2005-06 Committee A Report

Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure has acted on a number of challenges during the 2005–06 academic year. Three in particular merit emphasis in this report.

First, in response to the institutional chaos created by the material and social destruction of New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina, Committee A endorsed the decision of the chair, concurred in by the AAUP’s general secretary, to establish a special committee to review and analyze post-Katrina developments that impinge on colleges and universities in the city, on their faculties, and on their academic programs. Members of the special committee conducted site visits and interviews in New Orleans in August. Of particular concern to the special committee is the large number of faculty members who have been notified of release from their positions because of plans by the institutional authorities to restructure university programs and operations.

Second, our staff has worked energetically and creatively with the administrations of a number of institutions on the Association’s censure list in the hope of assisting them to get the censure removed. Happily, five of these institutions made demonstrable progress toward the adoption of AAUP principles and procedural standards. Committee A was able to recommend to the Council and the annual meeting that the censure be lifted for these institutions. The committee was especially cognizant of the skill and patience of members of the national staff in achieving these positive results. In this and other ways, their service to the AAUP is exemplary.

Third, in response to ongoing controversies in many parts of the world concerning academic boycotts, Committee A established a subcommittee to explore ways in which the AAUP’s objections to academic boycotts could be more widely disseminated and brought into direct and sustained engagement with colleagues in the United States and abroad who are reluctant to see all forms of academic boycotts repudiated. This subcommittee attempted to convene an international conference, but canceled it when conflicts about the role that the case of Israel was to play proved too difficult to resolve. Much of this issue of Academe is devoted to this abortive endeavor. Anyone interested in a detailed account of these events and their consequences is referred to the contributions in this issue by Joan Wallach Scott and Ernst Benjamin, who, along with Robert O’Neil, were members of the subcommittee charged with attending to the boycott issue.

Beyond responding to these three challenges, Committee A has also addressed the needs of part-time faculty for greater protections of their academic freedom, approved publication of a report on the highly problematic practices of institutional review boards, and continued, in a variety of public settings, its defense of the political autonomy of universities against the threats presented by several of the professoriate’s critics, including the American Council of Trustees and Alumni.

Judicial Business

Imposition of Censure

New Mexico Highlands University 

The report of the investigating committee concerns the actions taken by the administration of New Mexico Highlands University in the cases of two faculty members, both of them unsuccessful candidates for tenure.

In the case of the first faculty member, the committee’s report found that less than a month after the administration had notified him of the rejection of his tenure candidacy, he was dismissed from the faculty and banished from the campus effective immediately, apparently because of statements he made in the press and to his colleagues that were sharply and personally critical of actions taken by members of the administration. His dismissal was effected without affordance of a hearing, and payment of his salary ceased with the termination of his services. The investigating committee concluded that the administration acted in violation of the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure in dismissing this faculty member without having demonstrated adequacy of cause in a hearing of record before a faculty committee, and also by failing to provide any notice or severance salary. The committee further concluded that, to the extent that the administration acted to dismiss him because of displeasure with his public criticism of its policies and actions, it violated his academic freedom.

With regard to the second professor, the committee concluded that the administration acted in disregard of the Association’s Statement on Procedural Standards in the Renewal or Nonrenewal of Faculty Appointments by not providing him with a statement of reasons for its decision to deny him tenure and by setting aside without substantive comment the judgments of two faculty appeals committees. These committees found that inadequate consideration had been given to his qualifications and that numerous procedural irregularities had occurred in the evaluation of his tenure candidacy. The investigating committee also concluded that the administration disregarded the principles of shared governance articulated in the Association’s Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities.

Committee A recommends to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting that New Mexico Highlands University be placed on the Association’s list of censured administrations.

No Recommendation Regarding Censure

Committee A considered another case that was the subject of a report published in the May–June 2006 Academe. The committee approved the following statement recommending no action by the 2006 annual meeting in the case of Greenville College, and the Council concurred in the recommendation.

Greenville College (Illinois)

The investigating committee’s report concluded that the college administration dismissed a tenured professor on the dual stated grounds of financial difficulty and weakness in academic performance but provided no evidence to suggest that termination of tenure on either ground was justified. The committee concluded that the administration acted without having afforded the professor any of the relevant Association-supported procedural safeguards. The committee also concluded that, as long as affordance of these safeguards was not required under institutional policies, the foundation for tenure and academic freedom at the college would remain insecure.

