Lawmaker proposes eliminating tenure for public university professors
By Rudi Keller
A state lawmaker who last year proposed yanking scholarships from athletes engaging in game boycotts has a new idea — eliminating academic tenure for new faculty at public universities.
A bill filed by state Rep. Rick Brattin, R-Harrisonville, would end job protections created to protect faculty from politicians or donors who dislike their academic work or public activities. Brattin said Thursday that he wants professors to focus on teaching and engage in research that promises tangible benefits for the state.
“I think we need to focus on the fact that our professors are hired to educate our students to achieve success, and I don’t think that includes having these sorts of protections so they can go off on the deep end on certain issues,” Brattin said.
In December 2015, Brattin proposed, then quickly withdrew, a bill revoking the scholarships of athletes after members of the University of Missouri Tigers football team announced a boycott of athletic activities in support of campus protests by Concerned Student 1950.
The bill raised free speech and NCAA compliance issues and was widely criticized before Brattin backed down.
Brattin also sponsored the 2015 law designed to protect free speech on campus by designating all outdoor areas as public forums.
Brattin’s new bill also would require public colleges and universities to add economic information about degree programs to course catalogs. The required data would include the estimated cost of obtaining the degree, jobs that the degree prepares students to perform and employment data such as income and the percent of graduates working in a field related to the degree.
Too many students are graduating with degrees that do not have “real world applicability,” Brattin said. “The intent is to try and show factual evidence that this degree is tied to this job market.”
Academic tenure was developed in the early 20th century to protect faculty from pressures by donors and politicians who targeted professors for unpopular views or research.
At the University of Missouri, a newly hired assistant professor has as long as six years to qualify with a combination of research, teaching skills and public service. In the 2015-16 academic year, the Columbia campus had 863 tenured faculty and 259 tenure-track faculty out of 1,973 full-time faculty. The portion of faculty with tenure has declined from 69.5 percent in 2006 to 56.8 percent in 2015.
The UM System, through spokesman John Fougere, declined to comment on Brattin’s bill.
Eliminating tenure in Missouri would make faculty recruitment “significantly more difficult” and damage academic freedom, said Ben Trachtenberg, the law professor who chairs the MU Faculty Council.
A tenured faculty member, with job security, can shed light on problems or engage in unpopular research without fear, Trachtenberg said.
“Tenure is one of the ways we help run a very strong university system here that benefits Missourians tremendously,” Trachtenberg said. “It is possible we are not communicating how much good we are doing and how tenure is an important part in achieving those successes.”
Brattin first proposed the requirements for economic data in 2015, adding the tenure prohibition when he filed the bill in December.
The data he is seeking might not be the best measures of the value of a degree, but universities should be prepared to discuss what information should be provided, Trachtenberg said.
“Behind these kinds of discussions is a desire of people around the state to know what the university is up to and how Missourians get value for their money, and that is a discussion the university should be happy to have,” he said.
Here is the House Bill:
FIRST REGULAR SESSION
HOUSE BILL NO. 266
99TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY
INTRODUCED BY REPRESENTATIVE BRATTIN.
0657H.02I D. ADAM CRUMBLISS, Chief Clerk
AN ACT
To repeal section 173.1004, RSMo, and to enact in lieu thereof two new sections relating to public institutions of higher education.
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the state of Missouri, as follows:Section A. Section 173.1004, RSMo, is repealed and two new sections enacted in lieu 2 thereof, to be known as sections 173.940 and 173.1004, to read as follows:
173.940. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no public institution of higher
2 education in this state shall award tenure to any person who is hired by such institution for
3 the first time on or after January 1, 2018. The provisions of this section shall not apply to
4 employees hired prior to January 1, 2018.
173.1004. 1. The coordinating board shall promulgate rules and regulations to ensure
2 that each approved public higher education institution shall post on its website the names of all
3 faculty, including adjunct, part-time, and full-time faculty, who are given full or partial teaching
4 assignments along with web links or other means of providing information about their academic
5 credentials and, where feasible, instructor ratings by students. In addition, public institutions of
6 higher education shall post course schedules on their websites that include the name of the
7 instructor assigned to each course and, if applicable, each section of a course, as well as
8 identifying those instructors who are teaching assistants, provided that the institution may modify
9 and update the identity of instructors as courses and sections are added or cancelled.
10 2. All public institutions of higher education shall post on their public websites
11 alongside their degree offerings or publish in their course catalogs alongside their degree
12 offerings all of the following information for each degree program offered:
EXPLANATION — Matter enclosed in bold-faced brackets [thus] in the above bill is not enacted and is intended
to be omitted from the law. Matter in bold-face type in the above bill is proposed language.
HB 266 2
13 (1) Estimated cost of the degree based on the hours required to complete the degree
14 program, the books likely required to complete the degree program, and the on-campus
15 housing costs for the number of academic years likely required to complete the degree
16 program;
17 (2) Types of employment opportunities generally expected to be available for
18 students who earn the degree;
19 (3) The current job market for people who have earned the degree. Such
20 description of the current job market shall include estimates of the numbers of jobs
21 available in the industries in which people who have earned the degree typically work;
22 (4) The number and percentage of students who earned the degree employed within
23 one year of graduation for the most recent graduating class for which data are available
24 and, for the students so employed, their average income; and
25 (5) The number and percentage of students who earned the degree employed within
26 one year of graduation in a field closely related to the degree program for the most recent
27 graduating class for which data are available.
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