As faculty returned to campus this fall, they realized that their attention was going to be diverted from the normal teaching, research, and outreach pressures of the busy fall quarter by the constant talk of reorganization and downsizing. This fall of 1998 can be honestly characterized as a season of intense dispute and discussion over proposed reorganization of the university, selection of programs for enhanced financial support, and identification of programs for possible elimination. None of us can remember a period when attention to the political environment has been so central to academic debate on campus as forces from both outside and inside the university converge for battle over the future of Auburn University.
Those who choose to remain silent and to remove themselves from the ongoing debate do so at great peril to the academy. Faculty need to attend as many meetings of the Commission to Review Auburn's Role in the 21st Century as possible and they also need to remember that meetings of both the University Senate and the Board of Trustees are open to the public.
The AAUP is concerned that the voices of a few faculty will not represent the diverse and divergent views of all. Those who feel that there is no sense in trying to bring other views to the table are wrong. Now is the best time to stand and be heard.
The University Senate has worked cooperatively with both administration and appointed taskforces to make reports available to the public by posting them on the internet . It has also established an internet discussion group where comments and queries can be addressed by other interested participants. This site can be located at: http://www.ag.auburn.edu/commission.
Auburn's chapter of the AAUP will hold an open forum on November 9th at 4:00 p.m. in room 206 of Tichenor Hall at which faculty can ask questions and enter in to discussion regarding the ongoing work of the Commission to Review Auburn's Role in the 21st Century, recommendations made by taskforces and commmittees regarding issues under study by the Commission, and the rights and responsibilities of the faculty as outlined in the Faculty Handbook.
Having participated in four months of analysis and discussion as a member of the 21st Century Review Commission, I offer the following observations. In every case when I use the term Auburn University I mean both the Auburn and Montgomery campuses. Furthermore, I do not suggest these points in order to argue or debate either my friends on the faculty or my friends on the trustees. They are offered merely as a vitally important agenda so none of us has to repeat this process. I would
suggest that we not even discuss them today. Just take them home, read them, reflect on them, and when we have more time and less passion let's talk together in a non-confrontational setting different from this one.
I believe the review commission began its work with two flawed premises. First, the problem at Auburn is low faculty morale that results from noncompetitive salaries. Secondly, A.U. is inefficiently managed. In four months of reading more than four linear feet of documents and dozens of hours of discussion, I am not convinced that either premise is true.
If these are not A.U.'s problems, what are the problems? In my opinion there are two, one internal (faculty and administration) and one external (trustees).
1. Internal
Contrary to public perception, academic culture is extremely conservative and resists change. When the administration put in place a priority setting process, faculty resisted, because they believed it to be a flawed process. Fair enough. But we (the faculty) did not put in place an alternative process that resulted in priorities being set in such a way that low priority departments and programs could be downsized or eliminated. The faculty was not entirely to blame for this failure because even trustees publicly announced that certain low ranking programs were central to the mission of Auburn and would therefore not be cut or eliminated regardless of current performance. As a result the wind went out of any attempt to prioritize. It is worth noting that some reallocation of funds did result from that prioritizing. But as we discovered in the mid-1980s with an earlier priority setting, good times tend to short circuit such a process. The faculty and administration need to commit to an ongoing
process of evaluation, certainly with faculty input, hopefully with faculty concurrence, but constant evaluation based on mutually acceptable standards with or without faculty concurrence.
An additional problem is modem academic culture which seeks consensus. Even the best modern corporations agree that mutual efforts by management and labor working together is better than peremptory action by one of them. But we do need clearly defined action on some issues, and when consensus cannot be reached, faculty must understand that administrators sometimes have to make tough decisions in the absence of consensus. My own sense is that faculty, if fully consulted and afforded opportunity for meaningful input, may oppose and complain about actions which negatively affect them but nonetheless understand the necessity for such action.
II. External
The second problem is the trustee process. As an historian taking a long view of events (rather than offering an harangue on current board members), I offer seven observations from hundreds of hours of faculty discussions and two decades of personal observation.
1. Auburn University has been governed since the later 1970s by a conflict management style. After an era of remarkable unity, growth, and development that stretched from the mid-1960s to the late 1970s, conditions changed. First, there was pressure on President Philpott to resign. Then the governor and board chose a president to come in and "shape up" the university and faculty. That resulted in three years of escalating confrontation and negative articles on the front page of the Chronicle of Higher Education and in every state newspaper as well as conflict between and among faculty, students and alumni.