In accordance with the Association’s stated procedures, a prepublication copy of the investigating committee’s report was sent to the Greenville College administration with an invitation for corrections and comments. The release of the report was followed promptly by a settlement offer from the administration that the dismissed professor accepted as a resolution of his case. Moreover, the president of the college, acknowledging the need to remedy the lack of an official hearing process to effect a dismissal for cause, informed the Association that he is “favorably disposed toward adopting procedures that align closely with those set forth in the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure and the complementary 1958 Statement on Procedural Standards in Faculty Dismissal Proceedings.” He has invited the appropriate faculty committee to formulate suitable provisions for expected adoption during the coming academic year by the faculty, the administration, and the board of trustees.

Committee A, which will retain the matter on its agenda until it receives word that acceptable procedures have been officially adopted, makes no recommendation to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting regarding Greenville College.

Removal of Censure

Committee A adopted the following five statements recommending the removal of censure. The Council concurred in the recommendations, and the 2006 annual meeting voted to remove censure.

Community College of Baltimore County–Essex (Maryland)

The 1995 annual meeting voted to impose censure on the administration of what was then named Essex Community College, following a report  (pdf) on the cases of four professors whose tenured faculty appointments were terminated without academic due process on stated grounds of program discontinuance. A year later, the board of trustees for the Community College of Baltimore County (CCBC), the three-college system of which Essex is a part, abolished the prospective granting of faculty tenure.

The cases of the professors whose appointments had been terminated were satisfactorily resolved several years ago. This spring, the current CCBC administration and the faculty approved, and the board adopted, changes in the college’s official policies recommended by the Association’s staff. An elected faculty body is now charged with hearing faculty grievances; the committee responsible for conducting program reviews includes a majority of elected faculty members; and in cases involving dismissal for cause or the termination of an appointment after seven years of full-time service, the affected faculty member is now entitled to a faculty hearing with the administration’s being required to demonstrate adequacy of cause. In seeking the governing board’s concurrence in the proposed policy changes, the CCBC chancellor wrote, “While AAUP censure does not impede the operations of the college, there is a moral sting to such a label that casts negative aspersions on the college that we are eager to remove.” Writing to the staff following the adoption of the new policies, the chancellor emphasized the college’s “commitment to ensuring that fair and equitable personnel processes are standard operating procedures at the [institution].”

The interim president of the Association’s Maryland conference, serving as the AAUP’s representative, visited the Essex campus in mid-May and spoke with officers of the administration and the faculty. He has expressed support for removal of the censure, noting that “the clouds have certainly parted on the campus at Essex.”

Committee A recommends to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting that the Community College of Baltimore County–Essex be removed from the Association’s list of censured administrations.

Des Moines University

The Association’s 1977 annual meeting imposed censure on the administration of Des Moines University (pdf), then named the College of Osteopathic Medicine and Surgery. The cases that led to the censure involved a tenured professor who was suspended and then dismissed and a nontenured professor who was issued notice of nonreappointment and shortly afterward banished from the campus. Neither faculty member was afforded the protections of academic due process called for in the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure.

The two cases were resolved several years ago, but still to be addressed were the university’s policies on academic freedom and tenure. Active discussions began eighteen months ago between the current administration and the AAUP’s Washington office staff in an endeavor to resolve outstanding issues. This past spring, the administration approved and the board adopted hearing procedures and notice standards that conform substantially with applicable Association-supported standards. A representative of the Association, the president of the AAUP chapter at a nearby college, visited the campus during the last week in April. He met with the vice president for academic affairs, the members of the university’s Rank, Promotion, and Tenure Committee, and other members of the faculty. He also spoke with a professor emeritus familiar with events at the institution at the time censure was imposed. He has reported wide agreement among the faculty for lifting the censure and has stated that a “favorable climate for academic freedom and tenure now exists at Des Moines University.” The president of the AAUP state conference has also expressed support for the removal of censure.

Committee A recommends to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting that Des Moines University be removed from the Association’s list of censured administrations.

Maryland Institute College of Art

The administration of the Maryland Institute College of Art was placed on the censure list in 1988, following an investigating committee’s report (.pdf) that dealt with the termination of the services of a faculty member after eighteen years of full-time teaching at the college. Although the administration’s action was in the form of a nonrenewal of a three-year term appointment, the investigating committee found that the action, at an institution that did not grant indefinite tenure, was tantamount to a dismissal for cause relating to the instructor’s fitness to continue.

