Donald H. Taylor Jr.: Decisions Ahead for Faculty on Tenure and Faculty Distribution

Those of you who might know the Faculty Handbook backward and forward are aware that Appendix B: Bylaws of the University Faculty indicate that at the Annual Faculty Meeting, “the chair of the Academic Council shall report on the activities of the Council for the previous year and on plans for the ensuing year.”

I will issue a written report in May 2018 with details of the Council’s Business during this year and a look ahead to next year, but I will provide a quick summary now:

Two key faculty committees are working feverishly to finish their work by May. The Provost’s Tenure Standards Committee (co-chaired by Bruce Jentleson, Sanford School, and Anne Allison, Cultural Anthropology) and the Academic Council’s Ad Hoc Committee on Faculty Rank Distribution (chaired by Gavan Fitzsimons, Fuqua). Both of these committees will provide important information and stimulate conversation about what it means for we faculty to replenish and remake ourselves.

The first committee will issue its report to the Provost, who will then begin the process of deciding how to proceed. Next year, I anticipate that ECAC and the Council will engage the Provost in dialogue about Duke’s tenure processes, and indeed we have already had some general discussions. This is an issue of fundamental importance to the future of Duke.

The Academic Council’s Ad Hoc Faculty Rank Distribution Committee will provide a common set of facts that the individual schools, departments, and the Academic Council can use to engage in discussions about the faculty at Duke—past and future. I think that all of us understand that there have been changes in the makeup of the faculty over the past 20 years. However, the magnitudes of the changes differ greatly across parts of Duke, as do the reasons they have occurred. A shared understanding of reality in this area will help us to have informed dialogue and discussion going forward about the faculty at Duke.

Next year, ECAC will use the submission of this report to review our current rules on Academic Council representation and how we conduct elections, and we will report to the Council our thoughts on this and hear from the Council members as well.

ECAC is hopeful that we will be able to bring a proposal to the Council in April 2018 for a revision of the Appendix Z “Consensual Relationships Policy” in the Faculty Handbook. I mentioned at our February meeting that ECAC has been working on a proposed revision with respect to undergraduate students. We had some feedback from Council members that we needed to also consider revisions for our policy with respect to graduate and professional students. ECAC has developed a draft revision of the policy contained in Appendix Z for undergraduate students as well as for graduate and professional students, and we have engaged in substantial dialogue: with the Provost, the President, University Counsel’s office, Office of Institutional Equity, and the Vice Provost of Faculty Development. We are taking the proposal to the Dean’s Cabinet next week, and after that ECAC will decide whether we are able to bring forward our proposal at the April, 2018 meeting. Stay tuned.

Both this year and most certainly next, ECAC has and will be involved in providing feedback and faculty perspective on Duke’s efforts to revise and modernize our approach to proactively improving the climate at Duke for faculty, staff and students, preventing harassment of all types, and also working to improve our processes and procedures for adjudicating claims of harassment. I anticipate that that there will be discussion of these issues in Academic Council next year.

Academic Freedom and Freedom of Expression are issues of central importance to the University. ECAC has sought to give some unhurried time to discuss these issues, without having a clear agenda for our discussions. We read and discussed Erwin Chemerinsky’s book "Free Speech on Campus" and I recommend it to you. The Provost’s Forum this past March 1 focused on these issues, and included Professor Chemerinsky providing the most lucid 8 minute monologue that I have heard on the role of the University, academic freedom and freedom of expression—I understand that this is available on tape and I highly recommend it to you.

ECAC plans to give more time to this topic next year as this is a key issue to the University both internally, as well as to how we are viewed externally. The country is watching us on campus, and rightly so. Our country needs for us to demonstrate how to talk about hard and important matters, with a spirit of openness and mutual respect, in a manner such that all sides can speak and be heard, as we seek truth, evidence, knowledge and the common good.

The members of ECAC (Kirsten Corazzini, Gráinne Fitzsimons, Claudia Gunsch, Andrew Janiak, Mari Shinohara, Erika Weinthal, Larry Zelenak)    have been great colleagues this year and we have worked together very well as a team. Those of you who have served on ECAC know that two staff members are crucial to the functioning of the Academic Council and ECAC—many thanks to Sandra Walton and Susan Jennings.

It is an honor to serve the Faculty at Duke as Chair of the Academic Council. Thank You.