Ifenure causes controversy among regents, professors
TENURE from page 1
found grossly incompetent.
At the University of Texas in Aus
tin, a five-year tenure peer review pro
cess was recently approved. The
university’s faculty members are say
ing it’s going to make it easier to fire
tenured professors. The University of
Minnesota in Minneapolis ended a
year-long struggle last month when
regents finally agreed to quit trying to
change tenure policies.
And at the University of Nebraska
at Kearney, orders by NU President
Dennis Smith to prepare a post-tenure
review proposal prompted one UNK
Faculty Senate member to declare it
was a “war on tenure.”
Here, opinions about tenure range
from wanting to get rid of it altogether
to wanting to keep it stoically the same.
NU Regent Drew Miller of
Papillion is one that would like to see
it go. He said he’s one of many.
“With all the protections you have
in employment, you can’t be fired for
you views,” Miller said. “The idea of
a guaranteed job has gone away in ev
ery other place in our economy, and
there’s no reason academia should
have this outdated concept.”
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same as they were when he was in
school — laziness.
“As a student taking classes, I had
tenured professors that were partly re
tired on the job,” Miller said. “They
can slack off and not get fired.”
Even though he doesn’t agree with
tenure, Miller said he won’t use his
position as a regent to fight it. Getting
rid of it would simply be too much and
too long of a fight.
“There are other things I’d like to
see changed at the university,” Miller
said. “It would take a lot of my effort
and time.”
In the end, he said, tenure will prob
ably bum itself out anyway.
‘Tenure’s on its way out,” Miller
said, noting that it doesn’t exist at
many private schools. “If you’ve got a
really good faculty person, the last
thing you need is tenure.
“At some point, I would like to see
the University of Nebraska say, ‘(We)
will abolish tenure as soon as other
schools in the Big 12 abolish tenure.’
ife: -
I could see that happen in the next
couple years.”
No way, say UNL administrators
and faculty.
“I don’t think anything like that
would happen here,” UNL’s Chancel
lor James Moeser reassured, but ad
mitted that changes do need to be
made.
That change will most likely be
what is usually called “post-tenure re
view.”
The name in this case is somewhat
deceiving. According to the regents’
bylaws, all UNL faculty—tenured and
non-tenured — are reviewed every
year.
After a probationary period of
about six years, some professors are
given tenure. At that time, they are
promoted to associate professors. At
this level, they are reviewed not only
annually but also an once every three
years to examine progress toward pro
motion.
If they are promoted to a tenured
full-professor position, this is when
post-tenure review (formally called
periodic review of fully-promoted fac
ulty) would take place. Right now, full
professors with tenure have the annual
review but no longer-range evalua
tions.
An ad hoc committee appointed by
the chancellor to study tenure is pre
paring a proposal for the Academic
Senate outlining a possible stance on
the issue of post-tenure review. They
will present the proposal at the Dec. 3
senate meeting.
If senators approve the proposal il
would become policy. If it was not
approved, Moeser said it could be done
by the administration or passed to the
regents.
But it’s in the best interests of the
university to plan it within the faculty,
Moeser said.
Proposals of post-tenure review
recommend evaluations every five cm
six years.
“Shouldn’t there be some evalua
tion of those full professors?” Moesei
said.
Faculty say maybe, but it depends
on how it’s done.
James Ford, an associate UNL En
glish professor and member of the ac
hoc committee, said faculty member!
have a wide range of reactions to the
idea.
“It goes all the way from people
who think we should have more test
ing of our accountability to those who
think we should be left alone, as re
sponsible professionals, to do our job,”
Ford said. ‘1 think die faculty is gen
erally open to some additional mea
sures of accountability as long as ten
ure is never in question.”
Tenure is an important principle in
upholding academic freedom, Ford
said, calling plans like Miller’s “fool
ish.”
“It is only the university which has
been made responsible by society for
the free search for truth,” Ford said.
Tenure has more to do with that
freedom than with teaching or research
competence, he said.
During World War I, before tenure,
Ford said, four professors at UNL were
fired because they were not considered
“patriotic enough, not anti-German
enough.”
And that happened all over the
United States, he said.
Moeser relayed similar tales, both
ancient and modem.
Galileo Galilei is {me example of a
teacher who was ostracized fot bu
“radical” belief that the universe did
not, in fact, revolve around the earth.
And closer to home, during the
’50s, he said the university was pres
sured to fire a UNL professor who was
teaching sustainable agriculture and
challenging use of fertilizers and pes
ticides in farming. He was not fired
because he had tenure, and sustainable
agriculture is now a common practice.
“He happened to be ahead of his
time,” Moeser said.
The ad hoc committee has drawn
up a proposal addressing some prob
lems faculty have brought up with
post-tenure review.
One big problem with the review
process is the time it would take, not
only for the professor being reviewed,
but for the “peers” (other professors)
that were conducting the review.
Professors will have to compile
their published^aaterials and come up
with outside references.
‘It’s not without effort, it’s time and
energy intensive,” Moeser said. “But
the merits far outweigh the demerits.”
Another problem discussed at
length in die proposal is that the re
views focus too much on what would
happen after a negative review. The
proposal states dial there should be a
positive focus for those who have good
reviews.
Eric Marintzer, president of the
Association of Students of die Univer
sity of Nebraska, was appointed by the
chancellor to give student input on the
tenure committee. He said the biggest
debate on post-tenure review would
deal with negative consequences.
Marintzer said ramifications of a
bad review could include salary cuts,
forced teaching instruction classes and
dismissal.
Moeser stressed the positives that
may come from post-tenure review.
“We could even recognize the top
tier of faculty,” Moeser said. In recog
nition of outstanding performance,
professors would receive money for
travel, research equipment or a gradu
ate assistant’s salary.
Goals would also be discussed at
the five-year reviews, he said.
“They will be forward-looking as
well as evaluative,” Moeser said.
Sketching out career goals, Ford
said, would be an important part of the
reviews as he saw them.
“The issue is primarily helping
people reach their potential, helping
them make the biggest contribution to
die university* the state and the world.”
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