The investigating committee concluded that the administration acted in violation of the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure in dismissing the faculty member, who had served beyond any reasonable period of probation, without having demonstrated adequacy of cause in a hearing of record before a faculty body. The committee further concluded that the absence of the protections of tenure at the Maryland Institute College of Art served to inhibit faculty members in their exercise of academic freedom.

Recently, the president of the institute has provided redress to the dismissed faculty member. As to the regulations governing faculty appointments, the Association’s staff has worked with the faculty and the administration over the years in developing policies that are in essential conformity with AAUP-supported standards of academic due process. The regulations of the Maryland Institute College of Art now provide for an adjudicative hearing of record before an elected faculty body if the administration seeks to terminate the appointment of a faculty member with more than seven years of full-time service at the institution. Consistent with the applicable provisions of the AAUP’s Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure, the burden is on the administration to demonstrate adequacy of cause by clear and convincing evidence in the record considered as a whole. The “academic freedom” section of the 1940 Statement of Principles is now incorporated in the faculty handbook.

The interim president of the Association’s Maryland conference visited the campus as the AAUP’s representative a few weeks ago and met with administrative officers and members of the faculty. He reported that conditions for the removal of censure appear to be satisfactory.

Committee A recommends to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting that the Maryland Institute College of Art be removed from the Association’s list of censured administrations.

Nyack College (New York)

Censure was imposed on Nyack College by the 1995 annual meeting on the basis of an investigating committee’s report (pdf) that found that the administration acted for reasons that violated a faculty member’s academic freedom in deciding to deny her reappointment. The report also found that the administration, in failing to provide an explanation to the faculty member for its decision and an opportunity to appeal the decision, acted in disregard of the Association’s Statement on Procedural Standards in the Renewal or Nonrenewal of Faculty Appointments. The committee further found that notification of nonrenewal was late under the Association’s Standards for Notice of Nonreappointment.

In response to the staff’s concerns with respect to these procedural standards, early in 2006 the college’s vice president for academic affairs submitted a revised faculty handbook to the Association’s staff for comment. The vice president incorporated the staff’s suggestions regarding standards for notice and procedures for appealing an adverse decision on reappointment, resulting in a document that conforms to Association-supported standards. The college’s board of trustees adopted the changed policies in February. The faculty member whose case led to the censure has stated that these changes satisfy her desire for remediation. An Association representative visited the Nyack campus in May; he reported favorably on the faculty’s relationship with the administration and stated that “there is now a strong atmosphere of academic freedom and academic due process” on the campus. The president of the AAUP’s New York conference has been kept informed of these developments and has not indicated any concerns.

Committee A recommends to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting that Nyack College be removed from the Association’s list of censured administrations.

Westminster College (Utah)

The investigating committee’s report (.pdf) that led to censure of the Westminster College administration by the 1985 annual meeting dealt with the termination of the appointment of a tenured professor on grounds of financial exigency that the report found was not justified. The report also dealt with action taken unilaterally by the board of trustees to abandon the system of tenure at the college.

The dismissed professor reached a settlement with the college in 2004. In the same year, a former president of the Association visited the college to discuss the potential removal of censure with the officers of the local AAUP chapter, other faculty members, and the current president of the college. The current administration subsequently provided the Association’s Washington office with a revised faculty handbook, requesting comments. The staff urged, as key to achieving the removal of censure, adoption of a provision assuring to all full-time faculty members with more than seven years of service AAUP-recommended protections of academic due process for termination of their appointments. The administration and board of trustees accepted the provision.

A professor from a nearby Utah institution visited Westminster College as a representative of the Association in May. He met with the president and vice president of the college, officers of the AAUP chapter, and numerous other faculty members. He reports having heard strong support for the new policies, a strong commitment to academic freedom, and no reservations about removal of the censure. He wrote that “after speaking with members of the faculty and the administration,I see a healthy, functioning institution of higher education.”

Committee A recommends to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting that Westminster College be removed from the Association’s list of censured administrations.

