Category Archives: Tenure & Promotion

The Santa Fe New Mexican: Former professor sues over denial of tenure

A former assistant chemistry professor who was denied tenure at New Mexico Highlands University has sued the school, alleging the tenure denial was because he wasn’t Hispanic.

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FIRE: Victory at SUNY Fredonia: Professor Promoted, No ‘Prior Consent Committee’ Required

In a dramatic turn of events, the State University of New York at Fredonia (SUNY Fredonia) has promoted the embattled Professor Stephen Kershnar to full professor. In April, SUNY Fredonia shamefully denied Kershnar’s promotion because he had publicly disagreed with the university’s policies and practices. Less than three weeks after the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) brought this abuse of free speech and academic freedom to public attention, the administration reversed its decision and promoted Kershnar.

“This is a tremendous victory not only for Stephen Kershnar, but also for professors at institutions across America,” stated FIRE President Greg Lukianoff. “Such unconstitutional attempts to dominate and control professors’ right to dissent must not be tolerated at our nation’s colleges and universities.”

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The Chronicle: U. of Colorado Report Recommends 40 Changes in Tenure, Not a Sweeping Overhaul

A University of Colorado committee in charge of a large-scale review of the tenure process at the system’s four campuses has released a final report that calls for 40 changes in the tenure system.

The report, which recommends such measures as an outside audit of tenure cases every five years and a speedier process for firing incompetent professors, has been well received by faculty members so far. But already some local politicians worry that the report did little more than reaffirm a tenure system that was in need of a major overhaul.

Officials at Colorado assert that the 431-page report, which says the university’s tenure processes are “sound and in general meet the benchmark of major research universities nationwide,” is ambitious in scope and will strengthen the system of tenure, which the report calls “fundamental to academic freedom and the free exchange of ideas.”

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Inside Higher Ed: Bolstering Tenure by Reforming It

Mend it — don’t end it.

A University of Colorado panel — created amid political demands to eliminate tenure — is taking an approach similar to the one President Clinton took when faced with demands to abolish affirmative action. Admit that the system is flawed, but defend its necessity.

The Chronicle News Blog: Panel Calls for 40 Changes in Tenure at U. of Colorado

A University of Colorado committee recommended on Wednesday that the system make 40 changes in its tenure policies, to deal with significant problems that were manifested, critics said, in the ease with which Ward Churchill received tenure.

The recommendations, which appear in a 431-page report by the committee, include conducting tenure reviews every five years, completing dismissal cases within six months, adding criminal-background checks to the hiring process, pushing for consistent approaches to tenuring both within and across departments, collecting better data on tenure, clarifying expectations for faculty members seeking tenure or facing dismissal, and making it clear on an annual basis when faculty members are not meeting expectations.

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Virginia Tech has become the latest university to announce automatic one-year extensions of the tenure clock for junior faculty members who become parents through either birth or adoption.

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Inside Higher Ed: Is Tenure Just Another Form of ‘Wages’?

Instructors who give up tenure as part of early retirement or severance plans must pay Social Security taxes on the payments they receive, a divided federal appeals court ruled last week. Although the court’s ruling came in a case involving public school teachers, it conflicts with another appeals court’s 2001 decision in a case involving professors at North Dakota State University, which may lead the U.S. Supreme Court to resolve the issue nationally.

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The Chronicle: Texas A&M Will Allow Consideration of Faculty Members’ Patents in Tenure Process

The Texas A&M University System Board of Regents voted unanimously on Friday to consider faculty members’ patents and the commercialization of their research in deciding whether to grant them tenure.

“We are taking a leadership position in modernizing the tenure process to bring it in line with some new realities,” Robert D. McTeer, chancellor of the university system, said in a written statement. As state support of higher education continues to decline, he said, universities must rely more on partnerships with businesses.

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Inside Higher Ed: Making the Case for Tenure

The University of Colorado on Monday released an initial report on tenure-related processes at the university that contained some good news for those at the embattled institution — and perhaps for proponents of tenure everywhere. It found that the tenure process is “well designed and generally well managed” at the institution, and that the “University of Colorado policies and processes [are] consistent with industry norms and best practices at other similar institutions.

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Inside Higher Ed: Many at Michigan’s smallest public university see recent tenure denials — over departmental objections — as sign of disrespect for liberal arts

Lake Superior State University, a small public institution in northern Michigan, is used to fighting against the odds. Its hockey team has won three national championships since 1988 — much to the chagrin of powerhouses like the University of Michigan and Michigan State University. Faculty members have created a top robotics facility. The university’s press office, too, works hard each year to make sure that prospective students know about the remote institution, through such traditions as the annual announcement of the List of Words Banished from the Queen’s English for Mis-Use, Over-Use and General Uselessness.

But LSSU hasn’t been seeking attention for the tensions that have become widespread, spurred by a break with tradition to reject tenure for two English professors with strong departmental backing — and comments from the university’s board chair that were viewed as demeaning by many at the institution.

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The Chronicle: Worthy of rank?

At four-year colleges and universities, promotion to full professor seems pretty straightforward. You need an established record of scholarship, teaching, and service to the institution and the community.

Sure, some promotions run into trouble as a result of personality conflicts, political feuds, or technical disputes. But faculty members at four-year institutions all start on a level playing field in at least one respect: Because a Ph.D. is a requirement for being hired in the first place, all applicants for promotion can claim that achievement.

That’s not the case for faculty members at community colleges. We are a tremendously varied breed, as is reflected in our academic pedigrees.

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Rocky Mountain News: Tenure issue off the books

Lawmakers voted down a bill Tuesday that would have made it easier for tenured professors to be fired, saying it was an overreaction to University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill and would harm the state’s ability to recruit top faculty.

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Inside Higher Ed: Slowing down tenure

The tenure clock and the biological clock — both for birth and for death — just tend to get in one another’s way.

In part to try to make the academy family friendly, the University of Michigan is currently mulling over changes to the process it uses to promote professors, which would include extending the maximum time to receive tenure from 8 to 10 years.

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Inside Higher Ed: Moving beyond tenure

By Dean Dad

OK, a thought experiment.

Although tenure is still around, it seems clear to me that it’s on its way out. Higher ed hasn’t really had an open, honest discussion about that yet — denial is one of our talents — but it’s hard not to notice. Right now we honor tenure in the breach, by saying all good things about it while simply replacing retiring full-timers with adjuncts. It seems to me that this strategy has a natural limit. We need full-time faculty, but do we need tenured faculty?

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