AAUP: Investigation at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
The AAUP general secretary has authorized an investigation into key issues of shared governance at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. The investigation, which will be carried out by a committee of AAUP members with no previous involvement in the situation, will focus on issues of concern surrounding the ongoing suspension of Rensselaer’s faculty senate. (12/18)
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Posted in Governance, Unions
Tagged AAUP, Governance, Investigations, RPI, Shared governance
The Olympian: ISU professor fired despite faculty vote
POCATELLO, Idaho – An Idaho State University engineering professor who was suspended in August says he has been fired, despite backing from a faculty appeals board.
The Idaho State Journal reports Habib Sadid confirmed Friday that university president Arthur Vailas had terminated his employment.
In a statement, Vailas said his decision was in the best interests of the institution.
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Posted in Faculty, Governance, Tenure & Promotion
Tagged Governance, Idaho State U, tenure, terminations
The Chronicle: Board Feud at Maricopa Community Colleges Spins Out of Control
The governing board of Maricopa Community Colleges wants to ensure that taxpayers’ dollars are well spent in tight times, and its members don’t care if they have to micromanage to do so. Board members say their day-to-day management decisions preserve fiscal accountability, but some professors and college leaders fear that the board’s eccentric and assertive leadership could damage the system’s reputation.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Governance, Maricopa CC
Press & Sun-Bulletin: BCC faculty votes “no confidence” in trustees
The faculty at Broome Community College has cast a vote of no confidence in the college’s board of trustees, the president of the faculty association said. The votes, which were counted today, were overwhelming in support of the no confidence resolution, said Greta Wingate, president of the association.
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Posted in Administration, Governance
Tagged Broome Community College, no confidence vote, trustees
Austin American-Statesman: Two former regents say Perry allies pressured them to resign
Both cite their support of Perry opponent, Kay Bailey Hutchison.
Two former Texas Tech University System regents said Friday that allies of Gov. Rick Perry’s pressured them to resign after their support for Perry’s political rival — U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison — became public.
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Posted in Governance, Government
Tagged Governance, Politics, Texas Tech
Chicago Tribune: University of Illinois trustee resigns over admissions scandal
Trustee Lawrence Eppley urges other board members to quit
A University of Illinois trustee’s resignation Tuesday made him the first casualty of the school’s high-profile admissions scandal, though fellow board members and those investigating abuses suggested that others are likely to fall.
Trustee Lawrence Eppley quit in a two-page letter to Gov. Pat Quinn that implored his fellow board members to step down along with him. He also urged administrators at the Urbana-Champaign campus to take responsibility for their actions in order to help the university regain the state’s trust.
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Posted in Administration, Ethics, Governance
Tagged Admissions, Scandal, U of Illinois
Chicago Tribune: Trustee requested job help at U. of I.
University gave future son-in-law tailor-made, $115,000-a-year position
University of Illinois board chair Niranjan Shah used his connection with the chancellor in 2007 to get a high-paying university job for his future son-in-law, a Dutch citizen seeking work in the United States.
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Posted in Ethics, Governance
Tagged insider influcence, Scandal, trustees, U of Illinois
Inside Higher Ed: Foxes Guard Illinois Henhouse
When state university leaders lose trust on issues of integrity, it’s usually the job of trustees to show them the door. It’s not that simple, however, in Illinois – where nothing ever is.
As daily and damning reports illustrate, the admissions scandal at the University of Illinois has engulfed senior administrators, as well as some of the very trustees who would, under typical circumstances, be making heads roll. Therein lies the quandary: as faculty and lawmakers are learning firsthand, it’s hard for trustees who are themselves implicated in a scandal to fire anyone for their part in it.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Admissions, Governance, Scandal, U of Illinois
The Chronicle News Blog: Colorado State U. Board of Governors Broke Open-Meetings Law, Judge Rules
Colorado State University’s governing board violated the state’s open-meetings law when it selected one of its members as the sole finalist for chancellor in a private session, a state judge has ruled, according to The Coloradoan.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Colorado State U, Governance
The Chronicle: How to Fire Your President: Voting ‘No Confidence’ With Confidence
College faculties often use votes of “no confidence” to try to push out the leader of their institutions. Many do so, however, without giving much thought to what such a vote actually means, whether they are using it appropriately, or how it will affect their institution—and their own future.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Governance, no confidence vote, univer
Inside Higher Ed: Out of the Loop
Sixty-four percent of American faculty members at four-year colleges believe that their institutions have a “strong emphasis” on a “top down management style,” according to an international survey of professors being released today at the annual meeting of the American Association of University Professors. Only 31 percent said that they believed there was a strong emphasis on collegiality in decision making, and only 30 percent believe that there is a strong emphasis on good communication between management of higher education and academics.
