November 09, 2009, 10:00 AM ET
Diversity Officer's Ouster Sparks Student Protest at College Park
Hundreds of students at the University of Maryland at College Park marched on the administration building last Thursday to protest the dismissal of Cordell Black, a popular diversity officer who has occupied his post for 18 years, The Washington Post reports.
Mr. Black will be let go as associate provost for equity and diversity at the end of the year as part of a university effort to cut costs. The university plans to fill the position with a part-time administrator. However, Mr. Black, as a tenured professor, may remain on the faculty, the newspaper reports.
The Post described the demonstration as "one of the largest demonstrations at the College Park campus since the Vietnam War era." According to the newspaper ...
The mood during...Read More
November 04, 2009, 01:00 PM ET
Colleges Hiring More Counselors?
In these tough times, faculty and staff job openings may be fewer and far between, but the market for mental-health professionals may be heating up, as stressed-out students turn increasingly to campus counselors for help with problems big and small, The Philadelphia Inquirer reports in a recent article. Suzanne Boyll, counseling director at La Salle University, told the newspaper that "as of Oct. 16, the number of counseling sessions had spiked 48 percent to 204, up from 137 the same time last year." And counselors at other universities have reported a similar trend.
To meet the growing demand, some universities are hiring more counselors. Temple University, for example, has added three counselors over the last five years, "at a cost of about $250,000" while...
Read MoreOctober 29, 2009, 03:00 PM ET
Aiming High?
What do fallen university leaders and felines have in common? Apparently, they both land on their feet. One need look no further than James L. Oblinger, the ex-chancellor of North Carolina State who resigned over the Mary Easley hiring scandal, and Richard Herman, the ex-chancellor of the University of Illinois whose fall resulted from an admissions scandal. Both are finalists in the search for a new president of New Mexico State University, Lesboprof observes in her latest post.
She notes, however, that fallen female university chiefs may be less fortunate than their...
Read MoreOctober 12, 2009, 10:00 AM ET
Is Hiring More Rational in the 'Real World'?
A well-worn topic of discussion in The Chronicle's forums
is the differences between the faculty and corporate (or so-called
"real world") hiring processes.
The invidious comparison usually goes like this: An academic search
takes months, a corporate one takes weeks (at most). An academic
search involves all sorts of silly rituals based on outmoded
traditions (the conference interview, the multi-day campus
interview), while a corporate one is rational and driven by
verifiable, objective data that simplify hiring the "right person."
An academic search is characterized by unprofessional and
thoughtless conduct, such as committees not getting back to
candidates in a timely fashion or communicating with them clearly,
while a corporate one is smooth, professional, and efficient.
A recent...
October 06, 2009, 08:00 AM ET
Another Kind of Nepotism
The topic of nepotism is a popular one in the Chronicle
forums, and I've seen it
discussed recently on some listservs I follow, possibly because the
economy has more folks looking for joint appointments within family
units. This got me thinking about another kind of familial
favoritism that crops up at some smaller colleges: parent/child
nepotism.
Sometimes faculty members have their own children enrolled in their
classes. It's only natural for faculty children to gravitate to
their parents' fields as majors. I know of several cases in which
professors' children have been turbo-powered versions of their
parents, incredibly talented and well-prepared for their courses.
In these cases, there have been no questions about rigor in classes
that were taught by a parent. Unfortunately, I have known of other
cases in which a...
September 25, 2009, 01:00 PM ET
Evaluating Campus Climate
I am always interested in finding ways to make the faculty
positions available at my institution attractive to potential
candidates. As I've discussed before, we have some challenges: We
are a small teaching-oriented and teaching-intensive university,
and (probably more importantly) we are located in a fairly remote
corner of northwest Iowa, which, while it can be beautiful if you
like cornfields, groves of trees, and silos, is not the dream
location for many young Ph.D.'s.
One thing we do have, though, is a very good campus climate.
Faculty members on the whole are collaborative, collegial, and
friendly. There is a climate of mutual respect among the various
constituencies on campus, and given the generally high level of
contentiousness academics are capable of displaying, our faculty
members are at peace, enjoy their jobs, and work very well
together. These qualities...
September 24, 2009, 08:00 AM ET
Presidential News Bytes
• B. Joseph White, president of the University of Illinois system, resigned yesterday in the wake of an admissions scandal in which well-connected applicants were admitted over more qualified ones, The Chronicle reports. He'll step down on December 31. Meanwhile, the Chicago Tribune reports that a former U. of Illinois president, Stanley Ikenberry, could replace him as interim president.
• Mary Sue Coleman, president of the University of Michigan, has
turned down a raise, the
Associated Press reports.
• The president of Florida...
September 23, 2009, 10:00 AM ET
The Ultimate Gated Communities
I ran across a recent
comment by Alan Wolfe that gave me pause: "The academic world
suffers from too many people trying to hire people too much like
themselves."
While Wolfe was discussing ideological diversity, he really
referred to one of the unfortunate tendencies that we have in
academe: a relentless drive to retain comfort. Universities are, in
many ways, the ultimate gated communities. A mentor once warned me
of the ease with which searches can degenerate into a process of
faculty members making copies of copies of copies of copies of
themselves until departments become stale, tepid groups that are
fearful of change. Such tendencies are not limited to faculty
searches alone, but also to staff and, more dangerously,
administrative searches. What he warned me about was not just
people hiring...
September 16, 2009, 02:00 PM ET
Hiring and Firing Bytes
• The University of Cincinnati has picked Gregory H. Williams, president of the City College of New York, as its next chief, The New York Times reports.
• Thompson Rivers University, in British Columbia, has booted its president, Kathleen Scherf, who during her one-year tenure was known for calling people "dude" and streaking her hair, The Ticker reports.
• A growing number of faculty members at the University of California are backing a planned systemwide walkout on September 24 to protest the university's handling of the budget crisis, The Ticker reports. Per the
Read MoreAugust 28, 2009, 02:00 PM ET
Faculty Members at 2-Year College in Md. Vote No Confidence in President
Professors at Montgomery College voted no confidence late
Thursday in Brian K. Johnson, president of the prominent Maryland
community college since 2007. About half the college's full-time
faculty members overwhelmingly passed a resolution criticizing Mr.
Johnson's leadership and alleging that he has consistently skipped
important meetings and events.
The resolution urged the college's Board of Trustees to dismiss Mr.
Johnson. Trustees were not available today, but they have scheduled
a closed meeting next week to discuss the matter.
Mr. Johnson was unavailable for comment today. But in a written
statement distributed today to the campus, Mr. Johnson said he
remained committed to serving the college, which opens its fall
semester on Monday.
"I remain focused on our students and ensuring that they receive
the high-quality education and services that...
