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November 14, 1990 University of Nebraska-Lincoln Vol. 90 No. 56
Officials, candidate differ over censure
By Jennifer O’Cilka
Senior Reporter_
Some university officials ex
pressed dismay about past
actions of one candidate for
the University of Nebraska presidency,
but that candidate had a different story
to tell aboulanational censure against
his university.
In a statement, the presidents of
the UNL and UNO chapters of the
American Association of University
Professors said they assume a na
tional AAUP censure will disqualify
Robert Dickcson, president of the
University of Northern Colorado, from
the NU presidential search.
The AAUP censure against the
University of Northern Colorado under
Dickcson’s administration came in
1984.
Because the consultants, hired by
the NU Board of Regents to screen
the candidates, failed to discover the
AAUP censure, the whole search
should be questioned, according to
the local AAUP statement.
Robert Bergstrom, prcsidcntofihe
University of Ncbraska-Lincoln chap
ter of the AAUP and an associate
professor of English, and Eugene
Freund, University of Nebraska at
Omaha AAUP chapter president, is
sued the joint statement Tuesday.
Bergstrom said that in 1982-83,
Dickcson terminated 47 faculty
members, 39 of whom were tenured.
“These people were dismissed on
the grounds of what they called pro
gram exigency,” Bergstrom said. This
means UNC needed to reduce the
number of l ull-lime faculty members
by closing programs, he said.
Bergstrom said AAUP principles
state that tenured professors and pro
grams can be cut when such a move
will save the university from being
financially crippled or from closing
entirely. He said this would not have
happened at UNC even without the
faculty cuts.
Rick Silverman, chairperson of the
UNC Faculty Senate, said that at the
time Dickcson made the faculty cuts,
Colorado law mandated that as cn
rollmcnt decreased, faculty positions
had to be cut.
Dickcson said that the AAUP was
concerned that the Colorado Legisla
ture was dictating the number of pro
fessors and money the institution
received.
Silverman, who was not a UNC
staff member at the time of the cuts,
said Dickcson was forced to ax the
positions.
“Whoever became president in 1981
would be forced to have to comply
with the law or else the university
would be in violation,” Silverman
said.
Dickcson said although he might
have agreed with the AAUP concern,
he had no choice but to reduce the
number of faculty members.
Since then, he said, “I have worked
hard with the Legislature and got it
(the law) removed.”
Silverman said one of the reasons
the law was removed was because
Dickcson argued forcefully that it did
not support higher education.
Bergstrom said faculty members
should have been involved in every
step of the process, but were not.
UNC had procedures for consulta
tion with the faculty, he said, but
these were not followed. He said there
was little faculty input into the termi
nations, and UNC did not follow its
own rules.
Dickcson said the entire UNC
faculty voted to change its provisions
for steps to follow in making cuts in
the number of faculty members.
UNC faculty approved a method
for cutting faculty that was not con
sistent with AAUP provisions, Dick
cson said.
The AAUP provisions allow for
faculty members to have an on-cam
pus hearing prior to approaching a
hearing officer and going to court.
The UNC faculty voted not to have
the on-campus hearings before ap
proaching a hearing officer because
they were afraid faculty members
without legal counsel could say some
thing damaging that would hurl them
in court, Dickcson said.
“1 backed the faculty,” Dickcson
said.
He said he feels the AAUP made
an error censuring him on this issue
because the faculty voted to change
the provisions.
An AAUP report that appeared in
the May/June 1984 issucof Academe,
a publication of A A U P, states that t he
organization recognized that the state
Legislature dictated the maximum
number of faculty positions possible
and had ordered a decrease because
of declining enrollment.
However, it also states that the
UNC administration could have taken
measures other than termination. It
suggested that a voluntary early re
tirement plan could have been imple
mented, rather than the termination
of tenured and non-tenured faculty.
It also points out that an expanded
early retirement plan was implemented
in September 1983, too late to affect
the terminated faculty.
