The Provost's Office: An Informal History
Chapter Three: Faculty and Other Personnel Exempt from the Personnel Act
Personnel
Policies and Procedures
The first
personnel procedures were established by Chancellor Bostian and sent to Deans,
Directors, and Department heads on July 16, 1956. This memorandum included both
SPA (Subject to the State Personnel Act) and EPA (Exempt from the State Personnel
Act) personnel, but I will refer only to those sections relating to EPA personnel.
This memorandum indicated that there would be a
strengthening
of channels of communication and personnel would be administered so that there
would be a constant and periodic review of each employee and of the effectiveness
of his work, so that all employees will be constantly informed of their privileges
and responsibilities. Documents pertaining to personnel changes will be simplified
and standardized in the interest of speedier handling and more adequate records
to form the basis for sounder judgment in treating personnel matters.
Centralized personnel records were
to be "maintained with a perpetual summary of employees in various categories
made available at all times." Records of work loads and performance were to
be standardized in such a way that "critical needs may be readily determined,
so that the limited number of new positions made possible through periodic increases
in our operating budgets may be allocated swiftly to meet these critical needs."
These were great goals and over the years a variety of changed procedures and
reports were developed to meet them. For example, when I first started to work
in the Provost's Office, a current record of all faculty by rank, by department
and by school was maintained by hand. We knew the total number of credit hours
taught in each department and in each school, and had a record of the average
credit and contact hours taught by each full-time equivalent (FTE) position
assigned to each department and school. Later, these statistics were available
through computers because information related to classes was computerized by
Student Affairs sooner than records were computerized for personnel. Student
Affairs had some personnel with the competencies to be programmers and analysts.
We began to provide this information to the departments and schools with what
we called a cross-over analysis. This enabled every department to know where
their student majors were taking courses and the numbers of students from each
major enrolled in the courses that they taught. The software for this analysis
was developed at East Carolina University (ECU) and was shared with us at no
cost. I always thought that this was a very valuable informational tool for
academic units to have, but I suspected that many departments made little use
of this data.
In a memorandum of Feb. 5, 1957,
the Chancellor announced the introduction of the PA-1 form. This form developed
by Shirley has been modified frequently. It is used today in a very modified
form except that it is entered into the computer by departments or schools.
That memorandum read:
This
form, again in five copies, will be used for all requests involving change
of status for all other non-classified personnel, for appointment, reappointment,
change in academic or professional rank or title, change in salary or salary
distribution, leave of absence, or termination of contract. These requests
will normally originate in the Department or Division and be forwarded to
the dean or administrative head responsible. All of these materials will be
transmitted directly to the Dean of the Faculty who will be responsible for
routing through proper channels of approval and maintaining constant check
on the expedition of such requests. It will be the responsibility of his office
to see that University or Trustee approval is obtained when it is required
and to make final distribution back through channels to the originating source.
Bostian added,
It is
our hope that the standardization of forms for multiple purposes and the development
of clear-cut routing and approval channels will speed approval requests, simplify
routine operations, and eliminate much of the red tape which has congested
both departmental and school offices.
It is of interest to me to note
that the form had only two races listed, white and Negroes, yet it had the following
categories for marital status: single, married, widowed, divorced, and separated.
In 1962 all personnel decisions,
including new appointments, still had to go through the President, and Caldwell
reminded the campus not to indicate firm and final offers or to close contracts
with individuals prior to such approval. Of course it would have been impossible
to hire anyone without having everything agreed upon by the College and the
prospective employee if this rule was followed precisely. We began to use "contingent
upon approval of the Trustees" and later the BOG when that was necessary in
letters offering positions. The secret was DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES
LET THIS GET INTO THE PAPERS BEFORE WE HAVE OBTAINED APPROVAL!
In 1965 the proposals for continued
employment over the age of 65 were requested and handled by the Chancellor's
office. It was at this time that Kelly requested that he would like to see the
proposed list. The list had to be approved by the President and was reported
to the Board of Trustees and to the Retirement System. The latter was really
a necessary informational procedure. Dr. Kelly's Personnel Office soon received
the job of obtaining the lists from the deans and had to prepare the material
for the Chancellor in a form ready for his signature for submission to the appropriate
places. Dr. Kelly then did get to see the list in advance of its submission
to the President and even before the Chancellor saw it.
The issue of hiring faculty who
obtained Ph.D. degrees from NCSU was raised by the Chancellor and by Dr. Kelly
in 1964 when a department wished to hire one of its own graduates. In 1967 we
began to keep not only a running list of the numbers of NCSU Ph. D. graduates
on our faculty in each department, but also maintained a list of numbers of
graduates from other institutions. For example there were significant numbers
of UNC-CH graduates in certain departments. We began to raise the issue of "inbreeding,"
both from the perspective of NCSU as well as from a few other colleges. This
list was also helpful when we needed to answer how many doctorates we had on
a departmental faculty or on the University's faculty from any specific institution.
It was surprising how often that question was asked.
We had a nepotism policy in 1955.
In the days of Shirley the Chancellors approved the exceptions to this policy.
These approvals were indeed rare at that time. The policy prohibited hiring
relatives (mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, spouses, nieces, nephews, uncles
and aunts) in the same school, but we could hire children who were students
for part-time or summer work. I recall our wishing to hire an outstanding faculty
member who really was in the same field as his wife who was already on our staff.
By this time the policy had been modified so we could make subdivisions of the
large schools by grouping related departments. For example the biological science
departments were grouped together, but Plant Pathology was placed in another
group of plant science departments. We were able to hire the husband in the
Department of Genetics whose wife was a faculty member in Plant Pathology. If
a couple got married and they were in the same departmental group, one would
have to be transferred to another unit or leave the University. Nepotism policies
included both EPA and SPA personnel. Later the Board of Governors, to avoid
claims of discrimination on the basis of sex, changed this policy so that we
could hire relatives in the same unit, but it still prohibited supervision by
a relative . This made it possible for us to hire a number of outstanding faculty
whose disciplines were the same who previously would not have been hired. Prior
to this time we had to try very hard to find jobs for spouses for prospective
faculty at neighboring institutions. We lost a number of excellent faculty when
we or the spouse, could not find a satisfactory job. I recall two cases that
I found of interest. My nephew, upon graduation at NCSU, got a job in the library.
By this time uncles, aunts, nieces and nephews were included in the nepotism
policy. We could not hire him since the library reported to me. I also recall
the case of a faculty member who was divorced and married again. He had a grant
and wished to hire his former wife who was quite competent and would be available
immediately to work on the grant. The dean called to see if the supervisory
role existed here. I told him no, but I was not at all certain that the idea
was wise. Upon questioning later, I found that this had worked well. About the
time that I became Provost, through the efforts of our Assistant Affirmative
Action Officer, Claudia Pattison, a network of Research Triangle Park institutions
and the Triangle's colleges and universities was established to facilitate the
hiring of spouses. It seemed to work well for a while.
It is always amazing how simple
things that have good intentions can cause a lot more work. After the passage
of the Buckley Amendment we had to ask those writing letters about students
to put only one student in a letter. This was true when I was making exceptions
to the rule for graduation requirements or for graduate students to remain as
graduate assistants when they had grade point averages below 3.0. The concept
was that it was illegal for us to give out information except to those who needed
it for administrative purposes and not to other people. If two people were in
the same letter then we violated policy when we gave both affected persons a
copy of the same letter for their records. In 1974-75 this became even more
serious for there were State laws on freedom of information which spelled out
what we could release and what could not be released to others. Anything in
the files about an individual became open to that individual. This meant that
we had to require those who wrote a letter about more than one individual to
rewrite separate letters for each individual. If we did not get separate letters,
we had to make Xerox copies and blacken out the information about the others
included because we put the correspondence in each person's individual personnel
folder. As we responded and gave approval we had to respond with separate letters.
It became our usual practice to write approved and to put the approval date
and initial or to sign the letter which requested the approval and make a copy
for the files. Information such as salary, the last salary increase, promotion,
rank, and date of employment was to be available to any citizen of the state
who asked for the information. While this is not the complete list, it illustrates
that we could give out only the allowed information or we were subject to specified
levels of fines. The consequence of this freedom of information and the restrictions
made a lot more work for all, but it had a very good purpose and was worth the
effort.
As a part of this law we had to
give out the salaries when requested to North Carolina citizens. Little else
was usually wanted. The Chancellor set up procedures so that the Provost was
designated as the giver of the allowed personnel information, except for athletics,
and the Director of Athletics was authorized to release that information. At
first we kept a list of salaries and made it available in the Provost's Personnel
Office for those on campus who wished to see the list with the social security
numbers blacked out. Later we could ask the computer to prepare a list with
the social security numbers deleted. It was illegal to give out social security
numbers. We did not make copies of lists to send out, and a salary had to be
requested for an individual by name. This later became a large inconvenience
for the staff and we prepared a total list, without social security numbers,
which was placed in the Faculty Senate Office for those on campus who wished
to see salaries. The Senate had volunteered to do this. A copy of the BD 119
(a form listing salaries and salary increases was prepared for the State) contained
this information and was in the D. H. Hill Library and several State offices,
but an individual paid from two salary sources would appear at two different
places. If individuals wanted a list of persons and their salaries they could
make it. For those off-campus requests we gave out information if a few individuals
were requested. If the list requested was long we required the person to come
to the Provost's Personnel Office and copy the salaries they wanted. Whenever
the Personnel Office or I gave out a salary to anyone from off-campus, we informed
the individual on campus whose salary had been requested. This procedure is
still followed. At first there seemed to be a large number of persons who wanted
to know the salaries of others. Today, except for a few major appointments which
are requested by the newspapers and those on the faculty who wish to see the
salaries in the Faculty Senate Office, there seem to be very few requests. More
recently Chancellor Monteith required all off-campus requests for personnel
information to be reviewed by the University Attorney. It seems that this was
necessary because the old policy seemed to have been forgotten and too many
persons on campus were giving out personnel information, some of which might
not be permissible under the statutes.
For many years we had questions
of exactly what was the academic year calendar. We always considered this to
mean a nine-month period. In 1979, we tried a system of floating dates, but
it seemed that this caused confusion too. These were associated with the beginning
dates of the fall semester and the end of the spring semesters. For example,
the academic year began on August 18, 1980, and ended on May 16, 1981. For 1981-82
we began the year on August 24, 1981, and ended on May 15, 1982. To avoid this
controversy and confusion, because no one seemed to remember the dates and they
were important and established the dates eligible for summer pay, we simply
began to make these dates August 16, for beginning the fall semester, and May
15 for ending the spring semester. Policy permitted no one to earn more than
three months pay in the summer. These new dates helped everyone to avoid an
overlapping of the employment schedules of the fall and spring semesters with
the Summer Schools every year and employment for more than three months in the
summer.
In 1984 the Faculty Senate recommended
an annual performance review of all non-tenured faculty and other EPA professional
personnel, a review of all tenured associate professors at a minimum of three-year
intervals, and of the professors at a minimum of five-year intervals by the
department head. The recommendation was accepted by the administration. The
administration would have preferred an annual performance review with all faculty
for we felt that these should be tied not only to promotions but also to salary
increase recommendations. In many departments reviews did occur for all faculty
almost annually and in others, especially those that were very large, the heads
followed the policy with considerable griping. We felt that there would be less
controversy over the salary recommendations if they were linked to the reviews.
We thought that the reviews would make it very clear to non-tenured faculty
what was expected of them if they were to gain tenure. It soon became obvious
that not all reviews were as stringent, honest and critical as they should have
been. There were still individuals who were certain that their performance was
satisfactory based on these reviews, but they were still denied tenure and promotion.
It also became obvious that in certain cases the expectations of the senior
faculty who debated and voted on tenure in a department sometimes differed from
those of the department head. We then reminded the departments that the expectations
of both the senior faculty and the department heads should be made very clear.
This continues to be a problem, but it is not as great as it was before this
policy was adopted.
Chancellor Poulton established a
new process for final approval of all matters that were to become policy, by
having such matters go to the Trustees. It was his belief that the policy should
be sent to him for submission to the Trustees. Since I dealt with the Personnel
Committee of the Trustees, I still had to prepare the recommendation and to
defend the recommendation to the Personnel Committee.
There are a large number of other
personnel policies discussed in many of the other sections of this history when
the policy is related to those sections. This is especially true in the other
units of this chapter. Other policies may be found in the Faculty Handbook.
Rank and Tenure
Shirley and Bostian both placed
a high priority on obtaining the privilege of tenure for the NCSC faculty. Tenure
and academic freedom were discussed frequently on campus by the faculty, and
the Faculty Senate was a strong proponent. Based on a number of memoranda and
discussions of the Senate, the hold-up seemed to be the Board of Trustees. Although
it was one of the first things that Bostian had indicated a need for when he
became Chancellor, it was not until after Caldwell came that tenure was finally
awarded to the faculty.
One of the other things that Shirley
attempted to establish were uniform systematic procedures for promotion, and
defined requirements for academic rank. At the time of his appointment this
had been more or less a school matter with review by the Chancellor, but each
school seemed to have some of their own unique criteria, rules or procedures.
At first the Faculty Senate was not in favor of a uniform system. They argued
that the needs in one school or department might differ from another. Some deans
were not enthusiastic either, for this reduced their power to control appointments
and promotions. Part of the issue really resided in the fact that we had a large
number of faculty whose highest degree was a master's degree. The world was
changing so that few new hires were being made for faculty with a master's degree,
even in the Agricultural Extension Service, except in a few areas where the
master's degree was the terminal degree. The change came quickly and after Kelly
gained the title of Provost, we required a justification for any permanent faculty
member to be hired whose expectations did not include the doctorate. This became
the process when tenure was awarded and the request had to be approved by the
BOG. We continued to hire a few persons who were near the completion of the
requirements for the doctorate, but we added to the letter of offer that the
person was employed as an assistant professor contingent on the doctorate. If
the doctorate was not earned by the beginning of the fall semester the rank
automatically would be made instructor. The rank would be changed to assistant
professor when we were notified that all requirements for the doctorate were
completed. We did continue to hire a few exceptional and experienced faculty
in several fields with the master's degree. We were beginning to have the expectation
that almost all faculty would contribute to scholarship as well as to serve
the University and to teach. Many faculty with master's degrees contributed
in very significant ways to scholarship. For example Doolittle in Mechanical
Engineering and many others wrote texts that were widely used for years. Many
holders of master's degrees were researchers and also contributed to other forms
of scholarship.
In 1973 the UNC System was in the
process of developing a code for the system and for each campus of the system.
Included was to be the rank and tenure and academic freedom statements for the
system and for each campus. This was heavily debated in the Senate and several
of us were on a NCSU committee to interface with the UNC System, which meant
Dr. Dawson and Dawson's associate, who was the author of the system's code and
whose job it was to assure that the documents of each campus were compatible
with the BOG Code. Out of this came our current tenure regulations. We had the
normal ranks of instructor through professor but also added those of lecturer,
demonstrator and laboratory supervisor. These are essentially as published in
the Faculty Handbook today. We would have liked to have had a few additional
minor revisions that were not permitted, but the document as it was revised
by the Senate and the NCSU administration and finally approved by the BOG was
a very good one.
At the Faculty Senate meetings on
October 2, and October 9, 1973, there was much debate about a quota tenure system.
This is a popular item for discussion in the press every three or four years.
This seemed to appeal to a few members of the UNC Trustees and later to a few
members of the BOG. The Senate said in its minutes that:
Many
faculty members were confused as to the implication of the statement in the
Provost's memorandum of May 17, 1973, on Faculty Manpower Planning, a discussion
of an appropriate distribution among academic ranks as an appropriate ratio
of tenured to non-tenured faculty for a school. If the appropriate ratio is
considered to be above three-fourths tenured faculty, please justify your
recommendation on grounds other than existing conditions.
Some faculty members have interpreted
this statement to mean that some sort of quota system or limit to the number
of tenured positions in a given school is under consideration.
