Sunday, May 29, 2005

ATTACK ON ACADEMIC MERIT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF OREGON

An early draft of a five-year "diversity plan" for the University of Oregon has drawn a firestorm of criticism from faculty, prompting administrators to distance themselves from the proposal. The draft plan, billed as a "long-term vision for diversity," called for the university to hire up to 40 faculty members by 2012 to teach courses in a "cluster" of diversity-related topics, including race, gender, gay and disability studies. Under the plan, academic departments that hew closely to the university's diversity goals when hiring would be given "priority in the funding of new positions."

The plan also would mandate that faculty up for promotions or tenure be evaluated on their "cultural competency" - the ability to successfully work with people from all cultural backgrounds. Traditionally, research, publications and teaching have been the key elements of a tenure review. The draft plan suggests that the university set aside more funding for hundreds of new "diversity-building scholarships" for minority undergraduates over the next five years, as well as new fellowships for graduate students aimed at those from "under-represented" backgrounds. A key goal, the draft plan continues, is to double the number of black, Hispanic, Asian and Native American students attending the university in the next five years.

Under the plan, student curriculum requirements could also change, possibly with the inclusion of a "gender and sexuality requirement." "Many people were upset with the content in different ways; the plan was sort of an Orwellian, totalitarian plan," said Michael Kellman, a chemistry professor at the university.

Sources at the university said the draft plan drew immediate condemnation from department heads across the campus, some of whom had little or no knowledge of the proposal before it was posted on the university's Web site. University officials declined to comment directly on the plan, which was overseen by Dr. Gregory Vincent, the university's vice provost for institutional equity and diversity, who last week announced his departure for a similar post at the University of Texas, Austin. But in a letter to members of the faculty senate's diversity committee, University President Dave Frohnmayer acknowledged public concerns with the plan. "We need to step back from specific details, to be mindful of alternative viewpoints, and to develop a sense of urgency in recognizing the problems we face," Frohnmayer wrote. "I also emphasized the need ... to engage faculty, staff and students who believe they have not properly been involved in this dialogue."

For years, Oregon's flagship public campus has struggled to attract diverse faculty members and students. The dust-up over the plan is the latest in a series of race-related incidents to roil the campus. Earlier this month, 150 people rallied to protest alleged racial discrimination and harassment at the school's highly ranked College of Education. Last week, a senior at the university filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education over the school's policy of reserving 10 slots of selected math and English courses for minority students, in an attempt to increased individual attention from faculty.

Chicora Martin, the university's director of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender education and support services, was part of the work group that put the plan together. She said the controversy provoked by the plan's first draft has created a welcome chance to talk about the current state of diversity on campus. "We want to make a welcoming campus around issues of diversity," she said. "I think you need to have a plan for that."

More here




And a comment on the Oregon imposition adapted from The Locker Room

Attn. AAUP: This is how a real threat to academic freedom sounds

The American Association of University Professors continues to operate with ideological blinders on with respect to academic freedom... As the group's homepage shows, the group sees two sources of threats to academic freedom here: those posed by "national security" and those presented by what the AAUP calls "the so-called 'Academic Bill of Rights'" (a note for the scholars: when you introduce something as "so-called," placing whatever it is so called within quotation marks is redundant). The first concern is understandable; the second, purely political - the Academic Bill of Rights, after all, is based on definitions that originated within the AAUP to define academic freedom. It's just that the AAUP has since abandoned its all-encompassing definition of academic freedom as its leadership in pursuit of SOME IDEOLOGIES ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.

That prologue is necessary for this: As best I can tell, the AAUP had nothing to say about a plan recently attempted by the University of Oregon that would have been a radical restructuring of the university's tenure and hiring policies - issues a naif would assume would have the AAUP's full attention. Here's what the subcriber site The Chronicle of Higher Education had to say about the plan:

...The draft plan, which was released this month, called for changing tenure and post-tenure reviews to include assessments of professors' "cultural competency." It also called for hiring 30 to 40 professors in the next seven years in several diversity-related areas, including race, gender, disability, and gay-and-lesbian studies. ...

"I was hired to teach chemistry and do research," said Michael Kellman, a chemistry professor. "I wasn't hired to be evaluated and even interrogated about cultural competency, whatever that is." In a letter to the president, David B. Frohnmayer, 24 professors called the draft plan "frightening and offensive." They complained that it would spend too much money on "diversity-related bureaucracy."

Mr. Frohnmayer said in an interview on Thursday that administrators had "taken a step back from the draft plan, given the extent of the response." "We're wedded to the objectives of the plan, but not to particular steps in any lockstep way," he said. "We're a community that lives to move with a greater sense of consensus."

The plan foresees increasing diversity by changing "the ethnic makeup of the freshman class, the racial and gender balance of tenured faculty, accessibility for the disabled, and the range of perspectives shared in campus classrooms around issues of sexual orientation, gender identity, religious differences, and other characteristics that make up the campus community."...


Not that this requires any particular insight to say, but I think this will not be the last we hear about such a move. I think Oregon has just shown us the next tyrannical step of the diversity movement. I think Oregon has just shown us the next tyrannical step of the diversity movement. I wouldn't be surprised if Texas is next; after all, the Oregon plan's "chief architect ... Gregory J. Vincent, vice provost for institutional equity and diversity at Oregon, is moving to the University of Texas at Austin to become vice provost for inclusion and cross-cultural effectiveness."

***************************

For greatest efficiency, lowest cost and maximum choice, ALL schools should be privately owned and run -- with government-paid vouchers for the poor and minimal regulation.

The NEA and similar unions worldwide believe that children should be thoroughly indoctrinated with Green/Left, feminist/homosexual ideology but the "3 R's" are something that kids should just be allowed to "discover"


Comments? Email me here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here

***************************

No comments: