American Association of University Professors

Radford University Chapter

16 April 2009

To:  The Members of the Radford University Board of Visitors

I first want to apologize to you for the fact that the list of your addresses, given to me only for the specific purpose of this letter, got posted elsewhere, apparently by one of the AAUP members who had access to the letter while it was being drafted. I have also apologized personally to President Kyle for letting this happen.

The Radford University AAUP Chapter is very concerned that the intense controversy arising from the past two years of university governance and coming to a head in recent weeks will damage the reputation of Radford University and its ability to recruit quality students.

You may know that the American Association of University Professors is the premier organization dealing with issues of quality higher education within the United States since 1915. It has chapters in nearly every American college and university. The national organization monitors the educational health of these institutions largely through input from its local chapters, and, in turn, supports the local chapters by disseminating information, educational advice, legal advice, and the promotion of uniform standards of quality higher education.

We are pleased to present you with a copy of the “Mini-Redbook.” It contains some key documents selected from the complete set found in the Redbook. The Redbook contains AAUP documents on such issues as academic freedom, tenure, and university governance have been endorsed by the Association of American Colleges and Universities, the American Library Association, the American Association for Higher Education, the Association of Governing Boards of Colleges and Universities, and dozens of other organizations.

The AAUP “Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities” has become the widely endorsed national guideline for good governance.  It argues (on the basis of nearly 100 years experience) that quality education is best served through close communication and collaboration between governing boards, administrators, faculty, and students, all of whom share an “inescapable interdependence.” It affirms that all these constituencies, plus reflection on the historical mission of their specific university, must participate in the framing of its educational mission and long range plans.  It states that quality education can only happen when there is a “joint effort” to move the university into the future in a spirit of collaboration, mutual trust, and shared vision.

Of course, the various constituencies have very different roles within this joint effort.   The “Statement on Government” clearly asserts that “the faculty has primary responsibility for such fundamental areas as curriculum, subject matter and methods of instruction, research, faculty status, and those aspects of student life which relate to the educational process.” Please also note that SACS documents also state that curriculum is the primary responsibility of the faculty at any institution of higher learning.

We are writing to you out of concern that Radford University has been moving away from these national guidelines for more than two years.  Programs and academic reforms appear to originate incorrectly with the Administration and the Board and then are imposed on the university, its faculty and students.  The proper procedure, according to nationwide standards, is for academic reform and innovation to originate with the faculty, involve active collaboration with the administration, and finally seek approval of the Board.

A recent example of this on-going incorrect process of governance was the “Expedited Program Review.” President Kyle and Provost Stanton have stated publicly that it was not a result of the budget crisis (which might have served as some justification).  Even so, that very review process involved major violations of AAUP principles of collaborative governance as well as proper internal governance.

1.  Very little notice was given. Busy faculty had to drop everything to meet the two week deadline to justify the existence of their programs.

2.  There appears to have been no clear rationale as to why these particular programs were flagged. Contrary to administration claims, SCHEV criteria were not clearly followed nor were the vague national labor statistics data they cited relevant. Indeed, the Faculty was not consulted about either these criteria or the process of review.

3.  Amazingly, several programs requiring expedited review had just completed legitimate program reviews involving serious faculty participation and extensive, thoughtful documentation. To make matters worse, only a five page document was allowed for each program’s defense.

4.  Document authors theoretically could attend review committee meetings, although not allowed to speak, but they often were not told the specific time when their particular program would be reviewed. That the review committee expedited its hearings made document author and general faculty observation of the process difficult.

5.   Review committee hearings allowed only twenty minutes discussion per program.  This, in itself, is a serious violation of the way quality programs are developed in higher education.

6.    Some of the programs reviewed were interdisciplinary minors that do not fall under SCHEV criteria at all.  Besides, a number had just completed extensive program reviews, did not need further review.

7. The instructions for responding to Expedited Program Review failed to follow Radford University’s criteria for regularly scheduled reviews. The entire expedited process, therefore, appeared arbitrary, irrational, and in serious violation of collaboration with faculty regarding academic programs.

Over its nearly 100 years of existence, the AAUP has found that educational excellence in institutions of higher education is significantly enhanced when there is a collaborative relationship between the board, the administration, the faculty, and students. Institutions that violate collaborative governance invariably weaken themselves because they fail to draw on the collective wisdom of the faculty who understand educational criteria, excellence, and processes best precisely because they are professional educators.

