July-August 2002

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Shared Governance on Black College Campuses

Faculty power continues to stall at the nation's historically black colleges and universities, threatening to turn engines of opportunity into "training plantations."

By Ivory Paul Phillips

Last October’s AAUP conference on shared governance, which included a day of sessions on historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), would have been quite depressing for me had it not been for two realizations. One was that misery loves company: the conference illustrated that all HBCUs are in the same boat when it comes to shared governance. Even prestigious institutions such as Florida Agricultural and Mechanical and Howard Universities seem to be plagued by the same lack of faculty governance found at Alabama Agricultural and Mechanical and Mississippi Valley State Universities. The other realization was that all of these institutions face a common challenge and that, in dealing with it, they can share examples with and draw support from one another. This was the realization that gained pre-eminence as the delegates exchanged notes.

The critical areas of shared governance in which HBCUs come up short include (a) faculty representation on policy and decision-making bodies; (b) searches and hiring of academic personnel; (c) faculty grievances; (d) promotion, tenure, and post-tenure hearings and procedures; (e) evaluations of peers and administrators; (f) salary determination and other budgetary matters; (g) program development, review, and revision; (h) development and revision of faculty handbooks; (i) access to information needed for decision making; and (j) the status of the faculty senate as a decision- and policy-making unit.

Those who have lived through the civil rights and black power movements are well aware that, in fundamental ways, historically African American colleges and universities differ from predominantly white institutions in how they are perceived and run. The fact that almost all HBCUs are located in the southern and border states should provide a hint as to why they are so different.

Most colleges for African Americans were started by religious groups or by the federal government through Reconstruction legislation and the Morrill Act. State and local governments got into the act later, and only reluctantly. Over the years, the historical attitude toward American black higher education continued to influence the endeavor. In the mid-1770s George Washington said that teaching slaves would create a troublesome property. And in the early 1900s Booker T. Washington shied away from advocating a liberal education for freedmen, championing instead training the hands. Higher education, then, was not a natural societal expectation when it came to African Americans.

The colleges that were to serve them were therefore segregated and not designed to be fully developed. To ensure this retardation, the institutions were given meager funding and administrators who would follow the dictates of racist boards and community leaders. The segregation has not changed. The poor funding has not changed. The dictatorial and racially oppressive manner in which HBCUs are run has not changed.

A word of explanation is needed, however, regarding the segregation of the black colleges. They are not segregated in terms of laws or customs restricting enrollment and employment to black people. They are segregated in the sense that their funds and, consequently, their programs and facilities are such that few nonblack students want to attend them. They are segregated in the minds of society, especially white society.

Problem Administrators

Many administrators of black colleges have served previously at other black institutions as presidents, provosts, or academic vice presidents. Some have served at several colleges. At least one veteran black educator from Alabama referred to them as "academic refugees." It almost never seems to matter whether they have been accused of wrongdoing, received votes of no confidence from their faculty, or been fired at a previous college. The game of musical chairs for incompetent presidents continues. One black college had three presidents in succession who followed the pattern. The first was pushed out over budgetary matters—and almost immediately rehired by another black college. Meanwhile, the president who replaced him had been castigated by an earlier black college faculty and community. When this second president left the institution, the college appointed a person who had received a vote of no confidence from faculty at his previous institution. This third president, in the course of time, received votes of no confidence from the faculty at the new college. Similar stories can be told about other black colleges, because most are chosen by boards that seem to have little regard for the historical mission or development of black colleges.

Boards of trustees at both private and public HBCUs continue to exercise a much tighter reign over their institutions than do their counterparts at white colleges. The public boards follow the wishes of racially insensitive legislatures and community leaders who have no desire to see HBCUs expand their traditional missions. The private boards try to please wealthy benefactors, many of whom turn out to be white and, at the very least, racist in deed if not in thought. Several recent articles on black colleges have underlined the plantation mentality that has been fostered on these campuses. To encourage black college administrators to help dampen aspirations and activism among faculty and students, the administrators are paid fairly well. The salary gap between black college presidents and those at predominantly white institutions is much smaller than the salary gap between black college faculty and their counterparts on white campuses.

When one looks at the compensation of the black college presidents, the racist history of black higher education, and the willingness to use police violence to keep black students in check—as was done at Jackson State University, South Carolina State University, and elsewhere—it is easy to conclude that the main job of black administrators is keeping a lid on black college faculty and students. Such circumstances directly affect the nature of shared governance, or the lack thereof, on black college campuses.

