Ahead of Midterms, U.S. University Faculty Report Self-Censoring On DEI, Politics

Six in 10 faculty members told Inside Higher Ed in a new survey that their enthusiasm for working in higher education has somewhat or significantly declined over the past two years. Headlines since 2024 offer plenty of possible explanations for their growing fatigue: The federal government has slashed research budgets and politicians have painted professors as boogeymen. State legislatures are exerting increasing controlover how and what faculty discuss in the classroom, and even tenured professors have lost their jobs over social media posts. Artificial intelligence, now ubiquitous, has touched nearly every part of professors’ jobs, from teaching and grading to research and publishing.

Ahead of tomorrow’s midterm elections, Inside Higher Ed and Hanover Research asked 1,665 faculty members how their jobs have changed since 2024, including whether they’re self-censoring on hot-button issues and if they’d like to stay or leave their current state. The survey also asked about the impact AI has had on their relationships with students.

Hundreds of respondents reported all kinds of self-censorship. Nearly half—47 percent—of faculty members said that they’re refraining from making extramural utterances, such as posting on Facebook, because of the situation on their campus or the political environment at large. Another 43 percent reported that they’re refraining from communicating with students about certain topics in and out of class, and 24 percent said they’re holding back from researching or publishing about certain topics they would otherwise pursue. The results on all of these questions were similar for tenured, tenure-track and non-tenure-track faculty members.

Four in 10 faculty members said they’re refraining from including certain materials on their syllabus that they would otherwise include. Syllabi have been increasingly scrutinized by Republican politicians, and some faculty members have been subject to doxing in recent years because of what’s listed in their course materials. A growing number of states, including Alabama, Florida, North Carolina and Texas, now require professors to post their syllabi publicly.

Asked about which topics are chilled, 50 percent of faculty respondents said they feel less free to discuss diversity, equity and inclusion than they did a year ago. That’s a decrease from the 65 percent of faculty respondents who said the same in 2024, but DEI is still the No. 1 topic for self-censoring. Black and Hispanic respondents were more likely than the group over all to report self-censoring over DEI, with 69 percent and 55 percent, respectively, reporting they felt less free to discuss the topic than they were a year ago.

Forty-five percent of respondents said they feel less free to discuss the Israeli/Palestinian conflict than they did a year ago, and 44 percent said they feel less free to talk about federal politics.

Some 45 percent of faculty members also pointed to federal interference in higher education as one of the things that concerns them most about the state of higher ed today, ahead of issues such as declining enrollment (which 16 percent cited as a top concern), the cost of college (24 percent), declining academic freedom (22 percent) and state-level interference in higher ed (20 percent). Notably, none of the respondents said they had no concerns about the state of higher education.

Over a quarter of respondents said they feel less free to discuss Charlie Kirk—not surprising given that dozens of professors and staff members were fired or disciplined for posting on social media about Kirk in the wake of his death in September 2025.

“I am not surprised that these are the topics faculty avoid the most, especially since we have seen many high-profile cases of faculty being punished or fired for discussing them,” said Kristina Brezicha, an associate professor of educational leadership at Neumann University who studies education and democracy. “On DEI and Palestine, faculty have been fired or disciplined for their speech or actions on and off campus.”

In a polarized era of social media and secret recordings, she continued, federal politics is another area where “many faculty members fear retribution for their statements.”

Faculty members were least likely to report self-censoring about contraception, with only 11 percent feeling less free to discuss the topic, compared with 23 percent who said the same in 2024. Talk about vaccines also appears to be less of a concern, with only 18 percent of faculty reporting they feel less free to discuss them than they did a year ago, compared with 26 percent who said the same in 2024.

Regarding their general enthusiasm about working in higher ed now versus two years ago, nearly two in three tenured or tenure-track faculty say it’s decreased somewhat (37 percent) or significantly (26 percent). Among part-time, non-tenure-track faculty, 37 percent say it’s decreased somewhat, and 14 percent, significantly. For full-time, non-tenure-track faculty, the numbers are 41 percent and 20 percent, respectively. Relatively few respondents overall say their enthusiasm has increased somewhat or significantly in the last two years (9 percent combined).

WOULD THEY STAY OR WOULD THEY GO?