The Radford Chapter of the AAUP, in consultation with the Virginia State Chapter and national headquarters, is seriously concerned for the educational future of our institution due to the serious erosion of collaborative governance at Radford. Since you are in a position of exceptional and unique responsibility for Radford University’s future, we urge you to reflect on the great importance of collaborative governance for the future and quality of this institution that we all care so much about.

Sincerely,

Dr. Glen T. Martin

President

cc. President Kyle, Provost Stanton

21 April 2009

Letter to the Radford University Board of Visitors

We are writing to share our deep dismay with the manner in which recent decisions by the Academic Affairs Division were made. We wish to emphasize from the outset our profound commitment to the University, our students, and the distinctive kind of collaborative teaching and learning that have rightly been acclaimed as hallmarks of a Radford undergraduate education. The decisions in question, involving radical restructuring of the curriculum and an expedited program review, have subjected Radford University to damaging criticism from the media, taxpayers, students, and alumni.

We are concerned that the reputation of the University has already suffered from the manner in which the Office of Academic Affairs has chosen to go about its plans for curricular transformation. Recent administrative actions threaten to undermine our excellence by diminishing the essential role that a university faculty must play in governance and in shaping the curriculum. We do not mean to impute ill-will or bad faith to any administrative decisions that have brought us to this pass. We wish, rather, to open a dialogue with the Board of Visitors and the Administration that will help us all move beyond this present upheaval and establish a basis for collaboration to advance the interests of the University and our students.

None of us objects to curricular change or to cutting programs if they are not central to
the University’s mission. In fact, we realize that constant critical assessment of the curriculum and revisions of programs predicated on this meticulous work are essential to the vitality of any university. That’s why the University has clearly delineated Internal Governance processes for the creation of new majors and programs as well as for rigorous program review.

Whether proposing a single course or proposing changes that affect the curriculum university-wide, everyone must follow our Internal Governance processes. Just as we are a “nation of laws and not men,” we must remain a “university of established governance processes” not just individuals. When established processes are violated, the kind of upheaval that has recently buffeted Radford is predictable.

We are optimistic, however, that the controversies disrupting the University at the moment can be reduced if the Provost would rescind the plans for restructuring presented to the Board of Visitors in January. In its place, we request full inclusion of the faculty from departments and colleges affected by any proposed changes, as required by the established process for university-wide curriculum changes.

For whatever reason—budget crisis, some inner sense of urgency—this step of the established process was omitted. It is not too late to include the faculty in a way that can only benefit the process of curriculum transformation.

We wish to make absolutely clear the depth of our commitment to the University and to educating students in our disciplines. This is the work to which we have dedicated our lives. Radford’s faculty have historically shaped an institution noteworthy for the superb opportunities it offers to students. While teaching is the most important activity for faculty at Radford University, research and scholarly activities play a vital role in our effectiveness as teachers.

Serving on the faculty at Radford is a privilege for us because the University supports our commitment to the disciplines we love and our passionate interest in teaching. Class sizes are smaller than at many other state institutions, professors often meet with students outside of class time for conferences on projects and papers, and courses often include innovative programs outside of the classroom to engage students as active participants in the learning process.

One effect of the distinctive symbiosis between teaching and research at RU is that as faculty members we engage students in collaborative research projects, working with them as colleagues.

Most recently, 23 Radford University undergraduate and graduate students presented their research at the 32nd annual Appalachian Studies Conference. This year two Anthropology and one Physics professor collaborated with six students from four different majors to search for the remains of U. S. Marines missing in action since World War II in Guadalcanal. Several professors from Biology, Chemistry, Geography and Geology combined their areas of expertise to study the changes occurring in a wetland constructed by RU to treat parking lot runoff. Several hundred students conducted research across disciplines.

In 2007, two Radford University students presented research at the 11th annual Green Chemistry and Green Engineering Conference in Washington, D.C. Our students were the only undergraduates making presentations, both having received scholarships from the National Science Foundation to present their work.

These examples have three features in common: first, they represent collaboration between faculty and students from multiple disciplines; second, they were initiated by faculty members from various departments and colleges; finally, they represent departments that were ordered either to restructure in a way that will effectively eliminate some of these majors, or to combine with other departments in a way that most faculty believe will weaken them. The eliminations and restructuring were all administrative mandates from the Academic Affairs Division with little or no input from the faculty.

In its Principles of Accreditation (2008), the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools states that one of its tenets for accreditation is: “The institution places primary responsibility for the content, quality, and effectiveness of the curriculum with its faculty” (3.4.10). In the opinion of many faculty members in the departments mentioned above, primary responsibility for curriculum was wrested completely from their hands.