The Faculty Senate at its October
2, 1973, meeting rejected the concept of quotas on tenure and rank. The Senate
Resolution read as follows:
The Faculty
Senate believes that the justification for granting tenure should remain the
qualities and accomplishments of the individual faculty member and the best
interests of the department in question; therefore, the Senate rejects the
concept of quotas on tenure and rank since such action does not serve the
best interests of the University and threatens the future of present non-tenured
faculty. We urge the University administration not to apply any such procedure
at all. There is nothing inherently wrong with a department composed of 100
percent tenured faculty if the faculty in question performs its function at
the highest level of competence that the University can expect. Academic excellence
requires both new ideas and methodologies, which are generated by tenured
and new faculty, and long-term applications and research, which are maintained
by tenured faculty. The life-blood of any university is in its tenured professors.
The University should invest more resources in this area, including more emphasis
upon faculty retraining and the institution of a workable University-wide
off-campus work assignment.
I do not think that was Provost's
Kelly's intent. However, he did ask the deans for a lot of information about
the proportions of faculty with tenure in each department, and the ages of faculty
et cetera. I recall no discussions with Dr. Kelly about limiting tenure or a
tenure quota. At this time the new tenure policies of the BOG were established,
and we also were required to have procedures on how to handle a financial exigency.
This obviously would let faculty and others go in times of financial disaster.
Another reason was that reports had been published of a projected decline in
future college enrollments. This theme was frequently a subject in the academic
press and popular press. It would have been helpful if our personnel data base
had been adequate at that time to do the study centrally without asking the
deans, but it wasn't. I recall attending a meeting where a chancellor of an
institution gave a talk which described the proportions of professors, associate
professors, assistant professors, and instructors needed on the basis of the
numbers of graduate, senior, junior, sophomore and freshman credit hours taught
at his institution. He was a very short time Chancellor of one of our system's
institutions. While only an Associate Provost, I recall asking him if his professors
never taught freshmen and didn't he think that they should. I also think that
I told him, in polite language, that his thesis was one of the most stupid that
I had ever heard. At any rate, our procedure at NCSU continued to be to search
hard for individuals with great potential as new hires with the hope that they
would indeed gain tenure and in time the rank of full professor. An investment
in a faculty member who does not make those contributions and does not have
the qualities needed to gain tenure is costly for the institution and indeed
a waste of developmental time for the department.
Near the end of Provost Kelly's
tenure as Provost, we initiated joint and associate faculty appointments. This
was done to encourage collaborative ventures between faculty of different departments
but with some common procedures, expectations, goals and objectives. It did
stimulate faculty collaboration by encouraging more faculty to work together.
A joint appointment meant that the two departments were both involved in paying
the salary of the faculty member, and the faculty in turn had responsibilities
to both departments. For a joint appointee promotion and salary recommendations
had to come from both departments. An associate member was expected to cooperate
in ventures with the second department. In both of these cases the faculty in
the new department had to approve the new faculty member's having rank in that
department. Associate members might serve on graduate committees or other committees
or have joint research projects in the new department. Their salary increases
and promotion recommendations were limited to the department which paid them.
Opinions concerning quality of shared contributions were expected to be sought
from the associated department. Prior to this time there were faculty who were
members of more than one department; however, the rules and the responsibilities
were as variable as the relationships. Some departments encouraged joint and
associate faculty memberships. Others made it very difficult for a person from
another department to gain faculty rank and membership in their department and
did not seem to like the idea.
With Dr. Kelly's retirement we had
several instructors with master's degrees who had taught at NCSU from 10 to
15 years. All were very good teachers and most of them were female. With the
recommendations of the senior faculty they were promoted to the rank of assistant
professor for a three-year term. Dr. Kelly promised these individuals that they
would gain tenure at the end of their terms. When the time came, I proposed
these individuals for tenure without promotion, and I assumed that Dr. Kelly's
commitment would be honored. The proposal was not accepted and we had to wait
for the final year of a second term before they were tenured. Provisions under
the NCSU tenure policy did not provide for early tenure without promotion. Until
the departments really understood that this was an inflexible provision it did
cause severe disappointments for a very few faculty. Some came to us with the
expectation that time spent in rank elsewhere would count toward tenure here.
I think that the provision which had been adopted was good for the accomplishments
at NCSU and the ingredients needed as a base for a tenure decision. An example
of great disappointment in my later years was that we could not get visiting
time in rank at NCSU counted. I wish it had not been so important to the individual
because it did cause disappointment and hurt feelings. We had a faculty member
whose visa was not proper for us to award him anything except a one-year contract
as visiting associate professor. When the visa problem was cleared we appointed
him as an associate professor for a five-year term. At the conclusion of his
third year in this contract he requested that he be considered for promotion
and tenure by his department. The senior faculty recommended tenure but not
promotion. When the issue came to me I requested that they reconsider promotion
for his credentials seemed to be excellent. I would have no problem in getting
a request which included promotion approved at the BOG level. For whatever reasons
the senior faculty did not want to recommend promotion. So he did not get tenure
then, but the next year when he was in the fourth year of his five year term
he got promoted with tenure. I had tried to explain that his contract protected
him and that certainly, if the senior faculty had approved him for tenure at
this time, they would propose him the following year too. I think many considered
this to be unnecessary bureaucracy. Maybe it was. The system was very inflexible
for many years in letting us hire anyone as a new associate professor with tenure.
One day a new department head, Downey Brill of Civil Engineering, called me
and said that he had stopped by to see Dr. Dawson and talked to him about tenure
for the new associate professor that he wanted to hire. I had just told Brill
a few days earlier that tenure would be impossible to obtain and that if his
newly sought for-hire insisted on tenure, we could not get it for him. I was
somewhat (this is too mild a word) shocked that he had talked to Dr. Dawson,
but I was delighted to learn of the result. He informed me that Dr. Dawson had
told him he would approve exceptions when justified. It had been turned down
several times earlier, but I had not asked recently. We then began to hire a
few exceptional persons who were in fields where faculty were scarce, and a
few based on race and gender in fields where they were very scarce. In general
it is not wise to award tenure until the faculty member has enough on-campus
experience to know that they will succeed in the NCSU environment, but as is
true with most rules it is nice to be able to make that occasional exception.
Late during Poulton's term we found
the need for more faculty for research activities than could be obtained through
the faculty formula or from appropriations. The Colleges of Agriculture and
Life Sciences and Forestry had a way to accomplish this for research and extension
functions. We had since our first beginnings of tenure, permitted tenure to
be awarded to faculty whose salary came first from Hatch, and later from Smith-Lever
and McIntire-Stennis funding. The other schools wanted a mechanism too. We established
a rank called research professor, research associate professor, or research
assistant professor. Under the terms for rank with the prefix "Research" was
the understanding with the employees that after a specified period of time those
person would be responsible for obtaining the grants and contracts that would
pay their salaries. We had wanted to have these positions non-tenured, but under
the provisions of the NCSU tenure policies, we were not permitted this, and
Dr. Dawson did not want to take a revision of the code to the BOG for this purpose.
So we agreed (the Chancellor, the Provost, the VC for Research and all of the
school/college deans) that the establishment of the research rank would be a
good thing too when used in exceptional circumstances. We began to add a few
research faculty in the Forest Resources, Veterinary Medicine, PAMS and Engineering
Colleges whose titles were Research Professor et cetera. Most of these appointments
were at the Research Assistant Professor rank. It was agreed that we would not
use the prefix "Research" in the title of all ranks for new appointments except
these, but we would permit those few professors in the university who had the
research prefix to retain it. We agreed that we would not add it to any new
hires except for those hired on soft funds. With this approach we could then
just look at the titles and be able to see how many soft money tenured faculty
we had in a school or department without going through hand searches in the
files. The volume of such appointments were to be carefully watched so as not
to over-extend the privilege in any unit. We would expand our research staff
and add to the quality of our efforts. These full-time research faculty could
be given released time from their grant funds for any instructional efforts
that they performed and the instructional budgets would then pay them or else
reimburse the grants appropriately for these functions. These research assistant
professors and associate professors were given appropriate term appointments
as described under our tenure policy except we added to their letter of appointment
that their continuation as faculty was contingent on the sources of funds they
obtained through grants or contracts. We normally tried to be as specific as
possible in defining the sources of pay in the appointment letters, but it was
clear that if their ability to get grants to support their research and to pay
their salaries and fringe benefits was lost, then they would no longer be employed.
Provosts or Deans of the Faculty
have always had reviews with the school deans on their recommendations for promotion
and tenure. In the case of these two matters there is a prepared record for
review. At NCSU the senior faculty in a department serve as a promotion and
tenure committee and recommend those of their colleagues who will be considered.
In a few instances, and the number seems to be growing, the individual faculty
members decide when they want to be considered and these faculty prepare their
own dossiers for review. Our practice had been that the review is made by the
department's senior faculty. In most early reviews, the senior faculty have
asked that the review be undertaken. The idea may come from the department head
and today it sometimes comes at the request of the individual faculty member.
I did not want to get the materials prepared by the faculty member who was under
consideration for promotion. I wanted not just a presentation of the facts of
background and accomplishment as viewed by the candidate for promotion, but
an assessment of the faculty member's credentials from the perspectives of the
quality of teaching, research, extension and service of the faculty member to
the department, school and university. I always felt that the best source of
this assessment came from the judgment of the senior faculty in the department.
If I did not get an assessment and value judgment from them, I was not likely
to get any other informed judgment. They could extend their sources to include
assessments by outsiders on research and extension and for teaching by students
and the advisers of students who took classes under these faculty. At NCSU the
department head usually prepared the promotion and tenure document. Central
committees and the Provost rarely have the ability to read and comprehend backgrounds
from all fields and to make qualitative judgments. Qualitative judgments are
what is needed in promotion and tenure decisions. I had sat on school and university
review panels and had seen cases when only one, or frequently none of the reviewers
had a sufficient background to assess the quality of what was presented. Who
could read the papers attached and tell whether they were good? So I wanted
to avoid the tendency to weigh or to count or to look for the pretty presentation
of the material. I always felt that I did not have the experience. I needed
the material submitted to convince me that the work of this person was of sufficient
quality to justify the proposed action. I remember one prospective faculty candidate
whom I interviewed who brought along the material that he prepared for his promotion
at his home institution to show me. I told the young man that I did not want
to see what he had prepared, for I did not have the ability to say whether it
was good or bad. I suggested that if he had not prepared it he probably could
have published another major paper or to have at least had the time to do the
research to be ready to write another paper now. He looked at me with surprise
and said that he hoped that he would get an offer from NCSU and if he did that
he would accept it, and he did.
The statement of Academic Freedom
and the ranks used and the requirements of each for appointment, promotion and
tenure can be found in several sections of the latest Faculty Handbook
(the 1988 edition).
Named
Professors
In 1959 there were seven named professors
in the School of Engineering, thirteen in Agriculture, four in Textiles, and
two in Forestry. Each of these were supported by endowments that provided salary
supplements. Today there are many more of these named professors. In 1959, Shirley
served on a committee for the UNC system which came up with guidelines for named
professor positions. This was implemented, but on June 20, 1960, that policy
was modified slightly for NCSC. Caldwell stated the following guidelines and
procedures for named professors.
To insure
that only men of real stature are so recognized, the distinction of the candidate
must be measured against:
1. All the members of the department
to which he is to be assigned. He must clearly be the outstanding scholar and
teacher in the department, or of distinction equal to that of other named professors
in that department. 2. The whole faculty of the institution.
The quality of these men must be such that they command the respect and admiration
of the general faculty of the institution and the University. 3. The community of scholars
of the nation and the world. Named professors should be favorably known to scholars
in their fields beyond the University and the State and the Region. Active participation
and recognition in the professional societies and organizations of the nation
will normally be expected of men of this distinction.
The procedure was to have the dean
of the school notify the Chancellor when such a position became vacant and that
dean would appoint a committee with the Chancellor's approval. During Thomas'
term as Chancellor, he delegated to the Provost the responsibility to review
and to give the dean approval of the committee's membership. This process continues
today. Nominations would be open to faculty. The dean would then present his
and the committee's recommendation to the Chancellor, the Dean of the Faculty
(Provost), and the Dean of the Graduate School. The Chancellor after consultation
with those two, accepted or rejected the dean's recommendation. During Chancellor
Thomas' term the Dean (Vice Chancellor) for Research was added to the list of
the Chancellor's consultants. The appointment then went to the Trustees, and
after the Board of Governors came into existence, if there was a salary increase
involved (and it usually was), it went to the BOG.
The process has changed based on
the recommendation of the Senate and school deans. The committee which the dean
recommends and the Chancellor (Provost) approves:
is to
consist of no fewer than three or more than five persons. The membership of
the committee shall be persons, no one of whom would himself be under consideration
for the position. The members shall be active or emeritus professors of North
Carolina State University or of another faculty of the University, although
the committee may include one or more members of some faculty outside of the
University. The members of the committee shall be persons who would have knowledge,
and judgment in the field of scholarship of the named professorship.
Ample opportunity shall be provided
for members of all departments concerned to nominate to the Dean's committee
any person in the world of scholarship thought to be worthy of the position
without regard to his known availability. The committee may consider persons
nominated by members of the committee itself. The committee shall procure essential
information on the teaching, and research qualifications of the nominees.
In 1986 the process was very similar
except that it was called Professorships of Distinction. It also stated that:
"The selection process described shall not apply to special award professorships."
Special award professorships were defined to include only those professorships
which are for a defined term, an example being the Alumni Distinguished Professorships.
The alumni professorships were always chosen by an entirely different process,
and there have come into being several other award professorships in the various
schools. There was also added the following category: "In special circumstances
where the conditions of an endowment require special procedures of filling an
Endowed Professorship, these procedures may be amended by the Chancellor."
The Professorships in a particular
school are selected by the previously described processes, and the initial committees
are appointed by the dean with the concurrence of the Provost. These make up
a majority of the named professorships. Committees to nominate University Professors
that have not been allocated to be appointed only in a specific program or school/college
are appointed by the Provost after consultation with the Chancellor, the Vice
Chancellor for Research and the Dean of the Graduate School. This trio reviews
the proposals from schools/colleges to determine which unit will make the search
for the next University Professor except for those limited to a specific field.
They then make their recommendations to the Chancellor. In all cases of University
Professors, the Provost will make certain to appoint a committee to review the
credentials of prospects to determine that they indeed meet the qualifications
for a University Professor.
We established the title of Distinguished
Visiting Scholar in 1990. These were to be members of the national academies
or organizations of similar distinction who came to NCSU after their retirement
at other institutions. Committees for the review of their credentials were appointed
by the Provost. We now have two such scholars. These two would probably have
been appointed as adjunct faculty in departments if we had not have the Distinguished
Visiting Scholar title. In this way we have received a far more beneficial and
intimate association with each. These and the University Professors, make up
the Council of University Professors. This council was established at the request
of several University Professors who felt that we were not using them adequately
except in their departmental and college functions, and the recommendation was
liked very much by Chancellor Poulton. The idea was that we should from time
to time seek the council of this distinguished group of scholars on subjects
of interest and concern and especially in areas of scholarship. The council
may also discuss areas about which they want to advise the Chancellor and Provost.
The Chancellor and Provost met with the Council about once a semester while
I was Provost. In some cases the Provost attended additional meetings. These
faculty sometimes came to see me individually for a cup of coffee and to offer
me their advice.
Members of the Council of University
Professors are members of the faculty in their departments and are expected
to serve as role models and are , if funded from academic affairs budgets, to
do some teaching at both the undergraduate and the graduate levels. It was not
expected that they would carry a full teaching load, but they were to provide
scholarly leadership in their departments and colleges. Some of these professors
were likely to be appointed to serve on a variety of special and ad hoc
committees as needed by University administrators or by the college deans.
University Professorships have come
from several sources. The first five were from a special Legislative appropriation
to enable us to bring some additional distinguished scholars to our campus.