But the report added that of the 47
faculty members who were icrmi
See SEARCH on 6
Jeff Willett Daily Nebraskan
Take your best shot
Sophomore Chris Bashus shoots pool at The Reunion on Tuesday afternoon.
KU chancellor
withdraws from
presidential race
From Stall Reports
?nc Budig, chancellor of the University
>f Kansas, on Tuesday withdrew his
tame from consideration for the Uni
versity of Nebraska presidency.
Ina statement, Budig said he could not leave
KU until “closure has been reached on a series
of significant matters w hich will impact KU 's
long-term future."
the statement said that KU isa special place
for Budig and his family and has been the focal
— * * ---
Dr. Budig was an outstanding
candidate.
Gosch
Student regent
-ft -
point of his life lor 10 years.
Budig could not he reached for comment.
NU Board of Regents Chairman Don Blank
said he is certain other regents will be disap
pointed by Budig's announcement.
Budig was high on the list of those being
considered for the presidency. Blank said.
Phil Gosch, University of Nebraska-Lin
coln student regent, said Budig’s decision is
unfortunate.
“Dr. Budig w-as an outstanding candidate,”
Gosch said. “All of them (the candidates) are.
“I know he’s been very successful at Kansas
and I can sec why he’d want to stay there. It’s
an excellent school,” Gosch said.
Study may be incomplete
Professors: Computers affect writing
By Doug Isakson
Staff Reporter_
Although a recent study shows
that computers help students
write belter, three English
professors at the University of Ne
braska-Lincoln say it’s not that simple.
The study, which compared the
writing of students who used comput
ers for classwork and those who did
not, failed to consider many of the
pros and cons of using computers to
teach writing, the professors said. The
study surveyed 15 universities across
the country.
Lcs Whipp, a UNL English pro
fessor, said the study was focused loo
narrowly to make any accurate con
clusions about the advantages of teach
ing writing with computers.
Whipp, who said he often requires
his students to write their papers on
computers, said the advantages of
learning to write with computers should
he measured by more than just the
quality of the end result.
“My sense is dial the study is right,”
he said, “but that it is a fairly narrow
notion.”
Students who can at lord their own
computers have an advantage over
those who cannot, he said. Teaching
all students to use computers pro
vides a socio-economic playing field,”
he said.
And familiarity with computers
helps students in classes other than
composition that require writing, he
said.
Whipp said he hoped students would
learn lo create at the computer, allow
ing them lo write their thoughts down
as they come, making their writing
more dynamic and interesting.
He said he also hoped students
would think at the keyboard, allow
ing them lo take advantage of the
easier correction and editing capa
bilities of a computer.
Kate Ronald, an associate English
professor, agreed that the conven
ience of using computers encourages
students to spend more lime revising
their work.
"As far as I can tell, they are a
wonderful boon to students' writing,”
Ronald said. “They show so graphi
cally that the writing is never fin
ished."
But, she said, computers aren’t a
curc-all and can’t generate ideas.
Dave Wdson, an assistant profes
sor in curriculum and instruction in
the Teachers College and the English
department, said he sees two changes
in students’ writing when they start
using computers to do assignments.
First, he said, students write longer
sentences, an advantage because they
write more, but a disadvantage be
cause their writing became more
wordy.
Second, he said, students become
more willing to revise their work
because they can make corrections
and move paragraphs around more
easily. But rewriting also requires
students to “re-see” their work, he
said, and a computer can’t help them
with that.
Activist: Racism
is worse now
than in 1960s
By Alan Phelps
Staff Reporter
A kind of “social apartheid”
exists in the United States
today because of the
tendency of people to “slick to
their own kind,” a government
official from Mozambique said
Tuesday night.
“Most people come from situ
ations of tremendous homoge
neity — they stick to their own
kind by and large,” said Prexy
Nesbitt, a civil rights activist
who has worked for Martin
Luther King Jr. and currently is
a U S. consultant for the Mozam
bique government.
See NESBITT on 6