Recently, I had the opportunity to attend a closed-door, small-group meeting of academic leaders with a lawyer who specializes in higher-education law. It was fascinating to hear the questions and the ensuing discussions. I’d never met with an attorney in a setting like that (the clock wasn’t running on my personal dime!), and I learned a great deal about actions I need to take, especially in the hiring process, to head off misunderstandings and liabilities.
I try to keep up with as many of these issues as I can, but I am, after all, a layman. I wish that all administrators, and really all faculty members who serve on search committees, could experience such a meeting. The myths and legends surrounding these issues are, many times, far afield from the legal truth. Does your institution provide training on the legal aspects of searches and other personnel matters or does it simply trust the word-of-mouth training that most people have received?
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3 Responses to On-the-Job (Legal) Training
uechronicle - August 21, 2009 at 8:33 pm
At a few institutions, in-house counsel will meet with faculty search committees before they begin a search. Some institutions have put good hiring materials on the web (see below). Department chair workshops sometimes cover hiring processes, and I’m planning a session for the ACE department chairs program in June, 2010. In terms of costly mistakes, tenure denial lawsuits are generally more frequent and more expensive than cases over failure to hire. That’s no excuse, however, for lousy hiring practices. “Folk law” is not good enough. More internal education is needed on legal obligations in this area and many others. Ann H. Franke, Esq., Washington, DC###Handbook for Hiring Tenure Track Teaching Faculty. University of Hawaii at HiloThorough manual with, among other elements, useful advice on candidate screening. See interview evaluation form on page 32. Includes lots of templates and sample letters.www.uhh.hawaii.edu/uhh/vcaa/documents/UHHFacultyHiringHandbookAugust2003.pdf ADVANCE Handbook for Faculty Searches and HiringUniversity of Michigan (ADVANCE is an acronym for diversity efforts)Extensive discussions on creating a diverse applicant pool. See sample candidate evaluation sheet, page 16. Extensive bibliography.www.umich.edu/~advproj/handbook.pdf Faculty Recruitment ToolkitUniversity of California at Santa CruzSee especially the section on interviews and campus visits. http://ahr.ucsc.edu/academic_recruitment_resources/faculty_recruitment_toolkit.html#interview_visit
sitepsu - August 24, 2009 at 11:01 am
The Faculty Recruitment Toolkit cited above was first developed in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington. Presumably, Denice Denton adapted the toolkit when she became Chancellor of UC Santa Cruz. See the latest UW version at http://www.washington.edu/diversity/avpfa/Recruitment_Toolkit/index.html.
sitepsu - August 24, 2009 at 11:01 am
The Faculty Recruitment Toolkit cited above was first developed in the College of Engineering at the University of Washington. Presumably, Denice Denton adapted the toolkit when she became Chancellor of UC Santa Cruz. See the latest UW version at http://www.washington.edu/diversity/avpfa/Recruitment_Toolkit/index.html.