They were allocated, with two to the School of Engineering, two to PAMS and
one to SALS for biology. When vacated these positions were to continue to be
allocated in Engineering and in the Sciences (including math), but the administration
was free to assign them to other departments. Each time that a member of our
faculty is elected into the National Academy of Science or the National Academy
of Engineering the Provost appoints a committee to review their credentials
for a University Professorship. Faculty elected to other organizations of similar
distinction could also be nominated for consideration. Another group was added
when the University (Chancellor Poulton was the primary driver and originator
of this appropriation) received an appropriation for three positions in biotechnology
and for four additional high technology positions. These last were accompanied
by an annual appropriation of $250,000 each, which was to pay the salaries and
the fringe benefits. Any remaining funds were for support. Most of these have
grown in value because of salary increases received by the professors who held
these positions. We (the Chancellor, Provost, Vice Chancellor for Research and
the Dean of the Graduate School) received applications from the schools which
suggested potential nominees and reasons why we should assign these positions
to a school or program. The positions were expected to be filled by members
of the national academies. They were allocated to chemical engineering, computer
engineering, computer science and to biotechnology (animal science). The position
in computer engineering, in so far as I can tell, had never been filled and
the position in chemical engineering was vacant in 1993. The three biotechnology
positions which were appropriated included salaries and some support but were
not at the high support levels mentioned earlier. These were allocated after
review to chemical engineering, botany and microbiology. The microbiologist
had not been proposed for membership as a University Professor in 1993 and was
initially hired at the associate professor level. In recent years another group
of distinguished professors has come into being with incentives provided by
the Legislature and by industry. These are the "million dollar chairs." This
means that they are supported by endowments of one million dollars each. Most
of the salary and a head count position was provided by the school deans or
the Provost with some funds for salary coming from the endowment also. Two of
these were given to the University in such a way that any unit on campus was
eligible for them, the Moore and the Friday Professorships. Each of these million
dollar endowed chairs is eligible for consideration for membership in the Council
of University Professors. In 1993 only one of these had been nominated and selected
for membership. This was the Kobe Steel Professorship filled by Professor Robert
Davis. From time to time we have a very distinguished scholar who may be nominated
for membership in the council. These may continue to occupy their current positions
as do most members of the national academy members. At times, and in one case
of a National Academy of Science member, a position was created by the Provost.
Each of these are reviewed by a special committee appointed by the Provost.
Not all nominated to become a University Professor have been made a University
Professor and a member of the Council. In 1993 three present or former members
of the Council had been chosen by this route.
On December 13, 1977, a policy was
established for the appointment of Distinguished Extension Specialists. Those
appointed so far are the Phillip Morris Specialists in SALS. There are three
of these.
The awards to professors for whatever
reason, and the Alumni Distinguished Professorships, have meant a lot to the
University because they finally gave us the ability to recognize excellence
in teaching, research and extension with a financial recognition in addition
to a certificate. At first, in 1968, the Alumni Professors were awarded only
to teachers of undergraduate students. These awards were for $2000 a year for
five years. In time the number of awards increased. We all agreed we had so
many excellent teachers that it would be better to give more awards each year.
The length of the award was changed to three years. The Alumni Association increased
the funding too and added an award for excellence in graduate teaching. Once
a person is named as an Alumni Distinguished Professor, they retain the title
until retirement.
The named professors, named extension
specialists, University professors, the million dollar chairs, the awards to
special professors, and the distinguished scholars all have been very valuable
to us in attracting and keeping our faculty. They have enabled us to be better
in all that we do in teaching, research and extension at NCSU. With these as
with all other appointments or title changes, the Chancellor signs the appointment
letters.
Teaching,
Research and Extension Faculty
One of the first functions assigned
to the new Dean of the Faculty by Chancellor Bostian in 1955 was oversight of
the teaching function. This was done in part to look at teaching loads to provide
a better basis to allocate new positions. No mention was made at this time about
responsibility for allocating these new positions. In a statistical report in
1958, the average full-time faculty teaching load was described as 14 credit
hours. Later while Kelly was Provost, the full time faculty load was usually
described as three courses. In addition, an increasing number of faculty were
expected to contribute to research and/or scholarship. For faculty who were
not involved in scholarship and research the described load was 12 credit hours
per semester. Both groups were expected to render service to the department,
school and to the University. Of course there have always been some large classes.
At times there might be three or more full time equivalent faculty teaching
a single course to a few hundred students. In these cases several faculty equivalents
might be teaching full time on one course of three or four credit hours, and
shown on such a record as teaching one-third or one-fourth of a course. To explain
the range and each type of example, always took too much time and might get
misinterpreted. I could imagine seeing a newspaper headline that might say there
are teachers at NCSU who do not teach a whole course.
Over the years there have been complaints
about poor teaching and large classes. In 1959 a letter to the Technician
created a stir on and off-campus. The references were to several departments
in the physical sciences and in engineering. It turned out that the letter was
fictitious. At least there was no such student enrolled at NCSC. We had then
and continued to have some large classes, but we also had many small classes.
Some but not all of the large classes had smaller laboratory, discussion or
review sections. Most large sections are not bad educational experiences for
students, and some small sections are not well taught. I am sure that the current
practice of a mixture of large and small classes will continue. I do know that
we were concerned about the size of composition classes and wanted them to be
small enough for the instructor to have individual time with each student both
in and out of the scheduled class time. We did not wish to continue the high
school practice of individual teachers having so many students and papers to
grade that they could not give adequate attention to the problems of each student
after the papers were graded. Of course there never has been an educational
rationale that all subjects should have classes of similar sizes. Individual
teachers may be very good in large sections and so valuable that more students
should have the opportunity to be taught by that teacher. Unfortunately all
large classes are not taught by such teachers, but most are. We did encourage
departments to move those who were less effective in large classes to the teaching
of other smaller classes. In turn, teachers of large classes usually had graders
and certainly would not teach the same number of sections if they were to be
accessible to students outside of the scheduled class time In other words, uniformity
or equality of work-load is not definable, but it is also educationally very
undesirable if interpreted to mean the same number of classes, sections or numbers
of students taught.
Shirley was responsible for enhancing
the faculty quality and reviewing all appointments. He soon began to interview
most new faculty appointments. This practice was continued until several years
after I became Provost. While I was Assistant Provost, Chancellor Caldwell asked
Kelly to have me interview all instructors who were expected to enter the tenure
tracks. At least faculty of the rank of assistant professor and above were interviewed
by the Provost or one of his assistants whether they were to be involved in
teaching, research, extension or any combinations of these functions. In most
cases when the interviewee was to be a professor, a department head or an assistant
dean, the Chancellor also interviewed the candidates. Later he came to interview
only the final candidates for department head and assistant dean positions.
He continued to interview all candidates for named professorships, major directors
and deans. For many years the Chancellors usually had separate interviews. At
other times and when possible, to save the interviewee's time, we had joint
interviews until Chancellor Poulton began to interview only the final candidate
for these several positions. My staff and I continued to interview all the faculty,
assistant dean, dean and vice chancellor candidates who came to campus. At times
I was asked to interview assistant and associate vice chancellor candidates.
The numbers of faculty nominees
became too large for the Dean of the Faculty to interview them all. When I became
Assistant Provost I interviewed the assistant professors and if I was unavailable
Mr. Simpson interviewed them, as he sometimes had before I joined Kelly's staff.
When I became Provost these became the responsibility of Dr. Downs and Dr. Clark.
The numbers of assistant professors became large and the amount of other work
that had to be done grew too fast. So they dropped the interviews of assistant
professors and began to interview only the associate professors unless there
was a special request by the hiring department or dean. When Dr. Witherspoon
joined our staff he also interviewed some of the associate professors. By then
I interviewed only the professor and administrator candidates. I still think
that interviewing all faculty candidates was of benefit. When I interviewed
all of the assistant professors I knew at least a little bit about all of the
new faculty, what they were interested in, and what they wanted to accomplish.
They also felt that they knew me, Downs or Clark, for they had met someone from
the University administration. When Monteith became Chancellor he indicated
to me that he would continue the practice set by Poulton of interviewing only
the final candidate for department head, assistant dean and University Professor
positions.
Students have always had a keen
interest and desire to evaluate the teaching faculty. The first such University-wide
evaluation was started under Provost Kelly. A committee of faculty developed
an instrument to evaluate the effectiveness of teaching and an instrument for
course evaluation. The instruments were simple and their use was strongly encouraged
for several years. Groups of students used this information from computer printouts
along with other information in deciding which faculty to recommend as new members
of the Academy of Outstanding Teachers. The individual faculty evaluations went
to the department head but not to the school dean or Provost. Each faculty member
received a copy of the instrument's summary for the courses that they taught.
Most faculty also asked for and got written comments from the students enrolled
in their classes. One time a student on the committee to select Outstanding
Teachers took the information from the computer printout and published anonymously
in the Technician a list of faculty with the lowest scores on a single
summary question on teaching. The headline read something similar to "The 99
Worst Teachers at NCSU." This created an uproar, for he also published each
person's salary too. These were available at that time to the public in a State
governmental office. Of course the questionnaire was not designed to rate the
quality of teachers on this question only. Even on this one question many listed
had received a rating over 7.0 on a 1 to 10 scale. Our students gave our teachers
better grades than the teachers gave the students. According to the scale a
rating of five was supposed to be average, and very few faculty were rated that
low. The average score on the summary question was well above seven each year.
This Technician story caused a loss of confidence by the faculty in the
questionnaire and in its confidentiality. We had a great debate on campus about
evaluation, and a number of faculty no longer wished to participate. Many of
the faculty had never liked the instrument, but we still felt there was a need
for student input into the evaluation process. With the advice of the Faculty
and Student Senates, our next step was to have the departments devise their
own evaluation procedures and to have a copy of them on record with the Provost.
This effort was coordinated by Dr. Downs. We continued to encourage evaluation
each semester.
Some faculty would not be evaluated
by the students. I recall one teacher who got no merit salary increase who complained
to me. I told him that I had reviewed his case with the dean and his increase
was based on the supposed poor quality of his teaching. He showed me a few letters
from students, all written in several different semesters about an upper level
course, which indicated that he was good. He did not have all of the students
participate in the evaluation of that course and none in any of his other courses.
The department head had told both the dean and me that he had advised the faculty
member that the only things that he had to use in evaluating his teaching were
student complaints. They were numerous, universally bad, and he had not one
good report to use.
At a later time the students became
unhappy with the evaluation process of the departments and decided to do their
own evaluation. We supported them, but they had to do all the work in sending
out the questionnaires, collecting them, and getting the results published.
We had the Computer Center score the evaluations, summarize them, and do the
analysis that the students wanted. The students soon found after only a few
years that this was a lot of hard work and that the evaluations did not change
much from year to year. They soon lost interest and discontinued the project.
It was at about this time that the
Faculty Senate realized that the subject of teaching evaluation and improvement
was not only very important, but it also took up a lot of the Senate's time.
They proposed that a standing committee be appointed and that any policy proposals
developed by the committee come back to the Senate before they were acted upon.
We did this, and the Teaching Effectiveness and Evaluation Committee was established.
It advised the Provost on policies and programs for the enhancement of teaching.
It conducted a major survey of the effectiveness of TAs, advised on the selection
of mini-grants for innovative teaching and for computing grants, designed the
first Teacher Handbook and it recommended and monitored the procedures
for the selection of Outstanding Teachers. It was in the mid eighties that the
Teaching Effectiveness and Evaluation Committee began to organize an orientation
session for new faculty just before the beginning of each fall semester, which
emphasized excellence in teaching. These were coordinated by Dr. Downs and the
committee with assistance from the associate deans of academic affairs in the
schools. Some of our truly great teachers have been involved. This committee
also was the review committee for the mini-grants awarded to teachers. The role
of teaching evaluations is discussed further in the Rank and Tenure section
of this chapter.
Our students, their parents and
others complained about the accents of foreign faculty and teaching assistants.
There are letters and newspaper stories in the files. We did have many foreign
born teachers. In certain fields, if we had no foreign born faculty, we would
not have an adequate number faculty to teach. Students have complained about
any accent, even those of the persons from England, Canada or Australia. I guess
that it was tough for students to realize that some of the accents of certain
areas of our state of North Carolina are also difficult to understand. The majority
of foreign born faculty have been in those fields that do not produce enough
doctorates in this country to fill the available positions in universities.
At NCSU these have been in math, engineering and in some science and applied
science fields. We have a few foreign born faculty in most areas of the University
and this has been educationally sound and good for us. At times they are among
the very best qualified persons in their scholarly fields in the world. The
accent as a serious problem rarely exists, and certainly not nearly as much
as the students and the newspapers make it out to be. There seems to be a revival
of complaints every few years. I recall one example of a father calling President
Friday to complain about our foreign faculty who could not speak English and
he also complained about the poor quality of faculty advisers. President Friday
gave me the name of the student and the course and wanted me to call him back
with the results of my inquiry. I looked into the accusations and called the
President back, but he decided that he would rather I called the father with
the detailed and complicated message. This is the story. The student was in
a course in engineering with a foreign born teacher. The department head said
that he had never before had a complaint about this teacher's accent. I continued
to look into the advising accusation. It seemed that the student had a B.S.
from another university and wanted to enter graduate school at NCSU in the fall.
Although he was not a student here the faculty member looked at the student's
transcript and found several deficiencies in the student's background. He advised
the student to take specific math and physics courses in each of the two sessions
of summer school and then he would be prepared to take a very fast 400 level
course in the fall which would enable him to make up the deficiency of two other
undergraduate engineering courses. He told him that if he did well in that course
then he would recommend that the graduate school admit him into the desired
MS degree program. He told me that he had spent a large amount of time studying
the transcript and talking to the young man on at least two occasions. The young
man flunked the 400 level course and told his father he couldn't understand
the foreign teacher and that was why he flunked the course. He told his father
that almost all of the students in the course flunked. Upon further checking
we found that he was the only student who failed the course. The student had
taken none of the math and physics courses in summer school. He hadn't enrolled
for any courses in summer school. He had no trouble with the teacher's accent,
but he was so unprepared for the course he couldn't understand the vocabulary
of the course, much less be able to work the problems assigned. I called the
father and the father said, "I don't believe you, but I'll find out." In a few
hours he called back and apologized for his son's behavior, for the trouble
he had caused and for falsely accusing us on two counts. I don't know what happened
to his son, but based on his discussion with me, I'll bet that it wasn't pleasant.
Over the years many changes have
been made in our grading systems, and these are described in Chapter Two. I
doubt if any of these changes have substantially improved learning or teaching.
Effective teaching occurs when learning occurs. Learning appears to occur when
the students are enrolled in a class for which they have the appropriate background,
skills and prerequisites, and if the student is sufficiently motivated to put
out the necessary effort required to learn that subject. Teachers can encourage
motivation and they can discourage it. There is ample evidence that a teacher's
attitude toward students does enhance learning and that remarks that degrade
a student, whether based on race, gender or any other things, can discourage
student learning. Of course knowledge of the subject by the teacher is essential,
and if it is presented in an interesting manner and organized in a learnable
way, student learning is enhanced.
Most research faculty have traditionally
been appointed to 12 month positions. The summer is essential to do field research
in programs in agriculture and forestry. Faculty in many others areas of the
University do research in the summer, but they are not appointed on research
budgets and their salaries are paid from grants and contracts in the summer.
In 1982 the issue of whether or not the 12 month appointment was a right came
up. The issue was whether the faculty on partial research or on full time research
and now on a 12 month research appointment could be placed on a nine month basis.
I said:
It has
always been this institutions understanding that regardless of whether or
not a faculty member has permanent tenure, an appointment can be changed from
a 12 to a 9 month basis from one year to the next depending upon various circumstances.
To state the proposition more directly, the fact that a faculty member received
a 12 month appointment at the time he or she was notified that permanent tenure
was effective does not constitute a promise by the University that the individual
will have a 12 month appointment until he or she retires or resigns. The term
of appointment can be changed annually just as the faculty member's salary
can.
We began to change contracts in
some schools and faculty were converted to a nine month basis. The faculty members
who were not productive in research were returned to a nine month basis with
only an appropriate salary increase on the nine month base salary and were rewarded
for the quality of their teaching and service. In other cases we had very grossly
underpaid excellent faculty and did not have the funds to make adequate salary
adjustments. In these cases we gave the faculty member sufficient time to obtain
grants that would pay their summer salaries and used a substantial portion of
their current 12 month salaries to increase the nine month base. This practice
was used extensively in Textiles, and for all of the budgeted 12 month research
faculty in engineering and PAMS. It was used to a lesser extent in Forest Resources.
