| Abstrakt: |
In modern society, higher education creates conditions for every member of society to study, improve, cooperate with society, be secular, provides opportunities to travel for the sake of science. "In the law of the Republic of Lithuania, the task of higher education is to develop education, a personality and society receptive to science and the latest technologies and cultural values, to create, accumulate and spread scientific knowledge and cultural values, to consolidate the distinctiveness of national culture, to promote scientific research and the creation of new knowledge and cultural values" (Avižienis, 2022, p.209). Biesta (2014), Jokubaitis (2016), Barnett (2021), a researcher of higher education in European countries, states that higher education, social responsibility and academic freedom, which promote competitiveness, growth of knowledge and human resources" (Kuchaidze, 2020). Indrašienė and others (2021) claim that higher education should be viewed from a broader perspective, understood as a basis for the development of personality and society. There are many expectations associated with higher education, the main of which is to provide knowledge, participate in scientific research and apply the available knowledge to the sustainable, advanced growth of society and the individual, responding to the needs of the times, forecasting and shaping them. According to Valuckienė (2009), changes in higher education and studies in the context of society have been discussed (Barnett, 1990, 1994, 2000, 2004), whose emphasis is on the value basis of higher education, based on the scientific activities of the academic community, constantly striving for liberal education of students, objective knowledge, commitment. Higher education institutions should encourage their students and scholars to become responsible and aware citizens. This means that higher education institutions should develop leadership, social responsibility and sustainable development initiatives. Therefore, academic freedom and social responsibility should be combined in order to achieve the benefit of higher education for society and the welfare of society. Academic freedom is the most important value of higher education because it ensures that researchers and academics can freely research, discuss and publish their findings without any prior restrictions. This is the fundamental thing that encourages new discoveries, ideas and scientific research, as well as ensuring that scientists are free to reveal facts, even if they are unpopular. Academic freedom and social responsibility in higher education were studied by (Adebayo, 2022; Barnett, 2021; Gläser and Buenstorf, 2022; Jakubik, 2023). However, these works rarely raise the question of how academic freedom and social responsibility relate to critical thinking in higher education. The aim of the article is to reveal the links between academic freedom and social responsibility with the development of critical thinking in higher education, based on the literature. To achieve the goal, the following problematic questions are raised: Why are academic freedom and social responsibility important for higher education? How does the development of critical thinking change the understanding of academic freedom? How does developing critical thinking increase social responsibility? Research methods. The method of theoretical analysis examines psychological, scientific didactic literature, the conditions, methods, etc. thinking education. in the process of university studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
