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UWM's Chapman Memorial Library
UWM's Chapman Memorial Library
UWM’s longest serving chancellor, Mark Mone, is stepping down after 10 years in that post. As the effort to replace him gets underway, he is to be congratulated for a job well done leading a state university under difficult political circumstances.
Since its founding in 1956, UWM built its reputation as a research university where students learn and explore at the frontiers of knowledge. This recognition as a top-tier university was built both on professional peer-review measures, and more publicly recognized by the Carnegie Commission that rates UWM as Research One (R-1), its top designation. Although much smaller than UW-Madison, UWM’s placement on Carnegie’s R-1 list means that the research performed by the faculty is of top quality and significance.
Meanwhile, the conservative Goldwater Institute rated UWM as one of the most cost-efficient higher education institutions in the nation.
Access Mission
Of course, the primary stakeholders in UWM are the many excellent students who study at UWM, including many for whom it is the only university within their practical and financial grasp. More than any other campus in the UW system, UWM is proud to serve an “access mission,” making it one of the top institutions of upward mobility in the nation. UWM’s stakeholders also include the business and cultural enterprises whose prosperity rely in part on interacting with professionals at UWM who are at the cutting edge in their fields of expertise.
These great achievements underscore lost opportunity. Rather than recognize that the Carnegie R-1 designation as a reason to invest in the high quality of UWM’s intertwined instructional programming and research productivity, its budget has been slashed to such an extent that much of what was achieved is being undone. A sampler: The physics department has lost 24% of its faculty due to exodus and retirement without replacement; biology lost 32%; history 27%. Distinguished undergraduate and graduate programs are difficult if not impossible to maintain in this ongoing situation.
Preserving R-1 Should Be the Next Chancellor’s Focus
To preserve and protect this essential research mission for the future of UWM and its constituents across the state, the next chancellor must fully understand it, promote it, explain it to the public and the regents and the legislature. To meet the challenge of replacing Mone, a committee has been formed that will invite applicants, screen them and select one. Unfortunately, despite UWM’s R-1 status, thus far the committee is top heavy with five politically appointed regents but only two members of the faculty. This under-representation of faculty is a throwback to the effort begun during the Walker administration to significantly downgrade the role of faculty in the governance of the institution, including search and screen for administrators.
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Walker’s notion was that university campuses function more efficiently if they emulate a business model with top-down authority. In that conception, the professors are conventional employees, with only a limited role in management of the organization and certainly should not take part in “choosing their own bosses,” i.e., deans, provosts and chancellors. This notion fails to recognize the nature of the research role of the faculty, a mistake that should not be repeated.
Primer on Research
Research faculty members engage in an enterprise that stretches far beyond the campus, and even beyond the state and country. Academic faculty and research staff are not conventional employees but rather they are experts within their own fields of study. Research is a global enterprise bearing little resemblance to the top-down authoritarian model that so naturally fits the typical business firm. In their professional research and teaching, faculty do not take direction from administrators. Instead, they operate within an international peer community and review process that critically evaluates their creative work.
They do this through journal publication, writing books, conference presentations, seminars, public lectures, and by bringing that knowledge to their home campus and the curriculum for their classes. None of this is reported to campus administrators for their review. Instead, it must survive the professional referee process that is global. Their own advancement in salary, promotion and special assignments depend on success in this global referee process.
The state and local benefits of this international research focus are huge. This peer review process harnesses logical and technical rigor in the creation of new knowledge. It enables faculty to remain current as the knowledge in their international disciplines grows, enabling them to bring their updated expertise as teachers in the classroom, undergraduate and graduate student research directors and as consultants whenever called upon by either the public or private sector. University administrators support the enterprise, they don’t guide it.
Faculty and regents could form a powerful partnership in this search. The regents on the search committee are prominent, politically connected individuals, chosen for their expertise and leadership positions in Wisconsin. Compared to the faculty, the regents are in a better position to forecast a candidate’s ability to interact with regents, the legislature, and the general public.
Meanwhile, due to the nature of the research mission, the faculty on the committee are in a better position to evaluate the academic credentials of the applicants for the job.
Expertise of Regents and Faculty
To balance the expertise of regents and faculty on a search committee seems a tall order, but it was routine before the Walker administration when the project was divided into two committees that operated in sequence. The first was a search and screen committee, composed of 50 percent or more university faculty, while the remainder consisted of staff, students, community stakeholders, two regents and ex-officio members. Their charge was to advertise the position, solicit applications, evaluate academic credentials and choose several candidates for in-person interviews. Their final task was to produce a list of three to five finalists. Then, the second “regents select committee” would offer the job to the candidate on that list who, in their estimation, was best able to represent the campus within the complex UW system. This sequential committee design gave both regents and faculty veto power according to their expertise.
This committee design simply divides the tasks according to expertise and has the added benefit of providing the successful candidate ultimate hire with wider support, making for a smoother transition for the next chancellor.