I recall no person being converted in SALS or in Forest Resources who were paid
from Experiment Station or Extension Service funds.
In 1977 the Legislature required
that a study of faculty work loads be conducted by the Board of Governors with
a report to the General Assembly no later than February 1, 1979. It was pointed
out in a memorandum of October 19, 1977, from Roger Fites, Chairman of the Faculty
Senate, who attended the meeting with VP Dawson, that such a study had been
conducted in 26 states at the request of other legislatures. The reason for
the North Carolina study was that the Legislators did not know what faculty
did because they had a contact hours in the classroom view of full time work.
It was really railroaded through by one legislator who seemed to have a dislike
for universities, and especially faculty. He definitely did not think that they
worked very much. Dawson said: "There have been a number of studies that have
attempted to elicit the reasons for what many consider to be Legislative intrusion
into the realm of faculty work." Fites wrote to the Faculty Senate members explaining
the rationale. He goes on in that memorandum to say that most studies had shown
the faculty to work on the average from 55 to 60 hours per week at their jobs.
When we did our study our faculty fell into this range too. The study did make
a lot of work. Dr. Dawson selected a typical week and had every faculty member
in the UNC system record what they were doing during this week. I don't think
that this ever satisfied certain legislators because the question continued
to come up with an inference that the faculty didn't work enough. It was nice
to be able to refer to the study from time to time, so it was worth something.
Just before I retired the Legislature also wanted another work load study. We
were fortunate in this instance because they were satisfied with a sample of
institutions and NCSU was not asked to participate.
Every year we had a report from
Institutional Research that gave the credit and contact hours taught in each
department by course level and with a total of both undergraduate hours and
graduate hours. We also had the average number of each per full time equivalent
faculty position assigned to the department. After computerization these calculations
were easier. We could and did obtain this information for every course. In this
way we could look up specific information about each course or section taught
by every faculty member. I recall when I was teaching Biological Science 100,
I was concerned that the grades in one laboratory section were very good and
in another they were very poor. I asked through channels to find out what the
average grades of students in each section were in other courses taken by these
students earlier at NCSU. I found that by the luck of the draw I had one laboratory
filled with students with good GPAs and in the other with much poorer GPAs.
I began to offer the poorer performing section extra help and time. Their grades
did improve some with the extra time, but they were not as good as those in
the other section.
The credit hour summary data was
very useful in faculty position allocations and will be discussed in Chapter
Five in the section on Budget Allocation.
The individual course data was used less frequently but occasionally for specific
complaints of students or to provide information to faculty. We did use this
information to determine which courses or sections of courses flunked the most
freshmen. This has been discussed earlier in Chapter Two in the section on Advising.
For many years it was required that
all faculty attend graduation. To miss it required the approval of the Chancellor.
With time it came to be a large matter to review requests for absences. Many
more faculty were absent without having requested approval. So the approval
process was delegated to the school deans. It does little good to have the Chancellor
approving something when no one pays attention. It soon became obvious that
most faculty were not in attendance and were not getting approval to be absent
from the deans either. When we looked at the school procedures in 1986, only
the Dean of Veterinary Medicine was still requiring faculty to attend or to
get approval not to attend. So we changed the rule and began to just encourage
faculty to attend. With this voluntary process as many attended as before and
we still had almost all of the seats in the coliseum assigned for faculty filled.
If all had attended we could not have seated them in the faculty section. It
was embarrassing to the School of Design students and the School Dean one year,
for Chancellor Poulton to ask all of the faculty in the schools to stand at
graduation when degrees were awarded to undergraduates from each school. There
was only one faculty member, Bob Burns, from the School of Design present. From
that time on there were at least a few more Design faculty at the general graduation
exercises.
In the late eighties there were
many national stories claiming that professors at research universities didn't
teach undergraduates. The Raleigh News & Observer naturally followed
suit and assigned a reporter to do a story locally. On our campus we had just
completed a survey which showed that almost all of the faculty except those
budgeted against organized research and extension funds, taught undergraduates.
A very large proportion in those departments which offered freshmen and sophomore
courses also taught freshmen and sophomores. The reporter was given a lot of
information from this report by me when he called, but he expected a propaganda
line from me and wanted to get the "facts" from the teachers and students. I
suggested that he talk to faculty in the Senate, and to persons in PAMS and
CHASS, the colleges which teach the majority of freshman and sophomore courses.
I even suggested that he talk to Dr. Abraham Holtzman, a professor of distinction,
who had just been named in the prior year as one of the nation's best teachers
and had won an award as North Carolina's top undergraduate college teacher.
When the story came out in the News &Observer it involved mostly
conversations with Duke and UNC-CH. There was a discussion with Holtzman, however
I would never have figured out from the story that he taught at the undergraduate
level. The story reported what the national stories had shown but did not reflect
at all what our professors were doing at NCSU. Since NCSU has become a nationally
prominent research university the press consistently equates all the triangle
universities as if they were all peas in the same pod and that the pod has only
one pea.
With the exception of SALS, Forest
Resources, and to a lesser extent Textiles, there are very few faculty hired
from Organized Research and Organized Extension budget funds. In SALS there
are more faculty lines or positions from each of those two sources than there
are from the Instruction-Departmental Research budget. In SALS and Forestry
there are a large number of faculty who are paid from only one of the three
sources. There also are many faculty who may be paid from two or more sources.
It is not unusual for a member to be paid from extension and research funds
or instructional and research funds, or from other combinations of funds with
the commensurate responsibilities. In each case the faculty member has responsibility
in the proportion of his/her budgeted salary to perform in the various areas.
Research faculty normally did not teach except when budgeted against instructional
funds. They did have graduate students and supervised their research and served
on graduate student advisory committees. As the years have passed more extension
personnel are performing these functions. Some of both advised undergraduates
but did so on a voluntary basis. Similarly extension personnel have taught at
both on and off-campus sites and at times have taught courses for credit. However,
most of these offerings were non-credit instructional courses or short courses.
In later years extension personnel have begun to do much testing of research
findings at a variety of sites and to do more and more applied research. In
Textiles the organized research lines were usually split with instructional
or extension lines. A few extension lines were full time, however many other
textile faculty taught some off-campus extension credit and short courses on
an overload basis. In Engineering most extension lines were full-time. In Education
and CHASS the few lines were part-time with instruction. In these two colleges
a person might be on extension for only a short time and then others would be
assigned to these functions. In Engineering some organized research lines were
full time, but those few lines that existed in all of the other schools were
used on a part time basis with instruction or for release time.
When I came to NCSU in 1953 the
work week was for five and one-half days. In 1957 there was a survey to determine
whether we would change from a day that started at 8:30 and lasted until 5:30
for five days a week. Neither faculty or staff wanted that change. I don't know
when we changed to an eight to five workday for five days a week, but we did.
Later we provided where it was possible, opportunity for the staff to use flex
time. Many did change based on their individual home and sometimes child care
circumstances. In the Provost's Office we had a number of staff who came at
7:00 and left at 4:00. Other who had to drop off children might arrive at 8:30
or even 9:00. The faculty hours and work days were quite variable. The faculty
were theoretically at work all of the time. I have known of professors who worked
on a sensitive experiment for a continuous 24 hour period or longer. It was
expected that they would in turn take off a similar amount of time because we
did not pay a faculty member for overtime.
You will find faculty and their
various functions discussed in much greater detail in almost all of the other
sections of this history.
Professional
EPA Faculty Who Hold No Academic Rank
From the appointment of Shirley
until Hart left the Provost's Office there were disagreements with the State
Personnel System about whether professional staff who hold no faculty professorial
academic rank should be classified as EPA. After Kelly became the Dean of the
Faculty the issue was raised about the EPA status of librarians. In 1964 the
Administrative Council of the Consolidated Office determined that they were
EPA and that they should have faculty status.
On November 22, 1957, there was
correspondence which clarified that the campuses would have responsibility for
positions involved in teaching and research. Precise definitions were not included
for either function, and that was probably intentional. One major basis for
disagreement was what comprised the two functions. NCSU and the UNC-Chapel Hill
campus tended to make our own decisions and to treat the definitions broadly.
I believe that all of the other campuses of the old UNC consolidated system
capitulated eons ago. We always considered those doing extension work as teachers
and researchers, and they are. Many areas of Student Affairs provide teaching,
primarily but not entirely, in the form of non-credit instruction. They also
frequently provide counseling and advising which are components of the teaching
function. Our definitions would include EPA personnel in admissions, financial
aid, registration, student center, crafts, institutional planners and researchers
and other similar types. The issue was raised after Caldwell came in 1960 with
no conclusion, at least I found none in the files, but NCSC continued to follow
the same practices as before. A very important area for us were research assistants,
research associates (the SPA system has the same titles) and post-doctorates
where personnel do research on a grant or in projects which might be State supported,
but they are not the major investigators and they do not have a professorial
rank. The ability to make quick decisions with only simple job descriptions
enabled us to hire such employees as soon as a grant was funded, even on the
same day if necessary. This flexibility rather than having the positions classified
(we believed improperly) in some SPA job descriptions, has been fundamental
to our ability to deliver quickly on research and other types of grants which
provide us with the majority of our funds for graduate student support, for
cost of research and for the salaries of many personnel including many who are
and should be SPA personnel and for graduate student stipends. I used the concept
of an individual's doing independent research rather than having to be supervised,
to separate these categories of personnel. The only job description that I was
interested in receiving was that the person was to do research in civil engineering,
textile chemistry, or whatever field was involved. The SPA system wanted a complete
job description in the format of SPA forms to study the description to determine
if the positions should be SPA or EPA before it was filled.
The most difficult group to defend
was that group of employees in the areas of Public Affairs and Development.
The issues regarding these and many other individuals were raised in 1964 when
Dr. William Turner the Business Manager, argued that:
There
are, at this time, a relatively small group of employees at NC State who are
neither faculty nor subject to the Personnel Act. This group includes librarians,
student counselors, editors, and others who are closely allied to teaching
and research. They are making substantial contributions to the objectives
of the University; yet there has been considerable confusion regarding the
long-run status of these positions. They are currently budgeted and administered
as positions exempt from the Personnel Act. The Personnel Department, however,
on several occasions has reviewed the duties and responsibilities of these
positions, apparently with the intent of incorporating them into its classification
plan.
We submit that there are many of
our higher-level professional positions that should be exempt form the Personnel
Act even though faculty rank may never be assigned thereto. Non-faculty EPA
positions should include those now in the so-called gray area, plus a relatively
few that are now subject to the Personnel Act. The recognition of a third category,
identified as Academic Professionals, would eliminate the "gray" list. A more
liberal interpretation of that portion of the Personnel Act which exempts employees
from its provisions and controls would be most helpful. In another portion of Turner's memorandum,
he states: The problem is accentuated by the
fact that these employees must work shoulder to shoulder with all academic administrators
on campus. These employees are charged with responsibility and authority that
require them to hold their own with deans, directors and department heads. The
area of their responsibility crossed all organizational lines. The level of
concern embraces judgments and decisions which affect directly all management
and operational activities of the university.
I saw no response in the files to
Turner's memorandum, but NCSU continued to operate on the same basis as before.
In these cases these employees are significant administrators and in our view
need to be EPA because of the status needed to work in both on and off-campus
settings. These and the other positions have always been EPA going back at least
to the days of Harrelson. We felt that a change and movement into the SPA Classification
arena would cripple our efforts.
During the later years of my term
as Provost there was a constant effort to have more of the other EPA staff positions
reviewed for SPA status by the State Personnel System. This continued throughout
Provost Hart's term. The effort included getting position descriptions for review
by the Personnel System before we would set up or fill the position. These professionals
would determine whether the positions would be EPA or SPA. For the last several
years the UNC staff represented by Dr. Raymond Dawson and later by Dr. William
Little joined into the fray to see if the issues could be resolved. I took the
EPA lists of our employees as provided from the General Administration computers,
excluding those with faculty rank, senior administrators and the librarians,
and prepared a justification which was jotted down on the list on the basis
or our criteria and the functions of the position as provided to us by the holders
of the positions. They were classified when I did the project to include those
that taught, did research or fit otherwise into the system. I performed this
function a second time using some of Dr. Dawson's suggestions. Dr. Hart performed
this same function again. I do not believe that as of July 1, 1993, they had
resolved any of the issues. Of course, senior administrators have always been
excluded from oversight by the State Personnel System.
On October 20, 1988, Chancellor
Poulton wrote to Mr. Richard V. Lee, the Head of State Personnel. I will quote
a part of the letter. "I met with my colleagues here and expressed to them your
concern that we are disadvantaging some people by wrongly classifying them as
EPAs, and I cited some of the examples you gave me. I expressed to them your
concern that we might be creating a legal problem for ourselves."
Legal counsel says in reality everyone
who works at North Carolina State University should be exempt from the personnel
act. Her brief is as follows:
The statutes
clearly state that the Board of Governors have the sole responsibility for
defining the Mission of North Carolina State University. The Board of Governors
have, in fact, defined that mission in writing, and it is a mission that speaks
only to teaching and research. The statutes clearly exempt from the personnel
act those persons who are involved in teaching and research. North Carolina
State University's full spectrum of activities relate to teaching and research.
We have no activities at this University that are not mission related. That
is to say, we have no non-related business activities at North Carolina State
University, although I realize such activities do exist at some universities.
In summary, a combination of statutes
and trustees' policies really dictate that everyone who is employed by North
Carolina State University is employed for the purpose of providing programs
of teaching and research, and therefore all of our employees qualify for exemption
from the State Personnel Act. I will be interested in your reaction,
and if you would like to go to lunch again, let me know.
I think that they did have lunch
again, but I did not see a response to that letter, and the debate continued.
We have a large number of EPA positions
that do not carry faculty rank. It had been our practice, at least under Kelly,
Hart and myself to provide them with the same benefits and privileges as the
faculty with rank except that these employees were not eligible for the TIAA-CREF
retirement option. This was changed in 1990 for the Librarians when they became
eligible. These EPA personnel did not earn tenure and were not appointed to
terms. Unless otherwise indicated in their appointment letters, they were considered
as permanent employees. Most persons employed from soft-money sources did have
conditions applied.
In 1976 Chancellor Thomas approved
a proposal by the committee appointed to study the employment status of individuals
holding professional appointments without faculty rank. This provided for the
establishment of appointment terms. Our campus liked these provisions very much.
Many of the units developed a system of term appointments with reviews, and
a system of reappointments. Others units such as Extension and Student Affairs
did not establish a term system. On January 18, 1979, President Friday sent
to the Chancellors a draft of policies for non-faculty positions not subject
to the State Personnel Act. There was great concern and disagreement on our
campus with the content of this proposal. On February 2, 1979, Chancellor Thomas
wrote to President Friday and proposed that Dr. Banks Talley and Dr. Clauston
Jenkins (Dr. Jenkins had left us earlier and gone to Law School at UNC-CH and
was now NCSU's University Attorney) serve on the committee to study the new
personnel policies. He said, "Since we have almost half of the total participants
in this category on our campus, I believe it would be appropriate to have both
of these individuals serve. I remain very concerned about development of these
policies and fearful of the inevitable results."
After considerable study that committee
recommended a format of privileges for these employees. That policy as it applied
to NCSU was passed on May 22, 1979, by the NCSU Board of Trustees. The most
significant change was that new employees would gain annual leave on a schedule
very similar to that of SPA employees. There were exceptions that could be made
so that the experience of an individual coming from other agencies could be
considered and that the number of days of annual leave that the person had earned
in their last job could be considered and used if they exceeded that adopted
schedule. We were able to retain most of the other privileges that we had made
available to our EPA non-faculty employees. These regulations can be found in
the Faculty Handbook of 1988 on pages 65 through 72.
Salaries
and Salary Administration
When Dean Shirley was appointed
Dean of the Faculty, Chancellor Bostian assigned him the responsibility of reviewing
all salary recommendations of faculty and other EPA personnel for the NCSC administration.