Cases Returmed to the 2006 Annual Meeting

Committee A approved statements with regard to Medaille College and the City University of New York which called for no action by the 2006 annual meeting. The Council concurred in these statements. A motion from the floor of the annual meeting to censure the Medaille College administration was tabled indefinitely, as was a motion to condemn the administration. In addition, Committee A approved a statement with respect to the University of South Florida that was provided to the Council and annual meeting as an informational item.

Medaille College (New York)

Committee A reported to the 2005 annual meeting that the two professors who had been dismissed had resolved all their disputes with the college, and that the faculty had approved revised dismissal procedures that comport, in every major respect, with Association-recommended standards. They include the requirement that the administration consult with a faculty committee concerning the propriety, length, and other conditions of a suspension pending the outcome of a dismissal hearing; that a full on-the-record hearing take place before a dismissal can occur; and that the burden of proof rest with the administration. The board of trustees, however, had not yet had the opportunity to review these revised policies when Committee A reported to the 2005 annual meeting. Believing that the policies should be adopted by the governing board, Committee A made no recommendation regarding Medaille College to the 2005 annual meeting but did state that it would report again on the college to the annual meeting in 2006.

Committee A is pleased to report that this past March the board of trustees adopted the policies governing dismissal for cause that had been previously approved by the faculty. In view of this welcome development, and inasmuch as no new cases have been reported to the Association, Committee A sees no need for action and therefore makes no recommendation to the 2006 annual meeting with regard to Medaille College.

City University of New York

Committee A reported to the 2005 annual meeting on the City University of New York following the 2004 investigation of the case of a part-time adjunct lecturer at the university’s York College who, upon being indicted by the government on charges of assisting a terrorist organization, was summarily suspended from teaching by the central administration and denied any further appointment. Last year’s annual meeting was informed that a trial ended with the jury having found the adjunct guilty of the charges but with sentencing yet to occur (now, a year later, it has still not occurred) and appeals fully expected. The central administration did assure the Association that, should the adjunct eventually be acquitted of the charges against him, it would comply with a York College recommendation for his reinstatement to the faculty. The committee reported that the administration, while granting that suspending an adjunct is a serious matter even with continuance of salary, resisted (and continues to resist) accepting the AAUP-recommended “immediate harm” standard for suspending a faculty member that an earlier City University administration had adopted.

In reporting on this case to the 2005 annual meeting, Committee A noted some positive developments in the City University administration’s position regarding the treatment of adjunct faculty as described in the investigating committee’s report. Committee A went on to report, however, that successive recent incidents at two other City University colleges involved actions taken or contemplated against faculty members that, coupled with a comment by the administration in the adjunct’s case about “a concern that public confidence would suffer,” suggested a possible pattern of failure to safeguard the university from political interference with academic appointments. Accordingly, the committee reported to last year’s annual meeting that it had recommended that the Association’s general secretary open a new inquiry into conditions of academic freedom in the City University system. The committee stated that it would report again on the City University of New York to the annual meeting in 2006. The 2005 annual meeting itself approved a resolution adopted by the Council that called for “a new and broader inquiry.”

After an initial exchange of letters between the general secretary and the City University’s chancellor, the general secretary sent a detailed communication to the chancellor late last summer. He noted that at one of the university’s colleges that had been a source of Committee A’s concern in June, the faculty’s union had been planning an “educational campaign” in the fall in behalf of academic freedom, and he said he would be alert to what might happen with the campaign. The general secretary also referred to developments, not previously addressed, at another City University college, where complaints by faculty members against the local administration led the College Senate to establish a Select Committee on Academic Freedom that was interviewing concerned parties and was planning to submit its report that fall. He said he would be awaiting that report with much interest.

The general secretary’s communication went on to argue again in favor of the City University’s adoption of the “immediate harm” standard for suspension, calling the standard “a commonplace feature of university provisions on dismissal and suspension” and providing examples of its usage at New York City’s major research universities and at public universities in the general area with faculty collective bargaining agreements. The general secretary concluded his communication with a review of incidents of the past few years in which real or feared public pressures against the City University might have been thwarted had the chancellor himself spoken out, “publicly and forcefully,” in academic freedom’s behalf. The general secretary urged him “to speak out now on the core importance of academic freedom for the City University of New York and the vital need to withstand outside pressures in safeguarding academic freedom.”

