On her second day as interim chancellor of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Kathy Ankerson acknowledged the low morale among faculty and staff and the grief many were feeling over the closure of four departments and loss of teaching and staff jobs.
The low morale is an “overriding message” she had heard and seen before taking the position as interim chancellor, Ankerson told the Jan. 13 meeting of the Faculty Senate.
“Morale is one thing, and then when there are separations, that kind of sense of grief is another,” she said. “And we have a lot to work through. So, our challenge, as I see it, is that we have to bolster morale, and I think a big part of that comes through trusted relationships.”
Working through the grief and rebuilding morale so that the university can move forward will require mutual trust, she said.
She said that throughout her career, which included terms as dean of the College of Architecture and executive vice chancellor, she said yes to opportunities to serve. She said she hoped all faculty members would involve themselves in the process of advancing UNL.
“I want involvement and input early in the process,” Ankerson said, “not because it is or isn’t dictated, but because the result is stronger.”
She said the opportunities for engagement in the process would be plentiful and varied. Faculty and staff might disagree with some of her decisions, but she promised to “strengthen our community, collaborate purposefully, and shape our shared future as Nebraska’s flagship institution.”
Chris Bourke of the School of Computing asked Ankerson if she had any response to the letter sent to the university by the American Association of University Professors. Ankerson said she had not seen it and could not respond.
The letter came from Todd Wolfson, national president of the AAUP, and was addressed to NU President Jeffrey Gold, with copies sent to former Chancellor Rodney Bennett and EVC Mark Button.
Wolfson said the AAUP had a number of concerns about the process used in deciding which programs to cut, the data relied on and the impact on faculty and students. He said the AAUP was investigating possible violations of tenure and shared governance standards. For instance, the closures might not be good faith closures of academic programs. Also, some of the programs closed included faculty who are most active in AAUP efforts to organize a collective bargaining unit, which could be a violation of federal law. In light of these and other issues that could lead to litigation, Wolfson urged UNL to delay the issuance of termination letters.
Aaron PeeksMease of the sociology department asked if Ankerson would be examining the data and suggestions faculty had provided in response to the administration’s recommended cuts.
Ankerson said she had not reviewed the material yet but expected to do so starting next week. “I don’t want to let that opportunity of people taking the time and putting themselves in a position to offer ideas or offer criticisms or constructive, ideas and have that lay someplace where it’s not useful. It is useful,” she said.
Susan VanderPlas of the statistics department asked if that meant the decisions to eliminate the four departments would be revisited.
Ankerson said it would be foolhardy for her to ignore information that might be useful for the future, but that won’t affect decisions already made. “The decisions have been made. The Board of Regents has voted, and we have to carry out what they voted on,” she said.
Elizabeth Lewis of the teaching, learning and teacher education department suggested a step toward building trust would be to send faculty their separation letters at the end of the academic year so they can have a full year to find new jobs.
Ankerson said, “There’s a lot of things I can do, but I don’t believe that’s one of them.”
The presentation of the report of the Academic Planning Committee offered an another opportunity to discuss other aspects of the budget-cutting process. Kevin Hanrahan of the Glenn Korff School of Music and the new chair of the APC said the committee would be looking at revising its procedures for budget reductions. Currently, the APC has guidelines for merging departments, but none for terminating programs, he said.
Rather than voting only on whether a program should be eliminated, Hanrahan said, the APC should also receive and vote on the procedures that would be used to close the program. This should include such things as the teach-out plans and the timeline for shutdown. That whole package would go to the Board of Regents, he said, and not just a recommendation on whether to eliminate the program.
Another issue is who gets to vote on elimination proposals sent to the APC. The committee includes administrators as well as faculty, and with the recent round of cuts, some of the administrators who created the proposals also voted on them in the APC. John Shrader, Senate president, said in past rounds of program cuts, administrators involved in proposing the cuts had recused themselves from voting in the APC.
Sharon Baldinelli, chair of the Intercollegiate Athletics Committee, presented that committee’s report. The committee is studying the problem of conflicts of interest involving student-athletes who are teaching assistants or otherwise in positions where they could affect the grades of fellow athletes. At present, there is no university-wide way of monitoring when such conflicts might arise. Some departments already monitor this, and Baldinelli said any program the IAC created would supplement, not replace, college or departmental ones.
Colin Meiklejohn of the School of Biological Sciences asked about the money the athletic department used to pay the university for academic services for student athletes, such as the time teachers spend filling out periodic progress reports on athletes in their classes. Shrader said the Trev Alberts halted those payments shortly before he left Nebraska.
Tim Gay of the physics department said instructors should help student athletes in the same way they help other students, but helping the athletic department is different. “If the athletic department says we want to know detailed accounts of how this student is doing, that’s a compliance issue for them,” Gay said. Given the time involved in providing information for the athletic department and the lack of financial support, it might justify refusing to get involved in compliance issues, he said.
