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[tenured_feminist]

I like to think that I am willing to listen actively to grey(er) heads and that I respect and appreciate their experience. But I'm currently having some issues with a retired member of my department, who disagrees with some policy decisions we made in our subfield after he retired. I've explained the rationale for these decisions to him more than once, but he continues to object and has been expressing his objections to grad students.

Am I being insensitive or a jerk to think that this is inappropriate and over the line? Suggestions for dealing with this issue without getting my back up?

[larryc]

Of course he is out of line. Why is he hanging around at all? Can you start hinting about needing his office space?

[glowdart]

Oy.  I have seen that it can be very hard for some faculty to let go.  The worst difficulties I have seen in that regard are people who were well-treated by the administration up through the very end (and into retirement) and who built the programs that the rest of us now populate.  It is as if you are dismantling their very life's work and tromping on their graves before they are dead.  Does this prof fit this bill?  They still feel ownership of the programs and curricula, and if they spent their entire life developing it, then it can be (understandably) very hard to watch people come in and "tear it apart."  

Of course, my response to this is always:  it isn't about the faculty, it is about the students; but I do not voice these opinions to the retirees who are having trouble letting go.

If this is only the first month or so in which you have spoken with this prof about the policy, then I might be inclined to let him gripe and then move on.  If, however, you have had to repeatedly address the policy change with him over a period of time and he just isn't letting go, then perhaps it is time to cut him off?  How is he finding out about the changes?  Are you being polite and keeping him in on conversations, or is he actually still teaching part-time and thus at meetings where changes are being discussed and made?    

Is there any politic way to turn this into an opportunity to explain the progression of the professoriate to your grad students?  I have only been in similar situations as a grad student or as a faculty member with undergrads.  There was no way I was bringing the undergrads into the conflicts more than they already were, but I could see how talking through the reasons for the policy change and the reasons why the retired prof disagrees might be helpful for a grad student, depending on the student and the nature of the conflict of course.    

May we all have the grace and self-awareness to retire and realize that our role has changed.  

[tenured_feminist]

Thanks for the thoughts. The person has been out of the department for a couple of years but still has a (pre-exam) grad student. The policies in question were changed after he retired and he's been complaining about them intermittently since they went into effect. His student is attempting an (ill advised and doomed to failure) end run around the field and the grad director based on his counsel and general egging on.

Glowdart, you are so right. I guess the one thing that gives me significant pause here is being able to see that he feels like the field has moved on and the new folks are radically revising his hard work. I would not want to be like that when I get to that career stage, but I'm aware of the possibility. I tried to listen and acknowledge his perspective in the last two exchanges we had over this issue though ultimately I backed up my current faculty colleagues.

Larry, he does not have an office on campus any more. Nor does he attend meetings. All of this is happening by phone/email.

[glowdart]

Oh well that's just messy. 

I can totally understand your hesitation.  That said, the field has moved on -- just as it moved while he was on the faculty.  It will keep moving long after we're all feeding worms, too.  If we see higher education and scholarship as an on-going conversation between the past and the present which informs and builds the future, then we have to accept our relatively brief role in that conversation, no?  Otherwise, the educational enterprise becomes about individual egos and our individual legacies rather than the conversation as a whole.     

More practically:  Did the policies change before the grad student enrolled/declared/qualified (however it works where you are)?  (Does the student have even a tiny leg to stand on?) 

My sympathies -- if this student is any indication, then it sounds like this will be haunting you for a long time, because the students who try to get around policies are never the ones who finish in a timely fashion (IMO). 

[ursula]

We have this guy; he's been gone for five years, and still has to try and weigh in on everything he hears we've been up to.  For a while we had someone who had been his protege who kept him informed, and then, when any decision was being made, would say "well, Douglas thinks . . . ", as if this would be an important and deciding factor in our deliberations.  Fortunately the protege has now moved on as well.

We're not dismantling your life's work, buddy; we're just dragging it into the twenty-first century!

[mozman]

Hang a cowbell on their neck and put them out to pasture.

mm

[normative_]

I agree with Glowdart.

All of this is happening by phone/email.

I suppose the phone/email version of shrugging your shoulders (which is my in-person response) is "C'est la vie" You needn't say more than that, as it's his problem, not yours, and saying something encourages him to repeat himself. Things change.

[kshenko]

Hi.  Although this person is totally out of line, I'd like to ask one question: How was he before he retired?  Was he a productive and active faculty member?  Or, perhaps was he a deadwood who never did anything for the department--or even scholarshipwise?

If he has been long actively involved, it might be hard for him to turn "the switch off."  He is probably still concerned genuinely--although I sometimes find their "desired goals" to be quite dated and ineffective.  In such cases, we do need to let them vent, out of respect, but I think we need to focus on what is best for your program in 2009 in the end (as opposed to, say, something that always "worked" great for 30 years before he stopped teaching in 2000).  So, their voice may not be reflected in our decision making.

As for the deadwood scenario, we DO occasionally get those, and I am less polite with them.  I may not directly say so, but I'd be thinking, "You never cared while you were here, and you made me do ALL of your committee work!  Now that you have nowhere to be, you want to get involved--making stupid suggestions???"  I am a bad person to think that...

[larryc]

Call the grad student in for a little free advice about how the world works.

[tenured_feminist]

Thanks again, everyone. I really love this place!

I will not engage him over the policy issue any more. Unfortunately, I think his misbehavior has prompted a student to make some poor choices, but because he was reinforcing what this student wanted to hear, he (the student) will not be diverted. After talking it over with my department head, we're simply going to hand over the long bight of rope that has been demanded and observe the unfortunate results. This will hopefully give me the leverage to tell the War Horse to STFU if there is a next time.

Kshenko, I like your distinction though it doesn't map perfectly in this case. Will tuck it away for future reference.

[kaysixteen]

If the grad student is being given incompetent or outdated counsel by this retiree, it really is the dept.'s responsibility to counsel said student with the contemporary realities.  It is not really his fault that he is listening to Prof. Retired Star's counsel, even if you (taking the easy way out) feel it is merely 'what he wants to hear'.  It is just not fair to grad students in general to allow them to be misled and caught up in internecine departmental politics with those who all have real or implied power relationships over them.

[bread_pirate_naan]

Call the grad student in for a little free advice about how the world works.

If this student is not your mentee, this is called meddling.

His student is attempting an (ill advised and doomed to failure) end run around the field and the grad director based on his counsel and general egging on.

This is called advising.  Leave the stupid student to the foolish advisor.  The student is "his student" not yours.  Unless you are on the committee, you are meddling.*

*which also looks bad

[tenured_feminist]

Naan, if a student requests special exemptions to field rules that the retired faculty member doesn't like, the field is inevitably involved, if only to adjudicate the request. And while I am all for allowing a lot of latitude in mentor-mentee relationships, once mentors begin advising their students to challenge department rules, their actions have an impact beyond that relationship. If Suzie Snowflake argues successfully for special treatment, then Bobby Blizzard should get the same accommodation.

I think I've done all I can to make the student aware of the risks. The last exchange we had shows no acknowledgment of this. Now all that remains is to wait for the fallout.

[bread_pirate_naan]

I would not want to be like that

But you are Blanche, you are!

It is just not fair to grad students in general to allow them to be misled and caught up in internecine departmental politics with those who all have real or implied power relationships over them.

Mouthful said.