Unshared Governance

HBCU policy, including academic policy, is generally made by deans’ councils and presidents’ cabinets. In the wider higher education community, faculty senate leaders often have representation on such boards. But at historically African American colleges, such representation is uncommon. Academic policy flows from the top down, with administrators feeling put upon when the question of such involvement is even raised.

This situation exists on black campuses because significant faculty involvement in academic policy making could easily push the institutions beyond the desires or expectations of college boards, many of which are dominated by racists. That is exactly what happened at one Mississippi university when its black president tried to expand the role and mission of the institution. The board terminated the president and has made sure that such an occurrence will not be repeated by any other ambitious faculty or president. Had faculty senates been meaningfully involved in the recent settlement of Mississippi’s long-standing desegregation case, Ayers v. Fordice, the missions of the three African American universities involved would have been greatly expanded. (The Ayers case was filed in 1975 by a man who contended that the education his son received at one of the state’s HBCUs was not equivalent to the education received by students at traditionally white institutions in Mississippi.)

Similar lack of faculty participation in academic policy making has freed more than a few black colleges to curtail academic programs through "program reviews" ordered by boards of trustees. Such draconian measures would probably not have taken place had faculty senates been fully involved. It is for such purposes that shared governance has been almost completely blocked on black campuses.

At the lower levels of institutional governance, where faculty may be involved in decisions about developing and revising handbooks, due process matters, salary and budget issues, and administrative searches, the role of the faculty senate is often usurped by administrators who hand-pick the faculty representatives on the relevant committees. The shared governance process is further compromised by the faculty’s being greatly outnumbered on the decision-making bodies. Even in conservative southern states, faculty at predominantly white universities select their own representatives on such committees. Furthermore, faculty dominate these committees when they deal with academic matters and academic personnel.

Although it would be unheard of on predominately white campuses, the development of faculty handbooks is seen as an administrative matter at HBCUs. Likewise, academic administrators—chairs, deans, and vice presidents—assume primacy in determining who on the faculty gets hired, promoted, and tenured. Even when administrators "allow" faculty committees to assist with such matters, the administrators exercise veto power and feel no need to explain the reasons behind their vetoes or substituted decisions. This situation exists because administrations want to have a way to deal with dissidents. And the boards, of course, want the dissidents dealt with. All of this helps keep the lid on.

Periodically, news stories recount how faculty senates on college campuses have taken positions on issues and prevailed. That almost never happens on black college campuses. As a matter of fact, the more that faculty senates at HBCUs try to assert themselves in institutional governance, the more resistance they encounter from boards and administrators. Administrations have gone so far as to establish ad hoc committees to do tasks that should be done by faculty senates, to appoint faculty to committees instead of permitting their election by colleagues, to refuse to provide independent budgets and offices, and even to suspend the faculty senate itself.

The faculty senate at Virginia State University was abolished in 2001. The administrations of other colleges have created "superbodies" to encompass and thus overshadow the senate’s and the faculty’s interests. On virtually every campus on which I have talked to faculty senate leaders, the administration has also used the tactic of ridiculing and bad-mouthing the senate and its leaders. Such blatant undermining of shared governance rarely occurs on white college campuses.

Moreover, information that is legally public is often deliberately kept from faculty, students, and others on black college campuses who are affected by it. Even if an administrator decides to give lip service to shared governance, the gesture is meaningless if faculty do not have the information necessary to participate intelligently and effectively in making decisions. For example, information on budgetary matters is often withheld. On most black college campuses, the budget is considered to be outside the purview of the faculty and the faculty senate. As a result, not only is the budget committee closed to the faculty, but the budget book is also kept strictly from the faculty’s view.

In yet another area of concern, few of those who participated in the AAUP’s governance conference reported that faculty at their colleges routinely evaluate their administrators—chairs, deans, vice presidents, and presidents—or have access to the evaluation results and the assurance that those results will affect administrators’ compensation or future employment. Such lack of influence sends a clear message that the boards and the presidents—not the faculty, staff, or students—are responsible for all administrators. It also conveys the message that administrators need not be concerned about the opinions of faculty, staff, or students, nor be responsive to them. This kind of atmosphere most certainly undercuts the concept of shared governance and destroys its effectiveness.

