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New Committee to Focus on Academic Professionals
By Hans P. Johnson
As more and more academic professionals express concerns about their due-process rights and stake in institutional governance, the AAUP in April announced the formation of a new committee to examine the applicability of its principles to the increasing numbers of academic colleagues who share in the work of faculty but whose institutions do not accord them faculty status. Archivists, lab technicians, university counselors, and university press editors are among those who fall into this category.
Since its founding in 1915, the Association has maintained its primary focus on safeguarding the rights of faculty to academic freedom, tenure, and due process while advocating faculty participation in campus governance. But as higher education has evolved, academic professionals have come to play an increasing role in academic life.
"The new committee will survey the spectrum of work done by academic professionals in order to advise the Association on the appropriate application of faculty status and protections," reports Ernst Benjamin, the AAUP's director of research. He adds that the committee, which will meet in September, "will probably also consider how existing AAUP policy applies to these colleagues and what adaptations might be required."
Cary Nelson, professor of English at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the Association's newly elected second vice president, is chairing the committee.
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