In the Spring of 2007, a group of DePaul University students began a campaign to raise support and awareness of the denial of Dr. Norman Finkelstein and Dr. Mehrene Larudee's tenure, an event that was politically motivated and has degraded academic freedom at DePaul University.

Tenure Denials

For several years, DePaul's Dept. of Political Science became the center of Dr. Finkelstein's vicious tenure battle. Both inside and outside entities, disrupted the impartial tenure process which eventually led to Dr. Finkelstein's denial. For example, Harvard Law School Professor Alan Dershowitz is known to have sent a dossier of disinformation to a large numbers of the faculty at DePaul, including the entire College of Law, and Dept. of Political Science. It is also public that he had been an influencing factor over several tenured professors in the Department. Approved by a vote of 9-3 in the Department, and 5-0 at the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Dean Charles Suchar wrote a dissenting opinion, which was blindly followed by the University Board on Promotion and Tenure, and DePaul University President Fr. Dennis Holtschneider.
Dr. Mehrene Larudee was denied at the University level despite being approved unanimously by her Department, College and Dean. Dr. Larudee had numerous publications and was not short on scholarship, nor was she below average in teaching evaluations or service to the university. There is no way for sure of knowing why she was denied tenure, except for the fact that she was actively involved on a university committee that sought to support Norman Finkelstein in the time of outside interference.

Faculty Response

As soon as the week after Dr. Finkelstein and Dr. Larudee's tenure denial both the Faculty Council and College of LA&S Faculty Governance Councils lobbied questions to the Provost Helmut Epp, and Dean Charles Suchar about their role in facilitating outside interventions, and called for an appeal of these decisions. As such, appeals have been filed and though the legal battles have already started. Faculty are watching the case and have started to actively support the professors who were denied, recognizing their own academic freedom is in jeopardy.