It was not clear in the earlier memoranda what the role of the Dean was in the
allocation of salary increase funds. It appeared from the letters that the Chancellor
continued to do the allocations. However, by 1960 it was apparent that the division
of the salary increase funds for units was made by the Dean of the Faculty followed
by a review with the Chancellor. The Dean of the Faculty then prepared the letters
of allocation for the Chancellor's signature. As a matter of interest, the entire
School of Textiles received a total of $4000 for salary increases in 1960, including
funds for promotion and merit. The Legislature ended its sessions early (around
April 1) and met only every other year, so the increases could be processed
and were always in the July pay-checks.
In 1956 the formula used to convert
a 12 month salary to a 9 month salary, or visa versa, was 20%. About the time
of the establishment of the BOG this was changed to 22%. Except for the faculty
in SALS, Forest Resources and Veterinary Medicine, almost all faculty were and
still are on a 9 month basis. The factor set by the BOG staff for faculty in
Veterinary Medicine for conversion from 9 to 12 month salaries was one-third
of the academic year's salary. Personnel in administrative positions and in
almost all of the positions reporting to a Vice Chancellor are also on a 12
month basis.
In 1960 Chancellor Caldwell added
to Shirley's responsibilities the authority to negotiate salary recommendations
with Deans and Directors. This practice continued with all of the persons who
held this position. The primary difference was that as the University increased
in the number of such employees, the amount of review by the Chancellor decreased.
For instance, when I was Provost, Chancellor Caldwell wanted to review only
those who were associate or assistant deans or their equivalents. He also wished
to review those salaries that I planned to question with a school dean. This
practice continued with Chancellor Thomas and Chancellor Poulton. In their first
year or two, both Thomas and Poulton reviewed all of the salary increases of
one or more groups. For example, Chancellor Poulton reviewed all persons his
first year. Salaries for school deans and for the Vice Chancellors were set
by the Chancellors; however, each always asked me to suggest increases for the
school deans. Sometimes they agreed with my recommendations, and sometimes they
didn't. I understand that this practice continued under Monteith while Hart
was Provost. The Chancellors always wished to know what had been recommended
for a few individuals. There were times when they did not agree with the dean's
proposed salaries or with the Provost on some of the salaries that the Provost
planned to question with the deans. After review by the Chancellor, the Provost
had a meeting with the School Dean, the Vice Chancellor or with other unit heads
who did not report through a school or Vice Chancellor. Chancellor Poulton sometimes
handled the entire review of the salary increases proposed by a Vice Chancellor.
Dean Shirley proposed that all academic
year employees be paid their academic year's salary in 12 monthly installments.
This was accepted. In 1963 salary maxima and salary minima were already in place.
If a faculty member were recommended to receive a salary in excess of the approved
salary maxima from state funds, it had to be approved by the State Department
of Administration. In 1965 the State Budget Officer set the maximum salaries
by rank from state funds. He did not set minimum salaries by rank for the first
time, although the UNC administration did set them for that year. In 1966 the
schedule showed no minimum salary scale. In 1966 the scale was as follows: Dean,
$23,400; Director, $21,000; Distinguished Professor, $25,000; Professor, $17,800;
Associate Professor, $13,900; Assistant Professor, $11,900; and Instructor,
$9,600. Soon after this the salary maxima were set by the Board of Trustees
based on the advice of the President and his staff. When the BOG was established,
a scale was established which included the following salaries from state funds
at NCSU. The salary scale maximum for a dean was the maximum set for the Provost.
Other administrators' salaries, including directors, were set for the maxima
of the particular academic rank of the holder. For example, if an assistant
department head was an assistant professor then his salary maximum was that
set for that rank. The BOG set the salary maxima for all of the vice chancellors
and administrators that reported to the Chancellor. These varied very much among
the various Vice Chancellors. This was one of the reasons that Chancellor Thomas
desired to have Rigney report to me for his salary maximum as set by the BOG
was entirely too low for his value, contributions and experience. Maxima were
also set for the professorial ranks and for instructor. Each year these were
usually increased by the same or just a little over the percentage of the average
salary increase appropriated for that year.
In 1970 Provost Kelly wrote and
signed the letters of allocation for the merit salary increase funds allocated
to the school deans. He may have done this earlier, but these were the first
letters I saw signed by Kelly. Since so many of the guidelines on salary administration
were dictated by the General Administration of UNC and occasionally by the Legislature,
the Provost assumed the responsibility of writing the letters of policy explaining
how the increases would or could be handled, and his staff worked up the allocations
to be included in the letters with any restrictions and the deadlines for each
step in the processing of these increases. He also included any restrictions
imposed by the Chancellor.
There were usually no additional
NCSU restrictions except to encourage as much use of the funds as possible and
as permitted for merit increases. In making the allocation of the funds it was
necessary for the Provost to know of unusual circumstances that would require
a deviation from a proportional distribution of the increase funds. Each source
of pay in the salary of an individual had to pay for the increases in the same
proportion as the position was budgeted. For example, the Legislature did not
appropriate increases for the salary supplements which came from endowments
for the named professors. I sometimes used funds from the increases for vacant
or temporary positions to make up for this deficiency. When I became Provost
I always kept some funds back from the temporarily allocated positions so that
we could increase the salaries of women, because I felt that they were not on
par with those of men by field in 1974. I kept a small amount of funds, as had
Kelly, to use to increase salaries of a few individuals whose contributions
to the University had not been adequately rewarded by the local units. The Chancellor
had to be contacted to see if he had made any promises that must be met. Any
remaining funds were distributed to deans for addition to an individual's increases
or was added to the increases for the continuing personnel in the temporary
positions or for graduate teaching assistants. When Shirley and Kelly were in
office the salary increase funds came as a lump sum for academic affairs except
for those earmarked for the Agricultural Experiment Station and the Agricultural
Extension Service. This meant that there were only three separate salary increase
lines in the appropriations and the increases could not be transferred among
these three budgets. We could if we wished, and did provide at times some extra
funds for increases among the academic affairs units. For example Kelly, and
at first I gave some extra increase funds to the Library's EPA staff, for their
salary levels were so very low. Soon after the University System absorbed the
campuses that had previously reported through the Board of Higher Education,
restrictions among budget lines became more numerous. Soon after I became Provost
we could not transfer salary increase funds from the 101-1310 lines (faculty
lines for teaching and departmental research positions) to those in the other
lines whether administrative, library, organized research, Student Affairs,
organized extension et cetera. But we could transfer salary increase funds from
these budgets to those faculty under the Instructional and Departmental Research
lines. To avoid problems in allocation and use, we made these increase allocations
separately as well as those for the Agricultural Extension Service and the Agricultural
Research Service. One of the things that this accomplished was to make the percentage
increases of continuing faculty greater than those for any others, including
all department heads, deans, directors, vice chancellors, and their associated
assistant and associate positions, the organized research and organized extension
positions. We could use the increase funds allocated for vacant positions or
positions filled temporarily in this budget for continuing personnel. We had
a very small proportion of administrative positions vacant, hence no or little
extra funds were available for these increases. This helped the increases for
continuing faculty except in those units which had a tendency to keep all positions
filled on a permanent basis. This did not change the average salary per full
time equivalent faculty position. In an occasional year we could not apply increases
to vacant positions without justification. All of the Chancellors and Provosts
have approved of this salary increase scheme and have thought this was a very
good idea. Under the Board of Governors directions each year, we were required
to use all salary increase funds for salary increases. No new positions could
be created under these rules with these funds and all salary increase funds
had to be allocated at the same time and none could be held for increases later
on during the year.
Under Thomas and continuing under
Poulton, I began to monitor the increases of the highest paid professors and
of the named and University Professors to insure that they got adequate salary
increases. Chancellors until Poulton's term were almost always the highest paid
individual on campus. Occasionally a salary supplement for a named professor
might make that salary higher, but these were very rare. We soon began to have
(if one converted salaries to a nine-month basis for comparison) a number of
faculty whose salaries were higher than that of the Chancellor. Dr. Poulton
used to brag about the number of faculty whose salaries exceeded his. I did
have to watch these high salaries because there is a tendency not to give similar
percentage increases, even if deserved, if the total increase was very large
and considerably higher than the dean's, associate dean's and department head's
salaries. One practice was to require at least an average percentage increase
unless a lower increase could be justified on the basis of performance, as I
did with the named professors.
A major objective of the salary
reviews by the Provost or Deans of the Faculty was to try to keep the system
honest so that the increases reflected only judgments of quality for any merit
funds awarded. There were always some recommendations for promotions and to
eliminate inequities, but we wanted no bias for reasons of malice or dislike.
This is very hard to judge, but it was almost always true that when a department
head change occurred a few faculty, who were receivers of smaller increases
in the past few years, began to get better increases under the new head. In
a few cases after a change of deans, increases proposed for a faculty member
viewed as exceptional in either the good or bad direction also changed.
I tried to make certain that no
department head gave the same amount or the same percentage increases to all
faculty. If such a recommendation came over it went back to have the salary
recommendations done again. After the second year as Provost I got a few such
recommendations and these were most likely to be from administrative instead
of academic units. In 1988 our time schedule to get the salaries in, processed,
approved and into the payroll was so short that I did not have time to have
many reviews with the deans. In cases of questions I called, but I accepted
almost everything proposed. I did write a couple of deans and told them I did
not think all of the increases which we had accepted because of the short time
schedule, reflected the differences in quality of performance among the faculty
that I knew existed in certain departments, and next year I would expect a greater
spread. One of the problems was that everyone who was involved in salary increases
had a shortened schedule too. In my reviews with the deans I tried to ask enough
questions to make certain that the dean knew and had a reason for all very low
and very high increases. I asked enough questions to feel that the deans knew
why the average increases were proposed too. In a few cases I did change or
caused salary increase changes to be made, usually for a larger increase. My
questioning was to keep the system as honest as I could. I never reviewed more
than a sample of faculty with any dean. Of course I did have some assessments
and computer runs to review before the reviews which gave me lists of females
and others who seemed out of line. It seemed to me that the department heads
and deans did not always adequately reward service to the University and sometimes
even service to the school. Throughout my tenure as Provost I was determined
to get rid of what I could not prove but felt was salary inequity for women.
For this reason, I always made certain that the average percentage increases
of females with faculty rank in the university, exceeded those of males in each
of the seventeen years that I was Provost. When I retired Institutional Research
assured me that there were no statistical differences in salary based on gender.
It was the normal operating procedure
from Shirley to Hart that all salary increases during the year not included
in the normal annual increases for faculty would have to be approved by the
UNC System administrators, and at times the UNC Trustees (or the BOG), and by
the NCSU Trustees. At first under Shirley, there were additional approvals from
State government officials. Approval of increases for research assistants or
other personnel paid from soft money sources and especially research grants
were not usually required. One or another of these was renewed on almost any
day during the year, and renewals usually had funds for salary increases for
these employees. It was such a hassle and involved so many rubber stamp approvals
and extra paper work that this was usually delegated to the local campus and
increases could be approved by the Provost to take effect the day that the grant
was approved or when the funds became available. These increases almost never
required approval by the NCSU Trustees because the salaries were too low and
below the minimum required for their approval. Under Hart there was a period
of a year or two when BOG Administrators had to approve all of these increases
as well as the new positions created under such grants. This created some havoc
and poor morale for these employees and considerable anguish for NCSU administrators
at all levels and for the faculty holding grants which supported these valued
employees.
In the mid-eighties I realized that
we were still paying academic year employees on the basis of teaching days.
I had thought we had changed this much earlier. This made no difference in the
pay that they received if an employee left us at the end of a semester. However,
we did occasionally have a person leave us during the semester. We almost never
had an academic year employee arrive during a semester. In my opinion this led
to overpayment or underpayment depending on when during the semester the person
left. It was very difficult to explain to an employee who had served for one-half
of a semester why they did not receive one-half of their pay. But we had always
done it this way, so it was very difficult to change. My argument was that faculty
worked in the semester before classes started to review instructional materials
and to get their teaching notes and ancillary supporting teaching materials
up to date. Those of us who taught biological science and a number of other
subjects that had laboratory sections had to begin to grow plants or microbes
and to prepare materials for laboratory well in advance of the semester. Considerably
more effort and work in teaching occurred other than just on the days that the
classes met. I argued that for most faculty some work occurred in the few days
after the end of the semester. I tried for several years to get these pay periods
structured on the basis of the proportion of the semester taught. I was determined
that this change would be implemented before I retired. While it affected only
a small number of persons over the years, it was still important. On August
30, 1989, I finally got this method of payment in place in the payroll system.
The spring started on January 1, and ended on May 15, and the fall semester
began on August 16 and ended on December 31.
At the time that Shirley became
Dean of the Faculty the policy of the system was that faculty could be paid
for specific services beyond their duties. Approval in each case required the
approval of the President and the BOT. There were also supplements at this time
for named professors.
In 1962 the policies about supplemental
pay were not uniform or clear. Each action required special approval. The Institute
of Statistics paid supplements from receipts from consulting which were approved
annually. Most of the faculty received payment for Summer School and extension
(off-campus credit and non-credit) teaching. Shirley wrote Ruggles, the Director
of Extension, that we needed to have regular approval by the department head
of the faculty teaching these courses. He said that if we are to have an alert
faculty, we must not permit them to overload themselves to the detriment of
study, research and professional development.
In 1963 the Evening College activities
were merged with the regular functions of the departments and schools and of
the faculty. Salary supplements were no longer paid to faculty who taught on-campus
credit courses in the late afternoon and evening. In 1965 we had one summer
session and the rate set for payment was set at two-ninths of the academic year
salary. When we moved to two sessions this was changed to one-sixth of the academic
years salary for teaching two three-credit courses. Rates were a little higher
if two four credit courses were taught. On March 4, 1968, the Consolidated Council
approved the following guidelines for extra compensation for EPA employees:
1. During
the regular academic year, an EPA employee on a 9 month or a 12 month contract
may earn extra compensation up to 20% of his/her annual salary by teaching
in the Continuing Education program.
2. By teaching during the summer
school, an EPA employee on a 9 month contract may earn extra compensation up
to 20% of his/her regular 9 month salary. If an employee earns more than 20%
for teaching during summer school, justification must be submitted and the Provost
must approve an exception to this policy. A teaching load of 6 hours is considered
full time, and an employee may not work full time in both summer sessions. 3. During the summer, an EPA
employee on a 9 month contract in research may earn extra compensation up to
three ninths of his/her regular salary. The maximum that a research employee
may earn during one month is one ninth of his/her salary. 4. For an EPA employee on a 9
month contract who is involved in both teaching and research, total summer earnings
may not exceed 33.3% of his/her regular salary. An employee is not allowed to
work more than full time in the summer.
I am certain that the figure of
20% was associated with the formula for conversion from a nine to a twelve month
contract, which happened to be 20% at this time.
Once the question of payment to
teach in summer school arose for a 12 month employee. The request was for overload
pay. I wrote back that I had never approved payment for overload teaching for
a 12 month employee in summer school or for a 12 month person employed 100%
in research at any time. I did explain that there were several cases of released
time being used to hire someone to perform those functions not now performed
by the 12 month employee. The units were compensated but not the faculty member.
After Charles Edwin Bishop in the
Consolidated Office as Vice President for Research and Extension devised the
policy described earlier, summer payrolls were still being sent to the Chancellor
for approval as late as 1973, with a copy to the Provost since his staff had
to check salaries and make certain that an excess salary over the 20% was not
being paid. When I became Provost, Caldwell assigned this function to me for
approval since my office did all of the checking. I also was assigned the responsibility
to approve exceptions to this policy in the rare circumstance where it was justified
and necessary for the program to be completed. We also permitted up to 20% of
the nine-month salary as earnings in Summer School with approval by the Provost
to teach and earn more than that under extenuating circumstances. With the increased
emphasis on research it sometimes became impossible to find another qualified
teacher for these courses in the summer in a few fields. We strongly discouraged
this because we felt that some vacation in the summer was needed.
We had a provision that under certain
circumstances, such as directing a major summer project in a training program
in summer school, a faculty member could earn from the soft money sources up
to three months summer salary if they were not on any other salary budget during
this time. No one was permitted to earn more than that amount, except that a
person could also earn 20% of that summer salary for extra extension activities.