The faculty of the Biology Department, in fact, voiced skepticism and elaborated several concerns about a merger of the Departments of Biology and Chemistry and the creation of a new Biochemistry major. The faculty of this department had not been consulted about the change, and they did not provide the rationale for it. Yet they were informed that the change would occur, the Provost having mandated it.

The majority of the faculty in Physics, Geology, and Geography were also excluded from any substantive discussions about how to restructure their programs into a new School of Environmental and Physical Sciences, about the pros and cons of creating a new major in Geosciences, and about the quite likely future elimination of majors in one or more of these disciplines once the Academic Affairs Divisions establishes a new major in Geosciences.

In his “Address to the Academic Affairs Committee of the RU Board of Visitors” (January 2009), the Provost recommended several program changes in order to create, in his words, “a solid foundation for a university 50 years into the future.” As delineated above, some of these changes required merging programs in ways that made little sense to the experts in these disciplines, who were not consulted; others appear as though they may eventually require deleting whole majors that we consider vital not only for the next 50 years, but well into the next century.

For many of the programs mentioned above, the recommendations were imposed downward upon the departments, which were told, simply, that they must restructure. Prior consultation between the Provost and some deans or chairs may have occurred, but the teaching faculty, all experts in their disciplines, were not included in any substantive discussions of these major curricular changes.

This, in our respectful opinion, violates established internal governance guidelines and the principle of shared governance espoused by professional organizations like the American Association of University Professors. Two of the “core values” posited in our 7-17 Strategic Plan are “collegial working relationships among students, faculty, administrators, and staff; and “shared governance and participation at every level within the University community.” If we are to do more than pay lip service to these bedrock principles, we need to modify the process already begun so that it conforms to our established internal governance process concerning curriculum changes.

We are calling upon the Board of Visitors and the Provost to initiate a substantive dialogue about these issues before any further restructuring ensues. For this reason, the Faculty Senate approved an ad hoc investigative committee to determine exactly what happened in the decision-making process concerning a number of programs whose faculty have complained about violations of procedures for curriculum changes.

If Internal Governance procedures were, indeed, violated, we need to know this in order to avoid similar mistakes in the future. A powerful gesture by the Academic Affairs administration to restore faith in collaborative working relationships and shared governance at Radford University would be rescinding the Provost’s recommendations made to the Board of Visitors in January 2009. We wish to open a dialogue with the Board of Visitors and the Administration that will help us all move beyond this present upheaval and establish a basis for collaboration to advance the interests of the University and our students.

Sincerely,

Editor’s Note: This letter was signed by 65 members of the RU faculty. Do you agree with those faculty members? Give us your thoughts on this letter by commenting below.

Dear Editor,

The attached letter was sent to the Radford University President, Provost, Dean, and Faculty Senate President at Radford University.

At its March 26 meeting the Steering Committee of the Appalachian Studies Association unanimously passed a resolution in support of the Appalachian Studies programs at Radford University. The ASA includes an active membership of scholars, activists, and community people, 900 individual and library subscribers to the Journal of Appalachian Studies, and a constituency of some 3,000 recent participants in our annual conferences. (more…)

Dear Editor,

Below is a letter I wrote to Radford University President Penelope Kyle and Provost Wil Stanton.

I am a professor of Sociology at Walters State Community College and an Appalachian studies scholar and activist. I want to ask you to take the time to think about the contributions of the Radford Appalachian studies program to our society. I want you to consider keeping the program and the minor. (more…)

Dear Editor,

I would like to encourage the entire community to add their voices to the objections raised in response to Radford University’s recommendation to discontinue portions of the Appalachian Studies program.

(more…)

Dear Editor,

Below is a letter I wrote to Radford University President Penelope Kyle and Provost Wil Stanton.

With great concern, I read of Radford University’s proposed elimination of the Appalachian Studies Department. Realizing this is a difficult time and tough decisions must be made, I would ask that you reconsider this decision. The Appalachian Studies Department at Radford is one of the jewels in the University’s crown.

As a nationally acclaimed novelist who writes about Appalachia, its culture, and its people, this decision impacts scholarship far beyond the University walls. Artistically, the loss would be enormous. Historical novels such as the ones I write could never be done without the diligent scholarship taking place every day in universities such as yours. Indeed, I credit the beginning of my writing life to Radford University, when I attended the Appalachian Writers Conference, which was held with the support of the Appalachian Studies Department.

The subsequent support I have received from your faculty and staff cannot be expressed in a mere letter, but I would not be the writer I am today without your university and that department in particular.

Sincerely,

Gretchen Moran Laskas
Author of The Midwife’s Tale and The Miner’s Daughter
Fairfax, Va.