The College Fix

University of Michigan students often protest a certain Dearborn-area restaurant that they believe treats its employees unfairly. Some of these protests even earn students internship credit. But Republicans in the Michigan House of Representatives want it to stop the protests, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education:

The Michigan House of Representatives’ education budget includes a provision that would deny funds to any university that collaborates with the Detroit-based Restaurant Opportunities Center, a nonprofit group that University of Michigan students have assisted for internship credit. A News investigation found that the Michigan Restaurant Association got Republican lawmakers to insert the provision into the education budget in response to Michigan students’ involvement, in 2009 and 2010, in protests organized by the Restaurant Opportunities Center outside the Dearborn location of the Italian-restaurant chain Andiamo.

University faculty members are predictably upset:

Faculty members have denounced the provision as an attack on academic freedom, but Republican legislators have argued that public universities should not be aiding protests outside the businesses that support them through state taxes, the newspaper says.

Is this an attempt to prevent to the use of taxpayer money for political purposes, or a blatant violation of academic freedom? Weigh in.

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