The chancellor’s response addressed the general secretary’s major points in some detail. Regarding recent incidents at particular colleges of the university and ramifications for academic freedom, he indicated unawareness of anything mentioned that suggested a need for corrective action. On the matter of the “immediate harm” standard, he argued that its adoption is not nearly as widespread as the general secretary claimed. On the matter of his speaking out in behalf of academic freedom, the chancellor asserted that he had done so in the past and that he was “not at all reticent to speak out when an appropriate occasion arises.” He provided a copy of a statement supportive of academic freedom that he had just issued in endorsing a statement on the subject by an international colloquium of university presidents.

Committee A discussed City University developments at its fall meeting, and over the ensuing months the general secretary and Committee A members and staff have been alert to potential concerns. The officers of the Professional Staff Congress (the faculty union that serves as the university’s AAUP chapter) and of the University Faculty Senate have been invited to provide any information considered relevant to the Association’s inquiry and to advise anyone with a complaint relating to academic freedom to contact the Association directly.

The general secretary on May 3 wrote again to the chancellor. On the matter of suspending a faculty member from teaching, he urged that the chancellor set a high standard for himself in providing his required approval of a particular suspension. Replying to the May 3 letter, the chancellor stated it to be his personal view that “a faculty member may be suspended from teaching when he or she has been charged with or convicted of a serious crime, when his or her presence at the college represents a potential danger to persons or property or would severely interfere with its operations, or when in the judgment of the president suspension is otherwise necessary in the best interest of the college community.” The chancellor’s statement does not alleviate Committee A’s concern, and the committee will continue to seek adoption at the City University of the standards for suspension that are broadly accepted in the academic community.

The general secretary in his May 3 letter reported that he had received no further word about the planned “educational campaign” at one of the colleges to which he had referred in his fall communication. At the other college to which he had referred, where the senate had established a Select Committee on Academic Freedom, he wrote that the select committee’s report, issued in December, did not provide specifics but discussed testimony about problems with administrators regarding academic governance and about a perceived “climate of fear” at the college. He wrote that the committee had recommended that this perception be widely discussed and that the Professional Staff Congress had followed with a survey of “attitudes and experiences concerning academic freedom.” Regarding governance problems between the administration and a substantial number of faculty members, the general secretary has offered, if both parties consent, to arrange for a mediative effort by someone with the requisite experience and skill.

Committee A notes that the case of the adjunct is still under the jurisdiction of the courts, and it reiterates its expectation that the City University administration will hold to its assurance regarding the adjunct’s reinstatement should he eventually be acquitted of the charges against him. Moreover, in the year since a broader inquiry was recommended, the Association has received no complaint from any faculty member in the City University of New York alleging infringement of his or her academic freedom. Committee A, while it will remain attentive to additional developments, accordingly makes no recommendation to the Ninety-second Annual Meeting regarding the City University of New York.

University of South Florida

Committee A last reported on the case of Sami Al-Arian at the University of South Florida to the Association’s annual meeting in 2004. Professor Al-Arian had been dismissed for cause without having had the opportunity to be heard in his defense, and a hearing was not possible because he was incarcerated by the federal government while awaiting trial on criminal charges. Committee A informed the 2004 annual meeting that it would keep the case under review and would insist that Professor Al-Arian receive a hearing at such time as he might be free to participate.

The Al-Arian case finally went to trial in 2005, and in December a federal jury acquitted him of eight major criminal charges regarding activity in the 1990s in behalf of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad while it did not reach a verdict on other charges. Professor Al-Arian’s incarceration was continued while the government was deciding whether to retry him on the charges that remained. In the interim, the government decided to commence deportation proceedings against Professor Al-Arian upon his release.

This past April, Professor Al-Arian entered into a plea bargain with the government prosecutors. He pled guilty to a lesser charge of “conspiracy to make or receive contributions of funds, goods, or services to or for the benefit of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a Specially Designated Terrorist.” The minimum sentence for this was only a few weeks longer than the time he had already served, promptly after which, reunited with his family, he would be deported.

The federal judge responsible for sentencing took a sharply different position, however, from that to which the parties to the case had agreed. The judge imposed not the minimum but the maximum sentence, which involves another year and a half in jail. Professor Al-Arian has been moved to solitary confinement in a special unit of a distant federal facility that is designed for inmates who violate prison rules. To some observers and legal experts, the jail sentence thus seems to be unexpectedly harsh and possibly unlawful not only in its length but also in its conditions. The Department of Justice’s and the judiciary’s course of conduct in this case has raised serious concerns for the climate of freedom of association in higher education. Committee A has accordingly referred those concerns to the Association’s Special Committee on Academic Freedom and National Security in a Time of Crisis, whose charge is ongoing.

