In spring 2022, the Republican majority in the legislature took a break from pummeling the professoriate and instead directed its attacks at K–12 educators. Joining the national trend seeking to promote what were represented as parents’ rights and increased curricular “transparency,” some legislators accused teachers and librarians of having a “sinister agenda” and proposed criminal penalties for including “obscene” topics and materials in classrooms and school libraries. These were bad times, to be sure, for all those who treasure academic and intellectual freedom. Nonetheless, at least for the 2022 legislative session, the subject of tenure seemed to be off the table.

However, the work of defunding and micromanaging the state universities continued during the legislative session of 2022 in ways that clearly communicate disrespect for the academic mission. The same contempt for lifelong scholarship that led legislators to consider banning tenure remained apparent in budgetary deliberations. The pride in high-quality public education that inspired Iowa to put a schoolhouse on the Iowa quarter was nowhere to be seen in 2022.