It remains to be seen, then, whether there exists either the will or stomach on the part of faculty or administration to step up to the plate and do the right thing.

Bill Woodman, Department of Sociology and former President of the Faculty Senate

It is likely that many in higher education noted the General Motors strike last summer and wrote it off as a mere by-product of the changing economy, an easy dismissal to make when the respective collars are of different hues. However, the real significance of that strike for the professoriate lies in the amazing similarities between their concerns and ours. The UAW struck over the outsourcing of parts from cheaper plants abroad. Meanwhile, U.S. colleges and universities have moved steadily toward fewer full-time faculty and many more part-time, temporary, and adjunct teachers. No doubt some would send our undergraduates, the most high-maintenance of our "customers", to Mexico for classes were it possible. The reasons administrators and boards of regents want fewer full-time faculty are precisely the same reasons that the GM managers cite: lower costs and "flexibility." It seems that all modern organizations insist on the freedom to treat employees with the same loyalty given to paper towels while still demanding unilateral loyalty from employees.

In the modern academy full-time faculty, after probation, may be awarded tenure, a status which carries with it traditional protections of academic freedom along with a limited set of causes for dismissal, most importantly excluding areas of intellectual and academic discretion. For all other categories of instructional staff, there exist either drastically fewer or no protections whatsoever where academic freedom or intellectual freedom or tenure are concerned.

At Iowa State University, using Professional & Scientific (P&S) employees as an example, we find that a decade ago this category mostly contained technicians, chemists, and other crucial staffers but few teachers. The fact that P&S staff often hold advanced and terminal degrees meant that, in a research-money-at-all-costs environment, it became expedient for Department Executive Officers (DEOs) to hire P&S staff to teach. At first this teaching was in addition to other duties, but more frequently in recent years, it has been instead of other duties. In some departments where not even lip service is given to teaching, faculty applauded these moves because they freed up faculty for tasks which advance their professional careers and salaries—research. For DEOs it was a no-downside proposition: P&S appointments required no approval by faculty and were rubber stamped above; the P&S appointee was assigned duties by the DEO, usually without review of faculty or deans; and P&S staff could be terminated at any time without cause. The fact that in some departments P&S staff are openly used for teaching core courses in order to free up faculty for research says volumes about the often cited dedication of ISU to getting faculty in front of students. The silence of the administrators equals assent.

The potential problems with this situation are many and serious. For one, individuals who often bear the same credentials and training as tenure-track faculty, but find themselves immobile due to family or other constraints are consigned to an impermanent, insecure, and second-class status. For another, it is unclear whether P&S staff have any academic freedom protections, or how they would ask to enforce them in any event. These issues fail to even touch on the hiring of teaching colleagues without the consultation of peers, the marginal position of such teachers in some departments, or the real nut of the matter: that teaching students, in some departments, is a job relegated to a status near the absolute bottom of the scale. Last year, the Faculty Senate took a tiny step in this direction when it passed a resolution insisting that DEOs confirm all teaching appointments with faculty but the core issues still simmer.

It remains to be seen, then, whether there exists either the will or stomach on the part of faculty or administration to step up to the plate and do the right thing. In this case, the right thing would entail an institution-wide policy of funding tenure-track teaching positions, a clarification of the policy on P&S teaching and specification of academic freedom rights and evaluation mechanisms, along with a rededication to the value of faculty participation as full partners in the shared governance of the university. Movement in this direction will only take place when tenured faculty members on campus make themselves heard on this issue as no one else on campus has a motivation to fix the problem. Make no mistake about it, the silence of faculty equals assent.

In elections held last May, the following were elected officers of the ISU Chapter of the AAUP.

President: Robert Hollinger, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies (rholling@iastate.edu)
Vice President: Mack Shelley, Departments of Political Science and Statistics (mshelley@iastate.edu)
Secretary: Heimir Geirsson, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies (geirsson@iastate.edu)
Treasurer: Kathleen Waggoner, Department Sociology/Political Science (kwaggone@iastate.edu)

The AAUP plays a key role when it comes to faculty interests. AAUP remains the leading organization primarily dedicated to protecting the academic freedom of professors. Faculty members turn to AAUP for assistance in the thousands each year. Some of these faculty members are well-known figures with resources and support. Most, however, are ordinary faculty members who need guidance in responding to troublesome or threatening professional attacks. In order to continue its work AAUP needs you as a member!