After the conclusion of the trial in December 2005, a University of South Florida public relations official issued a brief statement on its result, saying in effect that the professor’s appointment there had been terminated in 2003 and that was the end of it. The Association thereupon sought and received confirmation from the university administration that the 2003 dismissal was not a final action and that Professor Al-Arian could contest the dismissal under university procedures upon becoming free to do so.

While the University of South Florida administration clearly bears no responsibility for what Professor Al-Arian has endured over the past three years, Committee A’s assessment of the administration’s handling of his case until his indictment and dismissal in 2003 warrants reiteration. As Committee A stated in its report to the 2004 annual meeting:

The actions of the University of South Florida administration violated the fundamental standards of the academic community when it suspended Professor Al-Arian without having demonstrated cause, pursued a declaratory judgment against him in court, and dismissed him without having demonstrated adequate cause in an appropriate adjudicative proceeding.

Legislative Business

At its meeting in June, Committee A approved the publication for comment of a new Regulation 13 prepared by a joint subcommittee of Committee A and the Committee on Contingent Faculty and the Profession for potential inclusion in the Association’s Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure. In early July, the Committee on Contingent Faculty also voted to approve the document for publication. Committee A is strongly of the opinion that, in view of the growing percentage of college and university teachers who have part-time appointments, the AAUP needs to identify standards and procedures that will protect their academic freedom.

Committee A also approved for publication in this annual report the following statement calling for part-time faculty to be provided upon request with reasons for notice of nonreappointment and opportunity for review. While this statement overlaps the proposed new Regulation 13, members of Committee A believed that reasons and review for part-time faculty members should be treated separately as particular matters of concern.

Due Process For Part-Time Faculty Members

Over the past year, a joint subcommittee of Committee A and the Committee on Contingent Faculty and the Profession has been examining the complex issues of due process relating to part-time faculty. The subcommittee’s work goes on, with a text on which comments are invited appearing elsewhere in this issue of Academe. With respect to two aspects of due process, however, Committee A at its June meeting approved the following:

After having been reappointed beyond an initial term, a part-time faculty member who is subsequently notified of nonreappointment should be advised upon request of the reasons that contributed to the decision. Upon the faculty member’s further request, the reasons should be confirmed in writing. The faculty member should be afforded opportunity for review of the decision by a faculty body.

Committee A approved for publication a statement, Academic Freedom and Outside Speakers (March–April 2006 Academe), prepared by a subcommittee of Committee A. Several other organizations have responded favorably to this statement. Committee A believes there is good cause to hope that this statement will offer guidance and support for institutions eager to ensure open debate.

Committee A also approved for publication a report, Research on Human Subjects: Academic Freedom and the Institutional Review Board, prepared by another subcommittee of Committee A. This report recognizes the challenge of mobilizing the various constituencies that will have to come together in order to curtail the widespread abuse by these boards. Committee A sees this report as a necessary first step in what we envision as a long process of working for the protection of academic freedom in this domain.

In Conclusion

I write this report on behalf of Committee A on my last day of service as chair. David M. Rabban (Law), University of Texas, assumed the chair of Committee A in July. I depart with the hope that the AAUP will renew itself by expanding the base of its membership to include professors of many different kinds of American universities and colleges. I want to take this opportunity to emphasize the extremely important role Committee A plays in the national higher education setting at this time, when the professoriate is under persistent and calculated attack. The AAUP is the nation’s most respected and experienced organization devoted to the defense of academic freedom and to the political autonomy of universities. Within the AAUP, Committee A is the agency most responsible for discerning threats to academic freedom and designing responses to those threats. It is imperative that the AAUP as a whole nurture Committee A and protect the integrity of its processes from pressures to squander its extraordinary symbolic capital in the interests of parochial constituencies. I hope that in these next few years, the general secretary and officers can join with Committee A in forging strong, public alliances with other organizations with an interest in preserving the political autonomy of universities. Much is at stake. Finally, let me say that it has been an honor for me to serve as chair of this historic committee.

DAVID A. HOLLINGER, chair
(History), University of California, Berkeley

Cases Settled Through Staff Mediation

The work of Committee A’s staff in bringing cases to a sound resolution is illustrated in the three 2005–06 accounts that follow. Over a dozen such cases were closed during the past academic year after having been resolved through mediation by the staff.