This meant that the biweekly payrolls in the schools and the summer school salary
payroll sheets had to be cross-checked. The policy for any extra compensation
for extension activities also had to be cross-referenced and checked to make
certain that no policy was violated. At one time Mr. Simpson and Mrs. Strickland
did this checking. Later the staff in the Personnel Office including Mrs. Strickland
did it. In a very few cases we did find individuals in situations where their
earnings from several payrolls would have exceeded 100% for a summer session,
for a month or for the three summer months. These were all corrected. In some
cases we had to tell the individual that they would have to choose which project
that they would work on and be paid from for they could not be paid from them
all. A few individuals could not understand why they could not teach full-time
in one session and also be paid from their grants for a part of their time to
do research. Of course during the academic year faculty who were paid in part
from a grant had an equal amount of time and salary released from their academic
affairs position. We made no exceptions to this. This cross-referencing of payrolls
from different sources was very necessary for fiscal reasons as well as for
other reasons; such as, you cannot work more than 100% of the time. Too if we
erred, the auditors would have required us to return those resources to the
granting or other appropriate agency.
In 1976 the Faculty Senate appointed
a Senate Committee on Salaries. The committee was chaired by Professor Jack
Wilson. Other members on the Senate's Committee have varied over the years,
but Wilson continues. Each year the Provost's Personnel Office has provided
the committee with all the salary and salary increase information that the committee
has requested. Basically this committee has provided a statistical analysis
of salaries by rank and gender so that faculty can figure out where their salaries
are in relation to others. This has been a good and very useful committee and
has served the campus well. Anyone could use the data provided in the report
and calculate how their salary related to other salaries in their school, department,
and in the University. While they may have thought that they were underpaid,
now they knew their comparative salary status. I reduced but did not eliminate
the complaints from individuals who felt that they deserved more when they compared
their salary with that of others, but it got rid of a lot of gossip and reduced
suspicions and mistrust. Individual salary information has been available for
years in the Faculty Senate Office.
On campus I was constantly told
that good teaching was not rewarded in salaries. Another committee of the Senate
did a study to determine whether being selected to the Academy of Outstanding
Teachers had any effect on salary. I report from this study on the 1986-87 salaries:
"These results suggest that good teaching is, on the average rewarded in terms
of salary. The coefficients are cumulative for more than one award." The report
indicated a 5.86% salary differential with one award and an additional 3.65%
for the second award. The third award and the effect of being selected as Alumni
Distinguished Professor had little further effect. It should be noted that to
be an Alumni Professor you had to be a member of the Academy. I was delighted
to see these data because each year I had all of those who had been selected
to the Academy indicated for me in my reviews of salary increases. I thought
that I always remembered to question the increases of those who were members
if their proposed salary increases were low.
In 1985-86 Chancellor Poulton had
an idea we should make some arrangement so that when a person became a department
head that we would make a more logical increase in salary for the period of
time that he/she was head and then we would reduce the salary by that supplement
when the person returned to the professorial ranks. With the continuing decrease
in the length of time a person was willing to be a department head, we needed
something to assist us in salary determination for departmental administrators
with their return to the faculty ranks. The deans and I thought that this was
a very good idea. We worked together to come up with variable supplements that
were set depending on the size and complexity of the department. In fact we
liked the supplement idea so well that we made them for assistant and associate
department heads and for assistant and associate deans too. We did not make
this system retroactive and only used it for new appointees to these positions.
I had a copy for the entire system at my desk and one in the Personnel Office
for reference. Each dean knew what the supplements were for their units and
each new appointee knew what part of his/her salary was supplement and which
was base. With salary increases the base grew, but the supplement did not. As
we developed our base I had contacted several other universities to determine
their systems. Advice that I received was don't make the supplements too large
or you will have difficulty in taking that much away when the person returns
to the faculty. For NCSU the head of the Department of Economics and Business
was to get the largest supplement. I never got to use that one for Economics
and Business, because we did not have a change in that position while the system
was in effect. We did use it for several heads and a number of assistant heads
and assistant deans. Later, and before I retired, we learned from VP Dawson
that we could not use the system any longer. We could set the initial salary
and convert the salary to pay a head for 12 months. Under this system we then
had to determine what salary the heads who returned to teaching and research
should receive. Frequently an individual got only a small reduction or no salary
reduction except for the conversion to an academic year basis. This conversion
called for a 22% reduction for a change from a calendar-year basis to an academic-year
basis. Since we had to give many an initial salary boost to get them to accept
the position as head we frequently did not give them a merit increase on their
return to a faculty position because their salary might already be high for
their current worth as a faculty member.
Off
Campus Scholarly Assignment and Leaves of Absence
One of the first things Dean Shirley
recommended in 1956, at a conference of representatives of the UNC campuses
was for a system of sabbatical leaves. In
1960 there was a report of a special committee to the Senate which had studied
sabbatical leaves. There had been repeated attempts for many years with the
Visiting Committee of the Trustees and within the UNC system to acquire sabbatical
leaves. Everyone seemed to be in favor; however, the stumbling block was funds,
and there did not seem to be a way to get the State to fund them.
In 1960 Chancellor Caldwell assigned
responsibility to the Dean of the Faculty for review and recommendation of approval
of all requests for leaves of absence. At this time most leaves were without
pay. Our leave system was never funded with endowment or even special appropriations
for a sabbatical leave system. Even as late as 1965 the Visiting Committee recommended,
as they had for many years, that NCSC get funding for sabbaticals. On March
11, 1965, I found the first reference to off-campus scholarly work. Provost
Kelly wrote a memorandum to deans and directors on the subject of off-campus
scholarly work. A part of that memorandum follows:
Whenever
it is practical from the standpoint of the departmental teaching load and
other responsibilities, a Department Head with the approval of the Dean of
a school may assign a faculty member to off-campus duty for a semester (a
member assigned for a full year would be placed on half-salary) permitting
him to engage in scholarly work and refreshment. In each case the Department
Head and Dean must approve the assignment, report it to the Dean of the Faculty
for record, and require a succinct report at the end of the assignment period.
Under this type of arrangement no earnings may be received from any other
source.
In 1971-72 there was a clarification
of the faculty members ability to earn additional income. This is described
in the following paragraph.
As we began to use the off-campus
assignment system we adopted the following strategy. When one person was on
off-campus assignment in a department, the other faculty in that department
assumed responsibility for their colleague's work. It was only in a few special
cases, a very small department or a very specialized position where others in
the department were not qualified to teach a specific subject, that I would
assign a temporary position for this purpose. Our plan was to have the faculty
member go on assignment if they were nine-month employees for a semester with
full pay, or for an academic year at one-half pay. For 12-month employees the
assignment could be for a semester or for a six months period. If the person
was to receive pay from the institution for services rendered where they were
completing their off-campus assignment, we reduced their compensation from NCSU
accordingly. We did not consider any living expenses provided by the agency
or the granting agency as salary. In many cases, such as a Fullbright appointment
overseas, the appointment was for a year. In such cases the person usually got
some cost-of-living allowance and a small salary. They could then earn up to
one-half their salary from NCSU for a year-long appointment. In some cases the
salary earned was less than the salary at NCSU and in these cases if the appointment
was for a semester the salary from NCSU could make up for the difference in
that paid by the host or sponsoring agency and the NCSU salary. With Kelly as
Provost, we required the approval of the Provost and reported these assignments
to the Board of Trustees as we did other forms of leave. Although the Provost
approved the individual requests from the deans, the Chancellor had to approve
the material sent to the Trustees and was informed by this mechanism of the
numbers of leaves and off-campus assignments.
We encouraged our faculty to take
these off-campus assignments for professional development because we wanted
those who needed to learn new techniques to take these assignments too. For
many years faculty seemed to think of the system as a reward or an "excellence
in performance system". In such cases most went on off-campus assignment to
do research in their specialty at a location where there were resources not
available at NCSU, or just to have time to devote fully to the project. As we
encouraged the assignments for professional development, more and more of our
faculty began to go to places where exciting new innovations in teaching or
research were occurring. This then truly began to accomplish the objectives
intended for the system. Assignments could also be made available to all full-time
permanent EPA employees.
In 1973 it had become clear that
the faculty did not always know what their privileges were while they were on
leave without pay, on partial pay, or on full pay. Provost Kelly began to write
to the faculty when their assignment was received and approved administratively
before they were approved by the Trustees. The intent was to make certain that
the faculty knew what they had to do to remain in the retirement system or to
maintain other benefits while away from campus.
On March 23, 1978, Ellis Cowling
and Jasper Memory made their report on Faculty Professional Development at NCSU.
This report covered many forms of professional development and encouraged the
further use of off-campus scholarly assignments. It was at this time that I
renewed my efforts to encourage these assignments. It was a great surprise to
me when I talked to the faculty of SHASS, that I learned there were only a few
there who had heard of this possibility. The meeting was well attended. Several
departments in CHASS began to develop plans for using this mechanism.
As the use of the system developed
and was used more frequently, we realized that some departments were using the
mechanism for assignments to full-time research or for other special assignments
with the faculty members remaining on campus. Shortly after Chancellor Poulton
arrived and at his suggestion, we asked the departments if they considered this
as the equivalent of an off-campus assignment. If so, they were asked to keep
their own departmental or school records, but do not report these as off-campus
scholarly assignments.
During the 1980s we had a number
of assignments where the faculty were off-campus and working full-time for another
agency. In such cases the agency, most frequently a governmental agency, reimbursed
NCSU for the salary and paid for all the faculty members fringe benefits. We
did not call these off-campus assignments but maintained a separate count and
listing of those who were on this type of inter-governmental agency program.
Assignments in special circumstances could be with industrial companies. In
a few cases special arrangements were made with a few companies to exchange
a faculty member with an employee from industry for a semester or for a year.
These were exchanges most frequent in Textiles and Engineering. We also had
an occasional exchange between a public school system and the School of Education.
In such cases we continued to pay our employees and the other party in the exchange
paid their employees. This did not affect or disrupt anyone's retirement or
benefits systems. These were excellent programs and we would all benefit if
they were used more.
The places where the off-campus
assignments and other leave systems worked best were in those department where
they planned years in advance so that there was no risk of having key personnel
or the same specialties absent at the same time, or risk having an individual's
plan turned down at the departmental, school, or University levels. At the same
time we had to be flexible enough to take advantage of the opportunities that
sometimes became available at the last moment. This usually happened when someone
won an award. Of all of the departments on campus, I believe that the History
Department may have done the best planning and made the best use of this program.
While it was not a privilege to be applied to all every seven years, we discouraged
assignments more often than that. Exceptions were made on rare occasions when
needed. We did not like to have a person on leave without pay for more than
for a two year period. This was a policy that was made so that departments could
plan for the future and not keep key positions vacant for extended periods,
although funds in these positions were available for use by the unit or school.
We did make exceptions to this length of time, but they were rare and usually
were for assignments with State or Federal governmental agencies. In some cases
we did tell an employee that their leave would not be extended after this period
of time. In a few cases the employee resigned; however, in such cases they lost
the time while they were on leave in the retirement system because a person
had to return to work for a year after a leave without pay or with partial pay
to retain the time in the retirement system. In such cases the employee knew
what the cost would be.
Faculty
Benefits and Privileges
In this section many of the benefits
of faculty and retirees with which the Provost dealt are discussed. Most of
these will be concerned with non-compensation matters. A few will deal with
issues concerning extra compensation. Retirement pay, and the amount of earnings
permitted after retirement will be mentioned. These policies were set by the
Legislature or by other agencies of the State; however, it became the duty of
the Provost's Office to enforce the policies and to make certain that many of
these were followed. While we had group life insurance, Individual Retirement
Accounts and other tax deferment plans and group dental insurance in the eighties,
these were the responsibility primarily of the Vice Chancellor for Finance and
Business. The Provost was informed and had a member of his staff on the committee
concerned with these matters, but they will not be discussed in detail here.
The use or continued employment
of faculty and others after retirement was not encouraged in 1955. I noted in
a letter from VP Carmichael to President Gray that retirees could be employed
after retirement only if they were paid from non-state funds. Faculty would
lose some of their retirement pay if paid from state funds. There was some carry-over
from this policy for many years under a policy of the UNC Board of Trustees
which stated that you could not be continued on the payroll from state funds
after age 72 even on a part time basis. I recall seeing correspondence from
Shirley to Cahill in 1961 about a case where a faculty member had been denied
extra compensation from state funds for overload work in 1944 that was still
being argued. Cahill wrote, "The thing that disturbs me about it, however, is
that the whole situation seems to reflect a lack of generosity and a smallness
of spirit that we ought not to exhibit. It does not seem to me to be reasonable
to expect Mr. X to display excessive patriotism."7 Shirley wrote back and said,
"Let's face it we're cheesy and unpatriotic." The issue was over $281.88, and
of course it had been determined that state funds could not be used for this
supplemental pay.
Prior to 1959, on rare occasions,
supplemental pay could be approved from grants and contracts when the grant
specifically permitted it. On October 29, 1959, a policy was announced that
prohibited this practice and required that salary lines from grants for faculty
be used not as a supplement but for released time. Of course, it was to continue
to be possible for a nine month faculty member to earn full time pay in the
summer if they were not on other payrolls. At this time, if the earnings exceeded
20% of the nine months salary for the summer an approval was required. By the
time that I became Provost, this had been changed to permit up to three months
pay from grants in the summer, if the faculty member was on no other payroll.
This policy continues to be in practice in 1993. Later, and for many years it
was possible to continue on the payroll after retirement at one-half time so
long as your retirement pay and the wages earned did not exceed the average
of the last five (this was changed later to four) years' pay which was the base
on which the retirement pay was calculated. During the first Hunt Administration
several retired persons were employed by the State and drew their retirement
pay and a salary for their positions. At least this is what gossip says occurred.
The Legislature reportedly became unhappy with this practice and began to set
each year a specific annual and monthly rate as the maximum that a retired person
could earn. This was a serious blow to our continuing to hire retired faculty
for more than for a token amount of salary and time. Before this the practice
of using retired faculty had been very helpful in getting some classes taught
at reasonable rates by experienced and capable teachers, especially in areas
of teacher shortages and during the summers.
For many years the mandatory retirement
age for State employees was age 65. NCSU had provisions for the continued employment
upon approval by the Provost and the Chancellor on a year by year basis. These
were reported to the Trustees. Full time employment would end at age 70 and
part-time employment at age 72 if paid from State funds. This remained our practice
for many years until the federal and state governments passed legislation which
became effective in 1989 that eliminated age as a basis for mandatory retirement
but permitted universities to retain age 70 as a mandatory retirement age until
January 1, 1993. In 1993 retirement could no longer be required on the basis
of age. Of course with retirement or with age 70 on January 1, 1993, tenure
expired. This was not a thing which the Provosts helped to create or even wanted,
but it was a policy that required the Provost's staff to retain adequate records
and to prepare reports to the Trustees which gave the numbers of faculty in
various age groups. In the Faculty Senate Minutes on page 131 of 1962-63, there
is a poem quoted from the AAUP Bulletin 44(2): 500, 1958. Retirement at this
time was required at age 65. It reads as follows:
No
more the morning's sudden thrill of joy,
The
gently tolling bell, the feel of chalk,
Tired
students' eyes, ideas in endless flow;
No
more the atom's soul, proud walls of Troy,
Sad
poetry of living things. The talk,
The
endless, lovely talk, is stopped and so,
Not
old, I leave the friends I love the most,
To
be a guest where I have been a host.
The practice has usually been followed
that an administrator served at the pleasure of the Chancellor and they have
usually expected those administrators to step down from their administrative
office at age 65. Each year I prepared for the Chancellors a list of those who
would be age 65 during the next year. Normally this change would occur in the
academic year that a person became 65. Most administrators retired at age 65
because they were ready to do so. I usually asked deans if they wished to stay
on in a small part time capacity for a few years to complete some project. We
did ask some administrators to stay after age 65. This was usually the case
when a committee or the University had not found a replacement.