My worst fear for Auburn is a repetition of that era. If trustees decide they intend to appoint another president who will "shape things up," ignore or get rid of faculty and programs, etc., I believe the three year conflict of the early 1980s will be telescoped into a matter of months. The current faculty has fewer Auburn connections, is more mobile, and has fewer senior leaders (because of early retirements, etc.) and conflicts will escalate to confrontation much more quickly. No matter who "wins" such a battle, the "loser' will be Auburn University.
2. A parallel problem is faculty perception of a patronizing, paternalistic trustee attitude toward faculty. Faculty can be brittle, unreasoning, hard-headed and turf-oriented. But they are also the heart and soul of a university. The proper relationship of trustees to faculty should be one of mutual respect and cooperation. Trustees should meet regularly with groups of faculty (not just the president of the senate) both to say what is on their minds and to listen to faculty concerns. Some (though by no means all) of the problems at Auburn are mistaken perceptions about each other and the attribution of incorrect motives.
3. The politicization of trustee selection. It gives neither faculty nor Auburn people nationwide much confidence in the trustee system when selection is so tightly tied to who trustees or "want-to-be" trustees contribute to or support in political campaigns (or what key legislative committees they serve on). This is a system of selection that sometimes produces excellent trustees but is always unseemly and flawed.
4. Misplaced priorities. Whether correct or not, many faculty believe that trustees and influential alumni care more about the record of the football team than they do about who teaches their sons and daughters. As evidence faculty offer the following:
(i) A.U. people are furious when the football team does not rank in the top 25 and are willing to raise any amount of money necessary to reverse that condition. There is no similar commitment to raise the funds privately from A.U. people to solve our academic funding problems.
(ii) Further evidence is the buy out of coaches' contracts. Even as we go through the anguish of this review process, a Huntsville newspaper alleged that a coach fired three years ago still draws $110,000 a year in salary, more than all but a handful of faculty who faithfully tend their duties each day. News stories estimate that in the past five years, A.U. has paid nearly 11/2 million dollars to failed coaches. Even if one argues that this money comes from a separate, nonacademic stream or gifts from A.U. people, it raises the deeply troubling question as to whether A.U. people care more about failed coaches than the professors who teach their children.
If trustees wish to raise faculty morale, nothing would serve that cause better than a resolution at the next trustee meeting that in the future there will be no more contract buy outs at any level of the university. As in other arenas, let people serve out their time, and if they have failed, don't rehire them. And then let trustees become prominent advocates of Auburn, telling the state what is good about us and how efficiently we do our jobs. We know we aren't perfect, but it would be easier to accept your occasional criticism if you were seen more consistently as our advocates.
5. Length of trustee terms. In twenty-one years of listening, I have never heard one convincing argument for multiple twelve year trustee terms at A.U. As a chairman, I resigned after 8 years because I had exhausted my supply of creative ideas. With tens of thousands of A.U. alumni, many of whom are or have been heads of Fortune 500 companies, there is plenty of talent to spread this responsibility around.
Nor does the state need a law to make binding what is obvious. After 12 years of service, trustees need to bow out gracefully and give someone else a chance to contribute.
6. Conflict of interest. Partly because of the political nature of trustee appointments, faculty often perceive governors, legislators, and trustees as having agenda quite apart from the best interest of A.U. When funding is short across the state budget, cutting higher education funding may release money for other functions, tempting governor, legislators, and trustees to act in ways that at best reflect mixed motives and at worst appear to be outright direct and unethical conflicts of interest.
Whether or not this is so, that is certainly the way many faculty perceive it.
7. Faculty are not part of a production line. Nor are they disloyal to Auburn when they offer criticism of you any more than you are disloyal to Auburn when you offer criticism of us. Faculty do know a great deal about what they do. Issues that may appear simple from your perspective can be quite complicated from our perspective. As we have seen from this process, proposing changes without careful attention to the opinion of those affected by the change invites unintended consequences and disruptive misunderstanding. Auburn faculty and administrators work hard and effectively. And, compared to other universities, Auburn is run with amazing efficiency.
At least that is our perception of ourselves. And if that is not your perception of us, we need to see some persuasive evidence to the contrary, because all the evidence we see in national publications is so affirming of our productivity.
So, in conclusion, what is causing many faculty to either leave A.U. or consider doing so, in my opinion, is not low salaries. Throughout this university's history there have been many financial crises worse than this one when few faculty left. What imperils A.U. is the steady erosion of the solidarity of the "Auburn family" into an unseemly dog fight. It is
a disconnect between trustees, alumni, faculty, students, and administrators, It is loss of trust and mutual respect. It is misperception and unkind attribution of sinister motives. It is break down in communication.
And if we do not address these issues, I fear our four months of labor has been in vain.
[Dr. Flynt's remarks were presented at the September 18, 1998 Commission meeting.]