research Institute (HERI) Faculty Survey to assess the effect of faculty ideology on the political attitudes of undergraduate students over the course of a four-year college career (20012005). Our analysis of 38 private colleges and 6,807 student respondents indicates that, consistent with a number...