The Chronicle News Blog: U. of Colorado-Boulder Appeals Revival of Gender-Bias Lawsuit
As expected, the University of Colorado at Boulder filed an appeal today of a court ruling that revived a federal gender-discrimination lawsuit against the university.
Last month a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit unanimously reversed a lower court’s 2005 decision dismissing a lawsuit filed by two women who say they were gang-raped at a football-recruiting party in 2001.
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Posted in Equity, Legal issues
The New York Times: Noose Found at Columbia
A hangman’s noose was found attached to the office door of a black member of the faculty at Teachers College at Columbia University, according to a memo sent yesterday by the college’s president to students, teachers and staff members. The president, Susan Fuhrman, said the incident had been reported to the city police and was being investigated by the Hate Crimes Task Force. She wrote that she and the college “deplore this hateful act, which violates every Teachers College and societal norm.” Joe Levine, a spokesman for the college, declined to name the professor. Lee C. Bollinger, Columbia University’s president, said in a statement, “This is an assault on African-Americans and therefore it is an assault on every one of us.”
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The New York Times: In Reversal, Student Is Given Extra Exam Time to Pump Breast Milk
A Harvard student must be given extra break time during a medical licensing exam to pump breast milk, a Massachusetts appeals court judge ruled yesterday.
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Newsday: Adelphi sued over professors’ pay disparity
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed a class-action sex discrimination lawsuit in federal court Tuesday against Adelphi University, alleging the university pays its full-time female professors less than male professors of similar status doing the same work.
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Posted in Equity, Salary/Economic Benefits
Dallas Morning News: Judge denies Baptist seminary’s request to dismiss woman’s suit
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Posted in Equity, Legal issues
Inside Higher Ed: Philosophy and Sexism
Sally Haslanger’s latest paper won’t appear until next year, in the journal Hypatia, but a version she posted online is attracting considerable attention by pointing out the limits of progress for women in philosophy.
Haslanger studied the gender breakdowns in the top 20 departments (based on The Philosophical Gourmet Report) and found that the percentage of women in tenure track positions was 18.7 percent, with two departments under 10 percent. She also looked at who published in top philosophy journals for the last five years and found that only 12.36 percent of articles were by women. Figures like that might not shock in some disciplines, but they stand out in the humanities. In history, for examples, a 2005 report found women making up 18 percent of full professors and 39 percent of assistant professors.
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The Chronicle: Adjunct Fitness Instructors at Arizona Community College Say They Were Fired Because They Are Old
Fifteen former adjunct fitness instructors at Mesa Community College are accusing the institution of age discrimination for firing them this summer. The group includes Theo J. Heap, 80, a former president of the college who later started teaching exercise there part-time.
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Boston Herald: University of Vermont installs ‘gender-neutral’ bathrooms
The University of Vermont’s new student center doesn’t just have women’s bathrooms and men’s bathrooms.
It also has “gender-neutral bathrooms,” a feature added for transgendered people. The four single bathrooms in the new Dudley H. Davis Center – each with a toilet, sink, shower and lockable door – cost about $2,500 a piece to build.
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The Chronicle: U. of California Will Pay Former Athletics Official $3.5-Million to Settle Sex-Discrimination Suit
The University of California announced last week that it will pay more than $3.5-million to settle a sex-discrimination case with a former coach and athletics official who sued after she was laid off in 2004.
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Posted in Diversity, Equity, Legal issues
The Chronicle: Jury Orders Fresno State U. to Pay Ex-Coach $5.85-Million in Discrimination Case
A jury has ordered California State University at Fresno to pay $5.85-million to a former women’s volleyball coach who sued the institution for sex discrimination.
Lindy Vivas coached the volleyball team from 1990 until 2004, when Fresno State opted not to renew her contract. University officials have said the decision was based on her “unwillingness to improve the volleyball program,” specifically its noncompetitive schedule, unsuccessful postseason performance, and low attendance at games, by their measure.
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The Chronicle: Same-Sex Partners of Pennsylvania-System Professors Will Receive Health Benefits if New Contract Is Approved
Pennsylvania’s 14 state-owned universities will provide health-care benefits to same-sex partners of their faculty members, according to the terms of a tentative contract deal struck last week.
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Posted in Equity, Salary/Economic Benefits
Lexington Herald-Leader: UK alters domestic partner policy to comply with AG ruling | UPDATED
The University of Kentucky announced Monday that it has created a benefits plan designed to provide coverage for domestic partners and “sponsored dependents” while complying with a recent state attorney general’s opinion.
Under the new plan, UK employees could extend coverage to one qualifying adult and/or that person’s children in their household.