When I was first employed at NCSC
in 1953, twelve month employees had one calendar month of annual leave. This
was never, or almost never taken by a person in one lump. So in reality this
turned out to be the number of work days in a month or about 22 days. No annual
leave could be carried over after December 31, but leave could be taken at any
time during the year. In the eighties this was changed to 24 calendar days per
year and one could accumulate unused leave with a maximum of 30 days carried
forward on January 1, of a new year. It was established in July 19, 1889, that
records had to be verified so as to prove that the amount of unused leave was
accurate upon retirement. It was proposed at first that we maintain records
of annual leave in the Provost's Office personnel files. We knew that this would
be a tremendous undertaking and would be no more and probably less reliable
than the records kept by the faculty within their departments. Leave records
were retained and maintained by the faculty and verified when necessary by the
department.
This was also the practice for sick
leave. We had to obtain on a university-wide basis the number of unused days
of sick leave so as to have the accumulated number of days unused. Sick leave
could accumulate from year to year, and unused days were added to the employees
accumulated years of service in calculating retirement pay. These were furnished
for EPA personnel by the Provost's Personnel Office to the Business Office which
made the annual report to the appropriate State agency.
Although the Provosts were not directly
involved, Professors Horace Hamilton, D. M. Petersen, J. S. Doolittle and A.
C. Linnerud were among those who contributed much over the years for the benefits
that came into being for faculty. In 1966 Hamilton was much involved in the
death benefits' modifications for the spouses of faculty.
In 1956 Dean Shirley was involved
in an all UNC System conference, including NCSC faculty representatives, which
recommended that Academic Freedom become a reality on all campuses of the University.
They indicated that the faculty and the administration supported the right of
faculty and students to participate, or refuse to participate, in controversial
issues in public affairs, as long as they acted as private citizens and not
as representatives of North Carolina State College or of the Consolidated University.
This was to be adopted by the UNC Board of Trustees some years later.
In 1956 the Senate recommended that
an award be made for Excellence in Teaching. It was learned from the Attorney
General that the source of funds for the award could not be State funds. First
eight teachers were to be selected for the new teaching academy. I'm not certain
how the first eight were to be selected; however, after the first eight were
selected there would be a second eight selected by those then in the Academy
for Fostering Excellence in Teaching. There would eventually be 24 members each
serving for a three year term. The academy would then select one member to receive
a $500 award annually. A committee was to be established to develop the plans
for the academy. Dean Shirley was supposed to appoint such a group, but in 1959
the Senate considered again the matter of awards for excellence in teaching.
In that discussion it was said that, "Several years ago a plan to reward good
teaching came a cropper in the Faculty Senate." The minutes also said that "This
matter was considered by the Senate some years ago and was dropped because of
the difficulty of measuring teaching performance." I saw on the Liaison Committee
report as described on March 14, 1961 in the Senate Minutes, that on March 1,
1961, a teaching award was established for one outstanding teacher award of
$500 in each school. Schools developed procedures for selecting and recognizing
the one teacher for these teaching awards each year. In 1964 Dr. Kelly, at the
request of the Senate and because he felt the need to reward and to recognize
good teachers in a better way than we were doing at the time, appointed a Committee
on Support for Teachers. On December 16, 1965, Dr. Kelly announced to the Academic
Deans and to all faculty members a new procedure for the evaluation of faculty
by students and a new process to select the outstanding teachers. These were
to make up the Academy of Outstanding Teachers (at this time the title considered
was an Academy of Faculty Fellows) and would lead to the Alumni Distinguished
Professor Awards. With the establishment of the Academy of Outstanding Teachers
there was also the two annual teaching awards for the newly selected Academy
members. The Senate came up with the procedures which were used to select Academy
members and the Alumni Professors.
In 1970 the Graduate School began
to make awards to 10 Outstanding Teaching Assistants. At a later time these
were also paid for by Alumni Association funds. Later the Alumni Association
provided funds for faculty awards in each of the areas of extension and research
annually. These are all recognized at the Alumni Award's Luncheon and at the
Honor's Convocation. In 1986 the NCSU Student Aid Association (The Wolfpack
Club) provided the resources to give outstanding scholarships to students for
academic reasons. The awardees were selected by the Academy of Outstanding Teacher's
Executive Council. The awards are given in the name of the faculty and are called
University Faculty Scholarships. This was fostered by Chancellor Poulton.
In 1959, Chancellor Caldwell raised
the issue of extra compensation for extension activities. At this time there
was no uniform policy and procedures varied from school to school; however the
practice had existed many years for overload pay for extension and for off-campus
credit courses. No uniform policy existed among the schools for maximum participation
until one was established by Vice President C. E. Bishop of the UNC System in
the late 1960s which was described earlier in the section on Salary Administration.
This policy provided for extra compensation for extension activities up to 20%
of the faculty member's annual salary during the faculty member's contract period.
Any amount that exceeded this level was to be approved on each campus. Approval
at that time was by Provost Kelly, and later by other Provosts only in exceptional
cases.
Consulting has long been practiced
in several of the schools as a benefit and as a part of faculty members responsibilities
to transfer knowledge. It has probably also been used by a few to make extra
money, and extra money does come to those who consult. Our practice has been
to limit consulting so that it does not conflict with the faculty member's duties
on campus. This has generally been understood not to exceed one day a week.
That has been understood as the maximum by all concerned, that would not conflict
with regular duties, although that limitation has not been precisely stated
in the policies. I do not recall ever seeing a consulting report where any faculty
member consulted for that many days in an academic year. The consulting effort
also should not cause or be a conflict of interest. This generally meant that
the faculty member would not have a grant from a company and consult for the
company too. In a few cases there has needed to be an exception to this guideline,
because in some cases it was necessary to have the faculty members consult to
assure that the knowledge from their research supported by the grant got used
and put into practice to benefit the public. The cases where there has been
most controversy are in the professional fields of engineering and design. In
these areas there are many practicing professionals in business and in some
cases they believe that the consulting is in competition with their businesses.
The professional groups wanted the faculty in these areas to have enough practical
experiences to make their teaching more relevant to real world needs, thus making
the students more aware of practical problems and not just aware of theory.
One area of conflict was with the Landscape Architecture faculty. The national
professional organization encouraged practice and developed a guideline for
its members. It stated:
It is
recommended that staff members be also practicing in the profession at the
same time that they are teaching in order that a closer tie between education
and practice may be promoted. It is recommended that in all such cases the
practicing staff member should be associated with a professional office of
recognized standing, either his own or a that of a fellow practitioner. It
is recommended, however, that no staff member should conduct a professional
practice while he is carrying the full-time teaching load characteristic of
his school unless such outside work is confined to summers or other off periods.
As you can see this was a very touchy
matter for faculty, the school and for the university. One group would accuse
you of not being in touch with practice in educating students in the various
fields while another during the same year would charge you for the same activity
with doing too much so as to interfere with those in private practice. This
is where there had to be an approval mechanism. At first this approval was to
keep the dean informed, and then it began to require approval at the Chancellor's
level, and approval was quickly transferred back to the dean's level. If a conflict
arose the matter would be referred to the Chancellor. Later this review was
delegated to the Provost for resolution. Few issues came to Provost Kelly or
to me. I recall one case where a nine month appointee's request for consulting
was refused by the Dean and was appealed to me. This was a request of a faculty
member who taught two large classes to be absent for two weeks including the
Thanksgiving holidays. I also turned down the request, for although colleagues
had agreed to cover the classes, I felt that the consulting time was excessive
and especially so since it was so near the end of the semester. The matter of
consulting reports and consulting policy development was handled by the Research
Office after that office was established. There was consultation on these matters
with the various Provosts. At a later time after Frank Hart became Vice Chancellor
for Research, the Board of Governors staff developed a system-wide consulting
policy. Dr. Hart's advice was sought and used and the then existing NCSU Policy
was a blue print for the development of the UNC policy.
On July 10, 1961, in a memorandum
to all academic deans, Chancellor Caldwell stated the new policy for Emeritus
Status. The policy had been approved by the Consolidated University and by Caldwell.
It states the following provisions.
1. Emeritus
status at the last earned rank will be accorded to all faculty members of
tenure on their first retirement.
2. A special certificate to this
effect will be prepared and awarded by the President of the University at the
meeting of the Board of Trustees (now the Board of Governors) honoring retiring
faculty members. 3. Catalogue listings of faculty
will carry Emeritus Personnel so long as they live. 4. Emeritus personnel will be
invited to all formal faculty convocations, including the annual O. Max Gardner
Dinner. 5. Certificates of merit will
be issued to all non-tenure faculty members and to all professional personnel
retiring from North Carolina State College after ten or more years of service.
This policy remains in practice
today. The privilege described in item 4 was deleted after a few years and invitation
to this dinner was for only a few selected persons. I never received an invitation
even when an NCSU faculty member was the recipient while I was Provost.
When I became Provost it had become
practice for the Deans to request a few exceptions to the policy. Emeritus status
was provided to these exceptions. This was especially true for long time extension
employees, instructors and certain others who held administrative offices on
their retirements. These might include others holding the titles of vice chancellor,
director, librarian, counselor, admissions officer et cetera.
In 1962 the Faculty Senate reviewed
the benefits given to emeriti faculty and the benefits and privileges of faculty.
Benefits of emeriti included free parking which was later to be changed to $10
per year. That figure was retained with the support of Worsley and me when a
University parking study recommended a significant increase in the rate for
retired persons. The Association of Retired Faculty, especially Howard Miller,
called this to my attention so that I could help to retain the privilege. Privileges
also included listings in the catalogue, the campus directories, invitation
to formal faculty convocations, use of the library, use of the laundry, voting
privileges in the general faculty, faculty priced tickets to athletic activities,
tickets and participation in activities as provided for faculty at the Student
Union, at the Craft Center and at Thompson Theater at the faculty rates. When
possible, space could be provided for emeriti in their departments. This last
benefit has become a very prized and relatively rare privilege. Mostly this
includes a shared office with several other emeritus members in the same department.
It has been provided less frequently as space becomes more scarce. Membership
in the Faculty Club, at a reduced rate as determined by the Faculty Club, was
also included, as was use of the gym at regular faculty rates.
Benefits of the faculty and staff
have slowly improved over the years. Most of these, such as life insurance and
dental insurance, have been at the employees' expense. However, the benefits
of lower costs for a group has been helpful. Group activities have also consisted
of several tax deferred plans. By far the most important and biggest benefit
has been health insurance. The state now pays for the health insurance of the
employee even after retirement. This was adopted one year during the first Hunt
Administration in lieu of salary increase funds. It has benefitted us well and
is more than we would have gotten from a comparable salary increase because
costs of health insurance have risen rapidly and almost every year, and even
though the deduction has increased and the coverage has decreased, it is still
a great benefit. The family's health insurance is paid for by the employee.
One very important provision recommended
that both faculty and staff could have the privilege of registering for courses
for a minimal registration fee if space were available in the class. This was
made possible by a bill passed by the General Assembly on June 10, 1965, and
it was announced on our campus by Dr. Kelly on August 9, 1965. This fee has
been $7.00 per semester for one course for many years. I recall my sitting in
on a course in Intermediary Metabolism, with the permission of Sam Tove, the
instructor. In the earlier years these registrations of employees was counted
as a part of our official enrollment for budget purposes. So registration, not
sitting in, was encouraged, and if you did not want credit you could audit the
course. The regulations which existed for many years were as follows:
1. Free
tuition privileges shall be allowed for full-time faculty of instructor rank
and above and other full-time employees of the university who hold membership
in the Teachers' and State Employees' Retirement System. (This excludes all
part-time teachers, all part-time research staff, all graduate students and
all temporary employees.)
2. Free tuition privileges shall
apply only during the period of one's normal employment. (The period of normal
employment may be for an academic year or for a calendar year.) 3. Free tuition privileges will
be allowed on one course only in each semester or summer term during which one
is permitted to register. The course may be taken either during the day or the
evening. 4. Free tuition privileges will
be allowed only to employees who meet the requirements for admission to the
university and who have been duly admitted by the appropriate Office of Admissions. 5. Free tuition privileges do
not include such other charges as registration, laboratory, or material fees
which must be paid by the student. 6. A member of the full-time
faculty or full-time staff of the University shall be eligible, within the limitations
of these regulations, for free tuition on any campus of the university. 7. Members of the faculty and
the staff who enroll for a course under these regulations shall be required
to complete the full schedule of work encompassed in their normal employment
obligations. 8. Each applicant for free tuition
privileges must complete and submit through regular administrative channels
a 'Request for Full-Time Faculty and Staff Enrollment in Course' form.
Two other provisions were added
to the 1965 regulations.
1. Nine-month
appointments are not eligible for free tuition in summer school.
This later became the practice for
all employees at the time that persons could enroll on any of the campuses of
the UNC System.
2. Any
full-time employee taking more than one course a semester will not be eligible
for free tuition privileges.
These were wonderful privileges
for the staff and faculty pursuing a degree; however, they did not help many
employees to obtain professional development. This soon was modified so that
employees could take courses even if they were not admitted by the Admission's
Office. They enrolled through what is now called the Adult Student Program .
This was a very important change because it enabled individuals who did not
want a degree and certain employees who could not have gained admission to take
courses for professional development and improvement. In certain cases other
SPA employees took the courses and earned the credit hours needed to gain admission
and to enroll as degree students. We had a number of individuals who wished
on occasion to take two courses. In these circumstances the employees had to
pay for tuition in the second course. To take one course required the approval
of the Department Head and the School Dean or the Business Manager. To take
more than one course required the approval of the Department Head, the Dean,
the Dean of the Faculty, and the Business Manager. Approval for more than one
course was denied frequently by others and occasionally by the Dean of the Faculty
if the request came for two or more courses in consecutive semesters. I recall
one case where an employee in a unit that reported to the Provost wished to
take three graduate courses in each of two consecutive semesters so that he
could push his graduation date earlier. The request was denied and the employee
resigned. He planned to leave us when he obtained his doctorate too. He could
not understand that there was no way he could do his full-time job and take
three graduate courses simultaneously. The times that we permitted persons to
take two courses most often were when both courses desired by the employee during
the year were taught in the same semester. Occasionally, to enable a student
to finish his program sooner we would approve two courses. A few years after
I became Provost, it seemed to me that I was simply rubber stamping the requests
and they were very few. So in 1978 I delegated the approval to the school deans
and the vice chancellors and continued to sign only those forms of personnel
in the offices that reported to me. Provosts have encouraged this means of professional
development and improvement.
It was in the early 70s with the
new UNC system and the Board of Governors, and after expansion to the 16 campuses,
that this opportunity became available to staff on all campuses. This meant
that an employee at one campus could register on another for that campus's minimal
fee if space was available in the desired class. This was a valuable addition
and the loss to the campuses was that the students could not be counted as a
part of the budgeted enrollment. At this time we had around 300 FTE students
who were our own employees enrolled in courses at NCSU so this was a budgetary
loss; however, we were over-enrolled at the time so it didn't hurt much then,
but it did reduce our budgeted enrollment. Approval for an NCSU employee to
take a course at another institution required the approval of the Provost in
addition to the other approvals. I found that this approval could not be delegated.
The requirement of the host institution was that registration could occur if
there was space available in the classroom. We did try to make certain that
prerequisites were met. This was enormously helpful to our off-campus personnel,
especially those in the Agricultural Extension staff who were located in the
counties and wished to take courses or pursue degrees on campuses closer to
their place of employment, but it was even more important to faculty on other
campuses because it opened the courses in doctoral programs at UNC-CH, UNC-G,
and at NCSU at very cheap rates to the faculty and staff of the other campuses.
Patent Policies have existed at
NCSU for many years as a benefit to faculty. These will not be discussed here
since the development of these policies has been the responsibility of the Dean
and later of the Vice Chancellor for Research. Patent policy brochures have
been given to all employees.
Publications and the resultant recognition
and prestige have come to individual faculty, to departments, to schools and
to the University. Support of publication costs and any arrangements or requirements
for sharing in profits from publications have primarily been provided by the
schools. The usual practice has been for income from the publication of scholarly
books to be retained by the authors. CHASS has a different policy when the total
or a partial costs of publication of books and other text materials are provided
by the CHASS Foundation's funds.
