IOWA CITY — A review of voter registrations shows that the faculty at state university undergraduate programs lean heavily to the left.

At the University of Iowa, for example, there are eight Democrats for every one Republican, according to the review by the Des Moines Sunday Register.

The data confirms the belief many political watchers have held for years that college professors are overwhelmingly liberal.

Some conservative students said they cloak their political leanings to appeal to professors or avoid attacks from peers.

“I believe strongly in my political views, but I need to get out of college with good grades to use those views,” said Sam Becker, 19, a University of Iowa sophomore from Michigan and a Republican.

By matching the names of undergraduate faculty at Iowa’s three public universities with the state database of registered voters, the newspaper determined professors’ political affiliation.

Of the more than 2,400 faculty registered to vote, 55 percent are Democrats. Independents make up 28 percent and Republicans about 16 percent.

“People who go into teaching are more compassionate and like the idea of taking care of people,” said Sanjeev Agarwal, ISU professor of marketing and Faculty Senate chairman. “The struggle is between people who think we should take care of people and the conservative view that we should help people take care of themselves.”

Conservatives say the abundance of Democratic professors affects course offerings, reading selections and class discussions, shaping impressionable minds.

Students for Academic Freedom, a national conservative group, has drafted an Academic Bill of Rights that encourages universities to hire professors with diverse opinions and select material that reflects conservative and liberal views.

“It really adds nothing to what should already be going on in the classroom,” said David Redlawsk, political science professor at U of I and leader of the Johnson County Democrats. “The whole point here is that the people standing up in front have done an awful lot to get there. It is not an environment where students have to expect their views are on an equal plane.”

Some conservative students complain their political views are not just absent, but criticized when professors show political cartoons mocking President Bush or allow Republican bashing.

Some suspect their grades are lowered because of political views, said Tim Hagle, a political science professor for 16 years, and adviser to the U of I College Republicans and Students for Bush.

“It’s hard to prove these kind of things. You have to rely a lot on how the system works and take it that faculty are being fair with their grading,” he said.

Some students who are Republicans said they don’t think they suffer academically due to politics.

Republican Eric Parker, 23, earned his undergraduate degree from the U of I and now is a first-year law student. Parker said that he sees a Democratic slant on the Iowa City campus, but that it hasn’t hindered his grades.

“I didn’t feel like I couldn’t do as well because I have conservative views,” Parker said, adding that Democrat Redlawsk wrote him a recommendation for law school.

The review of faculty political affiliation shows that a majority of undergraduate faculty are registered Democrats, which is common at universities across the country.

Of the more than 32,000 college faculty surveyed in 2001, the most recent year for which data are available, 47.6 percent considered their political beliefs liberal or far-left, according to the University of California Los Angeles’ Higher Education Research Institute. Eighteen percent of faculty labeled their views conservative or far-right.