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Posted in Equity, Government, Salary/Economic Benefits
The Mercury News: Sonoma State softball coach awarded $229K over firing
Jurors determined Tuesday that a former Sonoma State University softball coach who was fired in 2005 was treated unfairly because of her gender.
The jury awarded Chris Elze $229,000 in her civil lawsuit against the school.
Elze had sued the school for discrimination after her contract wasn’t renewed after 11 years with the school. Elze’s lawyer, Dave King, argued that Athletic Director Bill Fusco treated Elze differently than male coaches.
Witnesses described instances in which Fusco allowed male coaches to handle problems with their teams, while he disciplined Elze or withheld information from her.
The Chronicle: Softball Coach Discriminated Against Because of Gender, Jury Finds
A former Sonoma State University softball coach who was fired in 2005 was treated unfairly because of her gender, a jury decided on Tuesday. It awarded her $229,000.
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The Ledger: Cronyism Rampant In Hiring at FAMU
In 1998, Florida A&M University hired an accountant named Curtis Hagan to work in financial affairs. It was a routine hire – except for the fact Hagan had just gotten out of prison for shaking down bribes.
A few years later, Hagan was canned after supervisors complained he was lazy and incompetent.
The rise and fall of a $35,000-a-year accountant with a rap sheet wouldn’t be worth mentioning if it was an isolated event. But for years, FAMU students and faculty have joked, groaned and openly wondered about the extent of questionable hiring – if not outright cronyism – on campus.
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Posted in Corruption, Equity
The Michigan Daily: Female profs paid less
Female faculty members at the University make less money than male faculty members on average, according to a study released by the Office of the Provost on May 18.
The study used statistical models to predict faculty salaries. One analysis revealed that female faculty members make 2.5 percent less than their male counterparts.
The pay gap based on gender reflects a national trend of lower salaries for women at universities across the country. The American Association of University Professors released data in 2006 showing that women in academia generally earn 81 percent of what men earn.
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Posted in Equity, Salary/Economic Benefits
Via the PEN Newsletter: WHITE SUPREMACY IS NOT COLOR BLIND
A Supreme Court ruling this summer on voluntary integration plans of Louisville and Seattle schools could sound the death knell for Brown v. Board of Education, warn the editors of Rethinking Schools in their spring issue. If the U.S. Supreme Court refuses to uphold voluntary integration plans in these two cities, it would wipe out the last vestiges of the 1954 Brown decision still in place. Over the years, the court has so chipped away at Brown that it is a mere shell of a decision, honored in speeches every Martin Luther King Jr. holiday but ignored in practice 365 days of the year. While conservatives argue that race-conscious policies are no longer necessary because the United States is becoming a multiracial, multiethnic society, Theodore Shaw of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund points out that “This country has always been a multiracial, multiethnic society. The problem has never been mere race consciousness. It has been white supremacy.” The editors challenge teac!
hers to find new ways to struggle against our increasingly resegregated schools.
http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/21_03/edit213.shtml
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Inside Higher Ed: Gender and Leadership
In some ways, men who are community college administrators are becoming more like women. And in some ways, women in these positions are becoming more like men — in leadership styles and certain demographic trends.
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Posted in Administration, Equity
Inside Higher Ed: ‘Tearing Down the Gates’
In a mix of individual students’ stories and demographic analysis, a new book by Peter Sacks offers a critical analysis of the role of colleges in the class structure of the United States. Tearing Down the Gates: Confronting the Class Divide in American Education is being published this month by the University of California Press. The book urges colleges to pay much more attention to issues of class, and to breaking down class barriers. Sacks is an author whose previous books were Generation X Goes to College (Open Court) and Standardized Minds: The High Price of America’s Testing Culture and What We Can Do to Change It (Perseus). He recently responded to questions via e-mail about the themes of his new book.
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The Boston Globe: A decade of race-blind admissions at Cal
A fit of spring-cleaning led Eric Brooks to a box of old newspaper clips from 1997. That’s when he was the lone black student enrolled in the incoming law school class at the University of California, Berkeley, following the end of affirmative action admissions.
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Inside Higher Ed:
The University of Kentucky Board of Trustees on Tuesday approved a major expansion of faculty benefits, including domestic partner benefits. While domestic partner benefits have become increasingly common among leading colleges and universities, public institutions in states that on the socially conservative side of the spectrum have lagged in offering the benefits. The University of Kentucky announcement noted that the benefits are offered by a majority of the universities the institution uses for benchmarking. The University of Louisville last year became the first university in Kentucky to offer the benefits, which became a recruiting issue with some of the researchers Louisville wanted to attract.
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