National faculty organization expresses concern about proposed tenure changes by USG
Abraham KenmoreA threat to tenure and academic freedom – that's what the national faculty organization American Association of University Professors called theproposed changes to post-tenure review put forward by the regents of the University System of Georgia. On Friday, the AAUP made their concerns formal by sending a letter to Matthew Boedy, president of the Georgia AAUP, and an associate professor of rhetoric and composition at the University of North Georgia.
The proposed changes to post-tenure review, included in the minutes of the Sept. 9 meeting of the Board of Regents and up for consideration during the October meeting, caused an outcry by faculty. Across USG, tenured faculty already go through a review process every five years, where they are evaluated on their teaching, research and service. Those who do not pass are put on improvement plans and can, ultimately, be dismissed if they fail it.
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The new changes include adding student success as a fourth category of evaluation, asserting the Board of Regents authority to take over the tenure process from institutions that are not considered rigorous enough in post-tenure review and adding the ability to fire faculty without cause.
The AAUP generally opposes post-tenure review, but identified two of the proposals as particularly harmful in the letter – the lack of faculty input in developing post tenure review policy, and language that seems to allow for dismissal without cause.
"The AAUP regards an action to dismiss a faculty member without affordance of academic due process as an inimical" to the organizations standards, the letter reads. "If, therefore, either of these proposed revisions to tenure protections in the USG regulations were to be adopted and if, as a result, faculty members were dismissed absent such affordance, the Association would be compelled to intervene."
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USG on Friday said they are updating the language.
"We continue to engage with faculty and leadership at our campuses to gather feedback about the proposed post-tenure review changes," wrote Lance Wallace, associate vice chancellor of communications. "Based on those comments, we are developing ways to modify the language to more clearly convey the originally intended meaning.
Receiving tenure is a lengthy process for faculty at higher education institutions, but it provides protections and job security that academics say strengthens their research. The protection of tenure, the AAUP letter notes, is not absolute job security, but the guarantee of a hearing by their fellow faculty before dismissal for a valid cause.
The AAUP letter identifies one sentence in the USG proposal as particularly problematic, following a paragraph outlining penalties for failing to complete an improvement plan after an unfavorable post-tenure review – "The institution’s imposition of such remedial action will not be governed by or subject to the Board Policy on Grounds for Removal or Procedures for Dismissal."
"As we have suggested, this provision, if adopted, would tend significantly to undermine academic freedom and tenure in the USG system," the letter reads.
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At least according to Boedy, it is unlikely that these proposals will change significantly before next month's vote by the Regents. On Friday, the USG Faculty Council – a collection of Senate Chairs and Boedy as AAUP president – met with Tristan Denley, the vice president for academic affairs.
"Denley's comments made clear none of these policy revision proposals would change in such a way as to alter their outcome," Boedy wrote in an email. "He suggested the "intent" of the language about being able to fire a professor without cause could implicitly only be applied to a professor who failed to finish an improvement plan after a post-tenure review. But as many faculty on the call pointed out, that simply is not what the proposed revisions say."