Two professors at a state university in the upper South, for one reason or another, were not evaluated for tenure until they had served well beyond the maximum probationary period permitted under Association-supported standards and, arguably, under the institution’s own regulations as well. The senior departmental members unanimously recommended to the dean that tenure be granted in both cases, and the dean joined them in a favorable recommendation to the provost. Although the professors were fairly confident that they would be granted tenure, over a year went by without their receiving word on the matter. Finally, one of them wrote to the provost about it, and four days later, the provost sent them letters informing them that they were not being retained with tenure and that their appointments for the following academic year would accordingly be terminal.

The professors then met with their dean, who told them she was unaware of any reasons for denying them tenure. They next met with the provost, who told them that it was not she, but rather a “committee” (which she did not identify) that had rejected their candidacy on grounds of insufficient scholarship. She invited them to provide her with supplementary material on their scholarly activity since they initially applied for tenure. They report her having said that she would herself review all the materials and would respond in writing within a week. Two months went by without further response from the provost, however, whereupon the two professors turned to the Association’s staff for assistance.

A staff member promptly conveyed the Association’s concerns to the university’s chief administrative officer, referring to unconscionable delays, urging that the provost’s response be forthcoming immediately, cautioning that a negative response be only for compelling reasons explained in detail, and recommending that the end result, with the time for termination of services through nonreappointment long since having passed, be notification of indefinite retention. The chief officer responded by having the professors’ candidacies reviewed by a new faculty committee. Yet another year was to go by, with three additional communications from the Association’s staff and with a change in the office of provost, before a final result was reached: the professors were granted indefinite tenure.

A faculty member in April of her second year of service at a small private college in the Southwest filed a grievance against her immediate administrative superior after he took the word of a student in a dispute over a grade she had assigned. A week later, she received notice of nonreappointment beyond that academic year. She claimed discrimination and filed a grievance with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). At the same time, she sought the Association’s help, saying that she was no longer interested in a career at the college but would like another year there in order to have ample time to relocate.

A member of the Association’s staff advised the faculty member that agreement by the administration in retaining her for another year did not seem at all likely. He pointed out, however, that the notice of nonreappointment issued to her was late by four months under the AAUP-recommended standard for second-year faculty, and that he would be pleased to recommend a settlement involving rectification of the late notice by payment of four months of additional salary and by her providing the college with a release against any further claims. The faculty member readily agreed, as did the responsible administrative officer. The money was paid to her, and her EEOC complaint was withdrawn.

A tenured professor at a community college in the Midwest was urged by the administration to assume and rebuild a full-time administrative position that had not been faring well under its incumbent. He reluctantly agreed to the new assignment while warning that a successful rebuilding might not be possible. After two years, he and the administration agreed that the position was not working out and should be discontinued.

The professor and the administration did not agree, however, on what he was to do next. He requested a return to his tenured faculty teaching position, where work in his specialty remained available. The administration rejected his request, on grounds that he had surrendered his faculty tenure upon becoming an administrator and that he accordingly had no claim to a faculty position. Because he had been listed for the past two years as having “professional tenure,” however, the administration acknowledged that he had a claim to another professional administrative position. It proceeded to assign him to the recruitment of office workers for in-service courses at the college where they would learn new skills. The base salary for this position was significantly lower than what the professor received as a faculty member and in the administrative position now discontinued, but the professor was told that he would also get a fee for each new student he recruited and thus, with sufficient diligence, should have a higher income than previously. The professor refused to accept the new position and continued to demand reinstatement to teaching. After one more effort at gaining his acceptance, the administration dismissed the professor on grounds of insubordination.

The Association’s staff, asked by the professor’s attorney to provide assistance, pointed out to the administration that the professor was entitled to reinstatement to teaching because work was available in his area of competence, he had not surrendered his tenure, and no evidence had been provided to the contrary. The staff also pointed out that the offered new position, with its income to be based significantly on commission rather than assured salary, did not have the economic security that is key to a tenured position. Supplementing its own arguments, the staff arranged for expert testimony from a retired administrative officer at a nearby university on tenure’s meaning and importance. Eventually, the administration modified its position. The dismissal was rescinded, and a mutually acceptable resolution was achieved. ¨