e-Bulletin20180921

Dear Colleagues,

Please fill out this survey on the state of academic freedom and shared governance at Temple.  Responses are due by midnight, Sunday, September 30th.   

With the rankings scandal at the Fox School generating negative press that has severely damaged Temple’s reputation, a group of concerned senior Temple faculty representing the Faculty Senate and the Temple Association of University Professionals (TAUP) met recently to discuss why this situation arose and what needs to be done to avert similar incidents.  We believe that a principal cause was the drastic reduction of shared governance and challenges to academic freedom at the University in general and at the Fox School in particular. What happened at the Fox School has clearly revealed the detrimental effects of over-concentration of administrative power and of over-reliance on the judgment of a small group who operated with little or no oversight and accountability.  Their actions have diminished the academic standing of our faculty, and gravely eroded the trust of our students, donors, local community, and the public at large. Fox faculty now find their reputations unfairly devalued even though they had nothing to do with this malfeasance.

We are aware problems with shared governance and academic freedom extend beyond the Fox School, in many schools and colleges. We must address them if Temple is to prevent similar incidents and realize its potential.  

We also want to hear about what is going well with academic freedom and shared governance so that we can get an accurate view and so that we can have models of best practice as we move forward.  

For academic freedom and shared governance to function as they should, we need to work with and be in productive dialogue with administrators.  We must be willing to speak our minds when we think these systems are faltering but also to listen. We assume our administrative colleagues want these processes to work, too, and some administrators we have spoken with are eager to be part of the conversation and to see faculty take on a greater role.

However, for these changes to occur, we need YOUR voice.  

We ask you to share your candid views of the state of shared governance and academic freedom at Temple in the following survey.  Your answers will inform our next steps, including our plan to gather interested faculty and librarians for open-ended discussions in the Fall and perhaps into the Spring. Some of these discussions may include administrators.  These discussions will lead to a Report on the State of Shared Governance and Academic Freedom at Temple and an accompanying list of recommendations to and demands of our administrators.

Any data reported out will be stripped of markers that would identify individuals.  For instance, we might report responses to a particular question based on college OR on rank, but not on college AND rank at once (e. g., assistant professors in a particular college).   Any identifying data in responses to the open-ended questions will also be removed before the responses are shared.   

Collegially,

Steve Newman, Ph.D. , CLA/English Professor, TAUP President,

Cornelius Pratt, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Klein College / Advertising & PR, President,  Faculty Senate