Tenure topic of Bollinger's address

University President Lee Bollinger discussed growing concerns surrounding diverse faculty roles at the Senate Advisory Council on University Affairs meeting yesterday.

"The relationship of the tenured faculty to other faculty is complicated and raises important questions," Bollinger said. "This is an issue of great scale, and we should not come up with quick, obvious answers."

Statistically, the University faculty composition is becoming increasingly heavy with non-tenured members, as evidenced by a report from the Office of the Provost.

Non-tenured faculty made up 39.2 percent of total faculty in 1996, up from 28.5 percent in 1987. Increases were more dramatic in the medical, nursing and dentistry schools, reflecting a demand for clinical professors.

"The reasons the Medical School uses non-tenured faculty are very different from the LSA's reasons," pathology Prof. Peter Ward said.

SACUA members expressed worries about tension between tenured professors and their non-tenured colleagues.

"I see future strife when people are talented enough, but have no way of getting on the tenured track," SACUA Chair and pharmacology Prof. William Ensminger said.

During recent weekly meetings, the faculty's executive governing body has explored the possibility of incorporating non-tenured faculty into the University's democratic procedures, and has met several obstructions.

Technical challenges include a necessary change in the University Board of Regents' bylaws and constructing a formulaic approach to re-apportionment and representation. Re-apportionment occurs every three years, and determines how many representatives each school elects to sit on the assembly.

Decisions on priorities and values color these objectives. Bollinger said these decisions must be made with regard to a "continuing trend."

"Expanding representation is a good idea," Bollinger said. "But I don't think we are in stasis. We can only get a snapshot of the moment."

SACUA currently is looking at the number of non-tenured representatives on Senate Assembly and the way in which non-tenured faculty should be allowed to vote to elect assembly representatives.

Sociology Prof. Donald Deskins said that using a categorical ballot, similar to the way the College of Literature, Science and the Arts faculty voting procedure allows faculty members to vote for representatives within their respective departments, is one option.

"By having non-tenured folks vote only for non-tenured candidates, we could create a fair system," Deskins said.

Setting the number of non-tenured representatives is also problematic, and may require a change in the size of Senate Assembly.

Ensminger said he'd like to give 10 percent of the assembly seats to non-tenured representatives, but attempting to maintain this percentage would result in difficulties with re-apportionment.

Other SACUA members raised concerns that the Medical School, with its high percentage of non-tenured faculty, would be too heavily represented through the inclusion of non-tenured faculty.

Yesterday, SACUA members asked Senate Assembly Rules Committee Chair Ron Lomax to develop models to test the voting and representation options.

"I don't think we can do anything before re-apportionment in February," Lomax said.

11-24-98