The Duty of Impartiality in Teaching and the Criteria of “Controversial Issues”

Abstract

When do teachers need to deal with sociopolitical issues impartially and when are they justified in taking a stand? In the academic literature, attempts to answer this question have centered on the relative merits of four criteria of controversial issues: the epistemic criterion, the behavioral criterion, the politically authentic criterion, and the political criterion. In this paper, Bruce Maxwell first presents a critical survey that details the limitations of these criteria as heuristic methods for reliably distinguishing controversial from uncontroversial issues for pedagogical purposes, and then advances and defends a more promising approach. This approach prioritizes students' rights and teachers' responsibilities at stake and hence aligns with the standard decision procedure that professionals gravitate toward when faced with a problem of professional ethics. The paper concludes with a discussion of the practical value for educators of focusing on teachers' responsibilities and students' rights in the context of professional decision-making about impartiality, rather than referring to the descriptive criteria of controversial issues.