Read on Twitter
1) Some thoughts about faculty governance in higher ed. and being in the position to change things for the better. ...
2) Actually governing and running a college is complicated and a ton of work, much of it the kind of work that too many faculty look down on. I say this based on ...
3) my first year as a dept. chair, hiring, writing staffing requests, managing the curriculum, &c &c and having now served on committees for reevaluating the college core curriculum, for developing free expression policies, for developing first-year orientation and ...
4) dormitory / residential plans, for launching, staffing a new AI institute, for deciding on & planning our COVID strategy, for evaluating classroom spaces and even campus landscaping and design, &c. I live on campus, I eat in the dining halls. There& #39;s hardly ...
5) an area of this institution for which I haven& #39;t had to work through plans, logistics, values, &c in collaboration with other people, and amid much (usually reasonable) disagreement. Let me give a specific example of what I& #39;m getting at with all this:
6) I& #39;ve been on twitter periodically railing against what I think are unreasonable requests for academic job applicants--letters of rec up-front, a million boutique documents that eat up a ton of the applicant& #39;s time, &c--and yet I& #39;ve had to chair or participate in searches...
7) where I was required by policy to go against my firm convictions in this regard. We& #39;re changing this unreasonable policy, and it& #39;s only bc of faculty (def. not just me) who are doing tons of service work speaking up on various committees and getting things changed. ...
8) It& #39;s a relatively small example that doesn& #39;t take much in the way of resources or readjustment to change--we simply decided we don& #39;t have to do a thing if we don& #39;t want. Obviously there are bigger obstacles for bigger changes. But the point is ...
9) if you& #39;re not in the room (or banging down the door--figuratively--to get into the room) then your & #39;shared governance& #39; is gonna look a lot like admin decision-making with faculty & #39;consultation& #39; when and where they want you, ie discussion into the void. ...
10) The way to not be in the position where a group of people who& #39;ve never set foot in a classroom with students make an & #39;unbelievable& #39; decision to destroy a department or push further toward a contingent labor staffing model is to be in all the rooms. Easier said than done ...
11) but my sense is that it& #39;s more comfortable for faculty to leave this (crucial) part out of the multi-pronged battled for the soul of the university. And, not for nothing, to overlook some unlikely allies in so doing. ...