Research by most faculty in time
came to be expected as a part of the faculty members' functions. Reimbursement
policies for travel costs to professional meetings to report on scholarly achievement
and to keep up in the fields of knowledge were set by the schools and varied
widely. The Provost was not involved in determining these matters, but they
have encouraged attendance and participation in these activities.
In 1971 the length of time required
for vesting in the retirement system of the state was changed from 15 to 5 years.
It was just at this time that retirement system and the General Assembly approved
TIAA-CREF as an alternative choice to the state retirement system for new faculty.
This was extended in 1990 to include librarians. Although many persons worked
for this benefit for many years, much credit must go to A. C. Barefoot who represented
the UNC System in the deliberations over a long period of time. This was a very
valuable development for it gave us an excellent recruitment tool.
In 1975 the Teaching Effectiveness
Committee began to select from among faculty proposals those to receive financial
awards for the improvement of undergraduate courses. The idea was that we wanted
to encourage classroom instructional innovation and improvement and that these
grants would help to pay the costs of the experiments. This money was frequently
multiplied for it was often supplemented by other departmental or school funds.
In the early eighties we also added a complement of additional grant funds to
bring experimentation with computers and their uses into classroom activities
in areas where they were not a normal part of the instructional methods. These
two activities were coordinated by Dr. Downs.
On February 23, 1976, the matter
of liability insurance for teachers was discussed at the All University Committee
on Faculty Welfare. This later was adopted and implemented at NCSU.
In 1978 the Retirement System added
a $20,000 death benefit to all employees who were members of the State's retire ment
system.
In the late 1980s the Legislature
passed a bill that enabled all citizens over 65 to take courses by paying only
the registration and other fees if there was space available in the course.
These citizens also do not count in the budgeted enrollment.
In 1989 we extended a recent policy
change instituted by the General Administration of the BOG for its staff to
the faculty of NCSU to enable payment for unused annual leave. This had been
the practice for all SPA employees for many years. On Nov. 2, 1989, George Worsley
and I sent a memorandum to Deans, Directors and Department Heads which established
the policy. The policy reads in part: "Twelve-month EPA employees eligible under
University policy to earn vacation leave will be permitted to receive a lump
sum payment for unused vacation leave (in an amount not to exceed 30 days) when
they retire or separate from employment on or after November 1, 1989." The policy
change indicated that the departments "are responsible for maintaining evidence
to support unused vacation leave balances."
Before I became employed at NCSC
we had a policy for sick leave and a specified number of days allowed as established
by the Legislature for State employees who are permanent employees and on a
full-time and a twelve -month basis. Over the years we have not had a policy
for sick leave for academic year employees. In most cases there was a general
understanding that when an employee was ill that colleagues in the department
would handle assigned responsibility for that individual. That faculty member
would reciprocate later when another faculty member was sick. In cases of longer
illness the individual might be put on leave without pay or other arrangements
in assignments might be made. In most cases these were resolved to most individuals'
and departments' satisfaction and did not create serious problems. As the numbers
of female faculty in the child bearing ages increased, we found that the departments
were handling the matter of maternity leave in a great variety of and in very
inconsistent ways. This necessitated a study of maternity leave and what we
were doing for these employees. In the spring of 1990 we undertook a maternity
leave, disability leave survey. As a result an ad hoc committee was appointed
to review and proposed policy and to address paternal leave policies and procedures
in their recommendations. In the Official Bulletin of May 8, 1992, the following
announcement appeared.
We are
pleased to announce that the Board of Trustees has approved a Maternity Leave
Policy for permanent EPA employees who do not currently earn leave (i.e. EPA
faculty or EPA staff who have less than a 12 month appointment). It ensures
that faculty and EPA staff women who do not currently earn leave will be able
to arrange maternity leave.
This new policy represents our view
that people who work and learn at North Carolina State University need to have
a working and learning environment that is supportive of their personal and
professional development. Personal circumstances other than
maternity sometimes require faculty and staff to request leave. We will continue
to encourage administrators and supervisors to accommodate faculty and staff
leave requests for family or personal needs. However, such requests should be
reasonable and achievable within the resources of departments, and consistent
with current University personnel policies.
This
policy is not intended to replace existing policies concerning extended leave.
Extended leave for off-campus scholarly and other assignments already have
been addressed in the Faculty Handbook.
The new policy was accomplished
with the effort of a number of women faculty members who were persistent and
with the aid of Provost Hart. I have not stated the policy in its entirety since
it was recently established and all faculty and staff received a copy. It will
appear in its entirety in the next revision of the Faculty Handbook.
Of course parking in the early years
was truly a benefit for it was free. As the years progressed it continued to
be a benefit but at gradually increasing costs. Today some consider it to have
been entirely lost as a benefit, but if one compares parking fees at NCSU with
those in other agencies of similar types, it still remains a benefit.
Retirement
Age
President William C. Friday reported
at a cabinet meeting the following as Retirement Policy: "The Visiting Committee
of the Board of Trustees has (1) reaffirmed the recommendation contained in
their 1956 Report, and (2) stated their position that the presumption is that
the law applies, and (3) that our people, upon reaching 65, shall retire unless
his or her superior officer makes the case for continuation of service. The
effect of this action by the Visiting Committee makes it mandatory that, in
those instances where continuation of service beyond 65 is desired, a substantial
case be made." Then the employee could be retained on a year to year basis until
age 70. After age 70 persons could be employed only on a one-half time basis.
It was understood that the Consolidated Office would support the recommendation
of each Chancellor in these instances and they usually did.
In the early years before the establishment
of the Board of Governors, the Chancellor usually approved those over age 65
who would be continued as employees on a full-time or on a part-time basis.
Requests were prepared after a reminder was sent out by the Provost's personnel
staff. The names, ranks and departments of those approved were sent to the Board
of Trustees of UNC for their approval. After the Board of Governors was established
this function of approval was delegated to the Provost who prepared the report
for the Personnel Committee of the Board of Trustees of NCSU for their approval.
After age 70 the employee had to revert to one-half-time. After age 72 there
was an expectation that the employee would no longer be paid from State funds
but could be kept on a part-time not to exceed one-half time if they were paid
from soft money. This in essence kept us from employing anyone over age 72 who
did not have a grant that provided the source of the salary funds. After the
federal and State governments passed the non-discrimination on the basis of
age provisions, the Board of Governors discontinued their rules about employment
over ages 65, 70, and 72. Of course the over age 65 rule was abolished, but
faculty with academic rank could still be discontinued after age 70. On very
rare occasions we might continue a person full time until age 72. We continued
our policy of over age 72 but did make rare exceptions for payment for part-time
assignments from State funds. As has been mentioned under Benefits, the state
had eliminated the provision many years ago of continuing a person on the basis
of one-half-time. At this time the Legislature set the maximum that a person
in the retirement system could earn during a month and over a calendar year
period. This was a very small sum which has increased slightly over the years.
This regulation continues, and it has limited our employing many retired persons
for pay beyond that maximum exempted by Social Security. This included most
retirees because the extra earnings were now hardly worth the trouble, red tape
and headaches involved with Social Security. It has also limited the employment
of retirees from teaching more than one course in either summer school or in
a semester.
It was of considerable interest
that the new retirement age provisions at the time of my retirement had not
caused many more faculty to continue to work full-time after age 65 than the
campus had experienced before these regulations came into being. I do remember
the concern about this as a potential problem, and it was on the programs of
national organizations at their annual meetings for several years. I know that
we did some worst scenario studies at NCSU. There were a few cases when we would
not have continued a specific faculty member who continued after age 65, but
not very many. I asked the deans each year and the most ever reported for the
entire University in a single year was three. So all those meetings, studies,
and worries were not needed at that time. Most faculty have things they want
to do and wish to retire so that they can get them done before they become incapacitated.
I understand that under the Hart administration there were more faculty continuing
until age 70. The effects of the demise of the retirement at age 70 requirement
for mandatory retirement after January 1, 1993, remains to be seen.
Other EPA employees in the University
were under the federal and State guidelines, and by January 1, 1993, the universities
no longer could require mandatory retirement at age 70 for any employees including
those with professorial ranks.
Major administrators work in their
administrative positions at the will of their supervisor, the Chancellor. In
general, there has been an expectation that they will leave their administrative
position at age 65 unless requested to stay longer.
Over the years we have had many
retired faculty who continued to teach for very small wages after they retired.
We have had a few others who continued to teach a few sections for several years
after age 72 when we could no longer pay them any salary. The largest group
of these were from the Department of Mathematics. I believe that Professors
Hubert Park and Jack Levine each taught mathematics successfully to NCSU students
for more than fifty years.
Interns
in Academic Administration
There have been two programs that
have brought interns in academic administration to NCSU or in which NCSU faculty
have participated. One of these started as the Ellis L. Phillips Foundation's
program and later was adopted with some modification as the American Council
on Education's Administrative Fellows' Program. I was selected to participate
in the Phillips' program. Chancellor Poulton was one of the first participants
in the ACE Fellows Program.
Faculty who have come to NCSU for
their internship from other universities have included Arlon Elser in 1967-68,
Tony Mobley in 1970-71, William Harvey in 1986-87 (Harvey later joined our faculty
in the School of Education) and Alfred Sullivan in 1987-88. These individuals
were officially mentored by the Chancellor. Since Chancellors do not have enough
time to schedule the individuals and to introduce them to all of those persons
on campus that they need to work with and to know, the Provost really becomes
their mentor, too. In the first two instances the individuals shared my office
while I was the Assistant Provost. I made certain that they were included in
a wide variety of meetings and that they saw correspondence and knew why it
had been handled the way it had been, or that they talked to and learned from
the administrator who had handled the matter. While the Chancellors gave them
some projects, I also gave them additional projects to perform so that they
could have some things they had to accomplish. These involved interpersonal
activities as well as studies and reports. The next two ACE Fellows did not
share my office; however, I did make certain that they had projects and functions
to perform and that they gained insight in administrative practices and behaviors.
By this time ACE had a more structured program which required the interns to
complete several projects including some on budgets.
Jasper Memory, a Professor of Physics,
and Assistant Dean of PAMS was selected in 1971-72 as the first of NCSU's ACE
fellows. He went to the University of Maryland for his internship. Dr. Lawrence
Clark, a Professor of Mathematics Education, was one of our own ACE interns
who stayed at home and continued to function in his assigned responsibilities
as Assistant Provost, but he was mentored by the Chancellor and in this way
gained overall university administrative experience. He worked some of the time
with other administrators on campus. Debra Stewart, a Professor of Political
Science and Public Administration, in 1982-83 did her internship at Duke University
and with the UNC General Administration, so she participated in some projects
involving NCSU. Donald Simmons, a Professor from the School of Veterinary Medicine
in 1984-85; Dario Cortez, Professor of Foreign Languages and Literatures, in
1985-86; and William Grant, Professor of Zoology, in 1986-87, participated in
Fellowships at other universities. In time Dr. Simmons and Dr. Cortez left NCSU
to join the administrative staffs of other universities. Dr. Grant served in
the CALS administration and later moved to the Provost's Office.
Under the terms of participation
in this program the home university continues to pay the salary of the Fellow,
and the Fellow continues to participate in the fringe benefits of their home
university. The host university provides some travel and support funds, space
and secretarial support.
On our campus, with the recommendation
of the Faculty Senate in 1986, we began our own program to give faculty some
administrative experiences. At first we agreed to limit ourselves to one intern
per year and agreed that these must have the approval of their school dean and
the approval of the host dean to participate. Interns could also be mentored
by the Chancellor and the Provost. The Provost would appoint a committee (I
used former ACE Interns on the committee) to receive nominations and to make
recommendations to the Provost. The Provost in turn, would take the nominations
to the Deans' Council for consideration and approval. No one recommended by
the Committee has ever been turned down by the Deans' Council. Persons who have
been selected and participated have been:
1. James
Gregory from Forestry in 1988-89 whose mentor was Dean Toole;
2. Joanne Rockness from Accounting
in 1989-90 whose mentor was to be Chancellor Poulton. When Chancellor Poulton
left the Chancellor's position, Dr. Rockness became an Intern under both Chancellor
Monteith and me. At first I thought, what in the world will we do to make her
experiences profitable. Later I said that I did not know how we could have survived
with all of the extra work that came to us that year without the help of Dr.
Rockness. 3. Three faculty have mentored
under Dean Debra Stewart's direction. These were: Margaret King from English
in 1989-90, Ellen Vasu from Curriculum and Instruction, in 1990-91, and Karen
Johnston from Physics in 1992-93. Dean Stewart is as vocal in her welcome and
appreciation of the assistance that these interns have given the Graduate School
as I was about Rockness' assistance. 4. Thomas Hammond from Multidisciplinary
Studies in 1991-92, mentored under Murray Downs when he was Interim Dean of
Undergraduate Studies. At this time Dr. Downs also needed help and was appreciative
of the program.
Although he was not formally an
intern selected by the above process, Dr. Russ Lea served under Franklin Hart.
There have been a large number of
faculty who have filled administrative positions on a short-term or on a part-time
basis. Others have been given released time to undertake some administrative
job or assignment. Many have filled an administrative position for a year or
more in variety of departmental, school or university administrative positions.
More individuals have gained administrative experience in this last way than
in any other.
Another position that has given
faculty administrative experience has been the Chairmanship of the Faculty Senate.
This seems to be a training ground for administrators, because a significant
number of these have either become department heads or have held other administrative
positions in schools or in the University.
Faculty,
Advisors and Teachers Handbooks
I found a reference to a draft of
a Faculty Manual prepared by Dr. Claiborne Jones on October 8, 1956. This draft
was in the hands of Consolidated UNC Provost Whyburn, and he was to study the
draft and submit it to the Chancellors for their consideration. This document
was to serve the system. I could not find a copy of this manual in the files.
I have been told we were supposed
to have a mimeographed handbook for years, but it was not kept up-to-date and
in time it became almost unknown and little used by anyone. In fact, as a faculty
member, I don't recall having seen a copy and I could not find a copy of this
handbook in the files. In 1967-68 the Faculty Senate encouraged the Provost
to prepare a faculty handbook. They also proposed that selected members of the
Personnel Policy Committee of the Senate review the drafts of this handbook
and make appropriate recommendations as to its content. They proposed a table
of contents for such a handbook. I am not certain that they wanted that precise
table of contents but rather wanted those matters included. Dr. Kelly appointed
Professor A. S. (Kit) Knowles of the English Department to work on the handbook
and hired him on a part-time basis to accomplish this task. This was published
as a loose leaf handbook in January 1971 based on policies in existence before
November 1970, and it was distributed to all faculty. In 1973, Dr. Murray Downs
prepared an updated and more detailed handbook again in loose-leaf form. When
I became Provost, Dr. Downs was given the assignment of Faculty Handbook
revisions and as he developed revised sections he was to confer with the leadership
of the Faculty Senate. This then became a continuous consultative arrangement.
The Faculty Handbook was eventually accomplished, but it is never finished.
I have not discussed or described the several handbooks' contents for they are
lengthy and copies of the Knowles (1971) and the Downs (1973-88) versions are
readily available.
Additional major contributions of
Dr. Downs was the publication of the Advisers' Handbook and the Handbook
for Teachers. These two publications brought together extensive policies
and procedures into a single place and was most helpful. The Advisers' Handbook
which was initially published by Student Affairs was updated annually by Downs
and went to all advisers and contains policies, procedures and information necessary
for advising students. This requires the reviser of the handbook to keep up
with all proposed changes by academic and other units to see that these are
consistent with University policies and procedures. These handbooks also had
extensive review and input from many units of Student Affairs. The University
Teaching and Effectiveness and Evaluation Committee and the Associate Provost
(in this case Downs) published a Handbook for Teachers that is updated
annually and distributed periodically to all teaching faculty and graduate teaching
assistants. This booklet contains information on all University-wide policies
and practices of importance to the classroom teachers as well as on sources
of support. Among its contents were the grading systems then in use. These handbooks
can be found in current and earlier versions easily so they are not discussed
in detail here.
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