May 2, 2003

High Faculty Turnover Roils Fledgling Soka U.; Noted Historian at Rutgers Heads to NYU

By BETH MCMURTRIE and SCOTT SMALLWOOD

START-UP STRAINS: When Soka University of America opened its doors two years ago, new professors there heralded it as a city on a hill. Established by Soka Gakkai International, a Japanese lay Buddhist sect, it promised to be a truly democratic, nonsectarian liberal-arts college without the traditional trappings of rank and tenure. Today, about one-quarter of those original professors have left, with some arguing that Animal Farm is the more appropriate analogy for the Southern California