Asked whether they would—if they could—leave the state where their institution is located because of the broader political environment, about a quarter of faculty said yes. Their answers varied by region: Just 2 percent of faculty in New England said they would leave if they could, while 39 percent of faculty in Plains states (Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota) and 37 percent of faculty in the Southeast (Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia) said they would leave the state if they could. In Texas specifically (n=131), 58 percent of faculty reported wanting to leave the state, as did 49 percent of faculty in Florida (n=49).

State political climates are “likely also influencing where faculty apply for jobs,” Brezicha said. “When I worked in Georgia, job candidates asked about the political environment out of concern for their ability to conduct research, but also, more broadly, for their ability to thrive in a state with these types of repressive laws.”

Though they may want to leave, other surveys show that professors aren’t actually moving out of their states at such high rates. Inside Higher Edasked the faculty members who would like to leave or who aren’t sure about leaving (n=583) what’s stopping them, and many cited having children or other family established in their state (42 percent) as a significant barrier. Other barriers included difficulty finding comparable employment elsewhere (42 percent) and fondness for their job or institution, despite the broader political climate (40 percent). About three in 10 professors said their spouse’s job was a deterrent to leaving, and about a quarter were concerned about losing salary.

In Inside Higher Ed’s recent survey of provosts with Hanover, academic leaders reported that overall faculty turnover had cooled since 2024, the end of the Great Resignation.

As for how the upcoming midterms might impact their institution’s ability to deliver on its mission, some 32 percent of professors said they believe the results will have a somewhat or very positive impact. That’s roughly double the share who believe it will have any kind of negative impact (17 percent). The remainder—51 percent—don’t expect any impact. Self-identified Democrats in the sample (n=843) are more likely than the group as a whole to expect a positive effect, at 40 percent. Among Republicans (n=91), it’s 10 percent; most of these respondents expect the effect to be neutral (74 percent).

AI HAS DAMAGED TRUST IN STUDENTS

Despite faculty worries about state-level politics and federal interference in higher education, the thing that concerned faculty respondents most about the state of higher education today was the increased use of generative and agentic AI. Half of faculty members reported that this was a top concern.

Nearly nine in 10 of faculty respondents said AI has had a somewhat or very negative impact on their confidence in the authenticity of students’ work or communications. Social sciences (90 percent) and arts and humanities faculty (92 percent) were more likely to say this than STEM professors (86 percent) and those in law or business (82 percent), but sentiment skews negative regardless of field. About two-thirds of all faculty respondents (67 percent) said AI has had a somewhat or very negative impact on trust between them and their students.

The survey figures “echo what we’ve been seeing and hearing from people everywhere,” said Paul LeBlanc, former president of Southern New Hampshire University and author of the book Reclaiming Purpose: The University in an AI World.

“Faculty of all stripes are seeing students use AI in ways that undermine the learning process and also the trust in the work,” said José Antonio Bowen, a senior fellow at the American Association of Colleges and Universities. “Faculty mostly like students and we want them to succeed, and I think a lot of faculty realize that if you give out candy, people are going to take it, even when they know it is bad for you.”

The reported negative effects of AI have yet to significantly sour professor-student relationships altogether, the data shows. More than half (53 percent) of faculty respondents said AI has had no effect on their overall relationships with students, while 40 percent said it’s had a somewhat or very negative effect, and 7 percent said it’s had a somewhat or extremely positive effect.

“That’s a testimony to faculty’s ability to separate these two things out. In other words, ‘I’m not trusting what I’m seeing in the work that my students are submitting, but I still love my students. That’s only one piece of my relationship with them,’” LeBlanc said. “It’s a reassuring and positive thing to see that.”

Faculty members were most positive about AI when it came to their ability to provide students with timely or individualized support. Nearly one in five respondents (18 percent) said AI has had an extremely or somewhat positive impact on their ability to do so, while most faculty—65 percent—said it has had no effect.

“So few professors report positive impacts from AI, but why would they? I don’t think we are deploying AI in our teaching and learning, generally speaking, in ways that build relationships,” LeBlanc said. For example, instead of going to office hours to ask their professor a question, students can now just ask an AI chatbot, he said.

“When you go to the office to ask your [professor] something, you might get your particular question answered, but it’s also a chance to get to know each other,” he said. “It’s a chance to connect.”