British professors in the survey had an even gloomier view on those measures of shared governance. Professors in China saw a bit more collegiality (35 percent) and less of a top down management style (57 percent).
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Posted in Governance
Tagged collegiality, Faculty, Governance, management, shared-decision making, top-down management
Inside Higher Ed: Departments Without Chairs
Department chairs are a fixture of campus life and academic governance. A plan being floated at Kean University of New Jersey would merge many existing departments into larger units and replace chairs with “managers” — who would be appointed by administrators and would not hold faculty rank or tenure.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Academic freedom, Department chairs, Governance, managers, tenure
Chicago Tribune: Chicago State University faculty group seeks ouster of trustees
Faculty Senate asks Gov. Pat Quinn to stop trustees from hiring a president
Chicago State University faculty took the unusual step Tuesday of asking Gov. Pat Quinn to remove the university’s board of trustees.
The unanimous request from the Faculty Senate, which comes days before trustees plan to announce their decision on the next university leader, also asks Quinn to stop the board from hiring a president.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Chicago State, Governance, trustees
Inside Higher Ed: More ‘No Confidence’ Votes in Board That Killed Tenure
A handful of faculty and staff boards have passed votes of “no confidence” in the Kentucky Community and Technical College System’s Board of Regents following its controversial decision last month to eliminate tenure for all new faculty hires. April 16, the Executive Council of Kentucky Community College Faculty and Staff Alliance (KCCFSA) – a labor group associated with the American Federation of Teachers – unanimously censured the board. The next day, four faculty councils overwhelmingly passed “no confidence” votes in the Michael B. McCall, system president, and the regents. These votes took place at Mayville, Elizabethtown, Hopkinsville and Bluegrass Community Colleges. These votes follow a vote two weeks ago by the faculty of Southeast Kentucky Community College. Now, 5 of the system’s 16 colleges have passed “no confidence” resolutions. Faculty advocates say votes at even more institutions are planned for this Friday. Barbara Ashley, KCCFSA executive director, said these resolutions mark the first time since the founding of the Kentucky system that any votes of “no confidence” have been taken against the governing board or a system administrator. McCall and the regents have offered no response to these recent votes.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Governance, Kentucky, no confidence vote, tenure
Tallahassee Democrat: Policy change at FAMU brings up faculty’s right to know
What started out as a routine policy change for Florida A&M’s trustees last week turned into a right-to-know issue for faculty.
At a trustee sub-committee meeting, members were asked to approve a policy change that would require annual performance evaluations for six FAMU executives. However, wording of the policy change included faculty.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Administration, FAMU, Governance
The Independent: Terence Kealey: Why Oxford University had to resist Sir Victor Blank
In the year 2000, Gordon Brown set out to destroy the 800-year tradition of academic self-government at Oxford and Cambridge. The man he chose to execute his policy was Sir Victor Blank. Sir Victor is the chairman who severely damaged the share price of Lloyds Bank, and on that evidence he is less than competent – as of course is Gordon Brown. So how did those two men position themselves nearly to destroy the governance of two of the greatest universities on the globe?
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Cambridge, England, Governance, Oxford
The Chronicle News Blog: Jackson State U. Faculty Votes No Confidence in President
Faculty leaders at Jackson State University voted no confidence last week in Ronald Mason Jr., the Mississippi university’s president. The resolution, which was published by The Clarion-Ledger, a newspaper in Jackson, Miss., criticized Mr. Mason for his alleged lack of transparency and for the growing salaries of an increasing number of administrators.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Governance, no confidence vote
The Chronicle News Blog: New Mexico Regent Who Was Criticized by Faculty Will Step Aside From Board’s Presidency
The president of the Board of Regents of the University of New Mexico has agreed to step aside from his leadership role “to avoid being a distraction” as the state’s governor works to improve relations between faculty members and the institution’s leaders, Gov. Bill Richardson announced today.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Governance, trustees
The Chronicle News Blog: New School Faculty Members Renew Standoff With President Bob Kerrey
New York — If Bob Kerrey’s recent comments on his blog are any indication, the New School’s president evidently feels that, with the new year, a new era of improved “communication and shared governance” has begun at the university.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Faculty, Governance
The Chronicle: Downturn Threatens the Faculty’s Role in Running Colleges
Professors are losing their grip. Tough economic times are leading administrators to propose swift changes that short-circuit faculty governance, long a prized principle that gives professors wide-ranging authority over educational matters.
The results, faculty members say, are hastily conceived plans that reorganize academic programs, decrease professors’ roles in shaping the curriculum, and jeopardize tenure applications — all done with little advice from the faculty, in the name of saving money.
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Posted in Governance
Tagged Governance
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