Protecting Faculty Employment in the “Crisis Economy” Duane Storti Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Adjunct Associate Professor of Applied Mathematics University of Washington, Seattle Vice-president UW-AAUP.
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Protecting Faculty Employment in the “Crisis Economy” Duane Storti Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Adjunct Associate Professor of Applied Mathematics University of Washington, Seattle Vice-president UW-AAUP Goals of this talk: Stimulate thought/discussion on timely topics related to faculty employment: • Identify current problems • Relate to academic freedom • Means of response/supporting resources Comments and questions will help us get to topics of interest, so please interrupt! Worrisome trends • Adjunctification – Systematic elimination of faculty who feel empowered to participate in governance • Katrinafication – Crisis as opportunity to get away with actions which are otherwise intolerable Worrisome trends • Commodification – “Packaging of content” for convenient delivery to the “educational consumer” – Headlong rush into “distance learning” – View of faculty as temporary hired hands • Admini-stratification/Whimocracy – Rise of an “administrative class” separate from the faculty in terms of qualifications, experience, compensation, values, goals… – Systematic erosion of shared governance What’s really wrong? • Significant violations of academic freedom • But why should your administration care? – Principles of academic freedom are spelled out in the AAUP’s “1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure”, and the first of >150 endorsers is the Association of American Colleges and Universities of which WSU is a member. – Accreditation standard 4.A.7 of the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (WSU’s accreditor): “The institution fosters and protects academic freedom for faculty.” (Anyone read this?) Essence of 1940 Statement Purpose The purpose of this statement is to promote public understanding and support of academic freedom and tenure and agreement upon procedures to ensure them in colleges and universities. Institutions of higher education are conducted for the common good and not to further the interest of either the individual teacher or the institution as a whole. The common good depends upon the free search for truth and its free exposition. Essence of 1940 Statement Academic Freedom Academic freedom is essential to these purposes and applies to both teaching and research. Freedom in research is fundamental to the advancement of truth. Academic freedom in its teaching aspect is fundamental for the protection of the rights of the teacher in teaching and of the student to freedom in learning. It carries with it duties correlative with rights. Essence of 1940 Statement Connecting AF and Tenure Tenure is a means to certain ends; specifically: (1) freedom of teaching and research and of extramural activities, and (2) a sufficient degree of economic security to make the profession attractive to men and women of ability. Freedom and economic security, hence, tenure, are indispensable to the success of an institution in fulfilling its obligations to its students and to society. Faculty Employment Conditions are crucial for institutional success • Advocating for improved conditions for the faculty enhances WSU and our society. • Don’t accept guilt trips! Relevant Documents • 1940 Statement • Other AAUP policy documents and reports • State laws – Enabling legislation for collective bargaining – Limitations of sabbatical leave – Contract law: • Your faculty manual is your contract – Administrative procedures act • Faculty manual and other WSU policy docs Enforcing your rights • Rights without enforcement? (Hobbes?) • Avenues of enforcement – Collegial discussion – Internal grievance procedures – PERC • Washington State Public Employment Relations Commission – The agency offers mediation, fact-finding, and arbitration services, training in collective bargaining, and is responsible for processing representation and unit clarification cases, and adjudication of unfair labor practice cases. – Judicial review – Law suit – AAUP inquiry/investigation Limitation of enforcement avenues • Collegial discussion – less likely to be effective when the administrator is not really colleague • Internal grievance procedures – – – – Do procedures exist? Can you actually get a hearing? Timelines? Who chooses the hearing officer? (healthcare arbitration) Are results enforced? Appeals process? Timelines? • PERC – only with collective bargaining • Judicial review – reluctance to interfere • Law suit – Who can afford to take on a university that has not only the AGs office, but also cash for additional representation? • AAUP – currently staff limited • National focus on egregious cases that set precedent with broad implication • State level inquiries by volunteer faculty; minimalist legal defense fund What can/must we do? • Faculty at research universities like to think of ourselves as independent “islands” of intrinsic value. • “That couldn’t happen to me…” until it does. • The only effective protection depends on collective faculty action – – – – Serve on faculty senate/councils/committees Volunteer for grievance panel Participate in AAUP activities (Recruit colleagues to join!) Know your manual and keep an eye on activities in your department/college – Recognize your obligation to help your colleagues exercise their rights (especially tenured faculty support for contingent faculty) Related experiences/anecdotes • Salary policy law suit – Inadequacy of grievance procedures – Importance of class action (despite mass inaction) – Legal status of university handbook/faculty code (despite attempts to twist language) – Coercion of Senate leaders – Challenge of finding appropriate representation – Access to public records – Summary judgment led to settlement – Reaction from Regents / colleagues at UW & CU – Round 2? Experiences/anecdotes (2) • Salary equity consideration – Equity consideration with salary consideration? • “It does not say what it seems to say…” – Role of the Faculty Senate Executive Committee • • • • Point out their power to interpret the Faculty Code Convince them to make “plain English” interpretation Letter to Pres. induced new instructions through Provost to depts. Still most units do not comply. Eternal vigilance… – Who makes policy? Who maintains it? Who interprets it? • Vacation, GSR, communications/website “ownership” • Loyal faculty penalty – Basis in salary policy; data collection; publication and personal plea to Provost/President actually produced dedicated funding. – Long term commitment has not been kept. Experiences/anecdotes (3) • Trend toward contingency leads to abuses – UW ESL instructors (denial of faculty status) – UW med school • Deans gone wild / scandal-based promotion • Ignored adjudications and EEOC findings • Simultaneous dismissal/patent – WSU extension • Copyright dispute • Time at work policy – Dismissal of activists at Antioch University campuses Experiences/anecdotes (4) • The horrors of Katrina – In addition to widespread personal tragedies, widespread dismissal of faculty occurred with no regard for AF&T. (See second document in Red Book: Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure.) – Major AAUP investigation led to multiple censures. – Most schools have made changes and been removed from censure, but Tulane used the “crisis” as an opportunity for program elimination (including the entire college of engineering except chemE/bioE) Experiences/anecdotes (5) • Economic Katrinafication – Economy as justification for program elimination • without following usual procedures • without declaring financial crisis that would hurt bond ratings – UW was a pre-Katrina pioneer in the 1990s • Activism prevented some cuts, but status still tenuous. – Currently happening at WSU? Experiences/anecdotes (6) • The Antioch Debacle: A cautionary tale of leadership that embraces the “business model” • • • • • Command and control structure Campuses nationwide to deliver content to consumers Marketing dominates academics (MBA etc.) Disinterest in residential undergraduate education Systematic disenfranchisment of faculty – Choke off info flow – Mandated curriculum change • Resulting financial “crisis” (depreciation acctg.?) led to – Unilateral closure of Antioch College. – Dismissal of all faculty without due process. – Faculty role in governance is crucial. – Direct relationship with admin. and board can save the day. Conclusion • Thanks! • Let’s continue discussing topics that matter to you… – – – – – – Budget process (or lack thereof) Program elimination Policy imposition Salary policy Curriculum control Manual has discipline but not grievance procedures and duties but not rights!? – Etc.? • Statutory authority for shared governance: – RCW 28B.20.200 FACULTY -COMPOSITION GENERAL POWERS. The faculty of the University of Washington shall consist of the president of the University and the professors and the said faculty shall have charge of the immediate government of the institution under such rules as may be prescribed by the board of regents. • Find similar statutory language for WSU!?