The-Ave.US

The President of the UW AAUP, Rob Wood,  addressed the non tenure issues at UWB and UWT as a labor issue.  (see below)

I suggest that he is missing the point.

There are two critical questions :

1. Are UWB and UWT vocational schools or research campuses? 

Despite the quality of faculty at these branches and the community pride the UW label brings to these communities,   the State regards them as vocational schools … more like community college finishing schools than places where academic inquiry is important.

Do vocational schools need tenured faculty?

2. Who decides if these campuses .. or programs at the Seattle campus .. are providing the intellectual environment expected of a “research” university?  

Is this the role of the administration of any public university?   Look at our own experience with Mark Emmert or to the recent appointments of a political buddy of Florida’s Governor as President of Florida State University.  Does anyone here have confidence that Phyllis Wise is committed to academic freedom?  Oh, and do not forget, that our employer, the legislature, awarded Western Governor’s University, a school that brags of having no faculty,  as a Washington State university.

 I suggest that the answers to both of these questions lie in the Faculty Senate.  Only an elite of Washington students can gain admission to the UW.  The Senate should support the need for UW class students to interact with faculty functioning at a high level, a function that requires tenure.