Possible Solutions

This sad state of affairs on black college campuses has not gone unnoticed or unchallenged. Almost every issue of University Faculty Voice chronicles the circumstances on one or several campuses. Occasionally, the Chronicle of Higher Education, Black Issues in Higher Education, or some local newspaper will also report on an individual case. Usually, however, little is done to correct the situation.

Conditions could perhaps be improved through national, systematic exposure. The predicament of Texas Southern University, for example, could be compared with that at Southern University. The barriers to governance at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff could be compared with those at South Carolina State University. Short of such national exposure, individual faculties have no recourse but to plead to their boards, be they at Bowie State or Fort Valley State. Or they can register votes of no confidence and hope for the best, be they at Hampton University or Lincoln University. The reality, however, is that most of the black college faculties know that the boards will pay little or no attention to them.

Yet in Mississippi, when faculty at the smallest predominantly white college complained, the board applied the appropriate pressure to get the desired result. As a matter of fact, whenever faculty at white colleges speak out, the boards of trustees of state institutions and state political leaders take notice and usually act to redress their concerns. But black college faculties must repeatedly write the board or hold press conferences before their voices are even acknowledged. Even then, the desired action is often not taken.

Shared governance is about power sharing, and people are usually unwilling to give up or share their power. It is thus understandable why black administrators, or any other administrators, resist shared governance. Fortunately, faculty at white colleges have tradition on their side. European and Anglo-American colleges and universities emerged in an environment that accepted faculty primacy in academic matters. Faculty members were recognized as professionals and as experts in the enterprise called higher education. They were meant to lead and change the world intellectually.

Black college faculty have no similar tradition; the role of their students and colleges was not to lead or change anything. They were simply tolerated and expected to fit in the larger society at whatever level and in whatever way society would accept. As a result, many faculty members at black colleges have been conditioned to accept the subservient, obedient, compliant role.

Yet, while the picture may indeed be dismal, all is not lost. I believe the conditions for shared governance can be improved on black college campuses by introducing several constructive measures. The AAUP and other professional groups have published documents on the role of faculty in institutional governance. The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and other accrediting agencies have standards for faculty involvement in governance. Subject area professional organizations, such as the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education, also have such standards. We need to use these standards to argue the case for full-fledged shared governance on our campuses.

The standards support the logic that professionals—those with the necessary expertise—should play the major role in matters about which they are the most knowledgeable. In medicine, doctors are accorded the most say about the standards in the field. Lawyers have similar influence in the legal profession. The same holds true for engineers, clergy, and other professionals. It should also hold true for teaching professionals in higher education. We need to take advantage of the faculty’s majority in the struggle for democracy on campus. We need to capitalize on our greater numbers and do whatever we can to carry others along with us. It is up to us to use moral suasion to carry the day; no one else is going to take on the task for us.

To succeed, we will need to be well organized. That is to say, we must make sure that the faculty, as a body, is knowledgeable about the issues. Knowledge is crucial to win supporters who can articulate the issues in a given situation. The faculty and the faculty senate, then, need to select the most intelligent and courageous individuals as leaders. In addition to a clear vision and the ability to express it intelligently, the leaders must have sufficient conviction that they cannot be dissuaded. Without faculty assertion, activism, and governance, students will have no role models to follow. We will lose yet another generation of leadership and creativity. And the damage will not be limited to black colleges or African Americans. The entire country will experience an irretrievable loss.

Because America has long been open to the voices and influence of white citizens (democracy), faculty on white college campuses have been free to call upon parents, politicians, and the press to advance their cause. Because black people were not at first even citizens and later only second-class citizens, they have not had parents, politicians, or the press on their side.

Today, many colleges and universities—both black and white—are moving toward more corporate models of institutional governance. Consequently, the struggle for shared governance must continue to be a major endeavor on all college campuses. It will, however, clearly be more difficult for those on black college campuses.

The sooner the public understands how it loses when the academy becomes a mere factory or training plantation, the better off we will be as a society. And the sooner those who toil on white college campuses realize that the forces that ignore and trample upon black college faculty can and will turn upon them after dealing with the black institutions, the sooner they will join with these suffering allies. Together, we will stand; divided, we will be defeated.

Ivory Paul Phillips is professor of social science education at Jackson State University, where he is serving his eleventh year as faculty senate president. He is also president of the Mississippi Coalition on Black Higher Education, an umbrella organization of faculty, students, and alumni of Alcorn State University, Jackson State University, and Mississippi Valley State University. This article is an expanded version of an address delivered at the AAUP’s 2001 conference on shared governance.