The 1990 Edition of the Policy Documents and Reports of the American Association of University Professors, in its Introduction, asserts that for seventy-five years the American Association of University Professors has been engaged in developing standards for sound academic practice and in working for the acceptance of these standards by the community of higher education. [p. ix.] Ironically, AAUP's success has led many in our generation of scholars to take academic freedom, and its corollary tenure, for granted. President Harold Shapiro, the University of Michigan, in addressing the Wingspread Conference "On Periodic Evaluation of Tenured Faculty," held August 24-26, l983, asserted:
Although many faculty members have devoted little careful thought to the issue of tenure, they are tenaciously attached to it as one of the anchors that define their relationship to the university. . . . [t]heir membership in the academic community would be severely diminished if not irrevocably ruptured by a substantial modification of the form of academic tenure. . . . Whatever their understanding of the objectives and rationale of our current system of academic tenure, the entire university community perceives tenure as an important and delicate issue. [Academe, November-December 1983, p. 3a.]
I believe that tenure is important because it is one of the chief means by which the academic freedom of individual faculty and, more broadly, of the university itself is protected. Such academic freedom is the essential ingredient that enables a modern university to fulfill its function. I agree with Shapiro "[academic freedom] is this vital link between tenure, academic freedom and the role of the modern university that makes tenure such an important issue."
In the light of this link between academic freedom and tenure it is necessary to remind ourselves that we have yet to celebrate the "centennial" of academic freedom and tenure in America. Their roots are recent! An examination of medieval and early modern universities reveals them to be institutions for promoting and reflecting the "establishment values" of their age. There was little or no room for doubting in the medieval world. In all thinking there was a consciousness of being sheltered by an "inviolable order, which it is not the business of thought to create, but only to accept."[Cassirer, The Philosophy of the Enlightment, p. 39] Medieval thinkers sacrificed liberty and freedom of thought for unity. Therefore, we should not forget that modern history is in large part a revolt against precisely this side of the Middle Ages. [Randall, The Making of the Modern Mind, p. 78]
Historians have observed that American universities throughout the eighteenth and most of the nineteenth century continued in this tradition of medieval orthodoxy. College and university faculties as late as the nineteenth century were perceived as obedient servants of the community, the Boards of Trustees, and the Presidents of the colleges. The faculty were expected to shape the character of their students in accordance with the prevailing ethos. [Hofstadter and Metzger, The Development of Academic Freedom in the United States, 1955] Academic freedom, as we know it, was not intended and rarely even considered. "The early American college was concerned largely with preserving current knowledge and promoting morality. The faculty of these colleges would hardly be characterized, either then or now, as an independent group of scholars searching for new arrangements in science and society and considering new systems of values." [Shapiro, Academe, November-December 1983, p. 5a]
The shift in American higher education came at the end of the nineteenth century when, under the influence of the German universities's model, scholars began to think of themselves as responsible for the development of new ideas in science and society. Freedom of inquiry began to replace the model of preserving current knowledge and promoting morality. With the emergence of Johns Hopkins, Columbia University, and the University of Chicago as graduate centers of education, academic freedom was seen to be a necessary ingredient if freedom of inquiry was to be developed once inquiry replaced dogma as the goal of education. I believe that it was this new environment which led professors to develop the modern concept of academic freedom and of tenure as the gaurantor of academic freedom. Scholars in this field have observed that our contemporary notion of academic freedom and tenure is inextricably linked to our modern scientific vision of progress. As it has been observed, the cultivation of reason and the open pursuit of knowledge are not aims in and of themselves, but are derived from our broader understanding of how to "bend nature to our wills," to paraphrase Frances Bacon.
The 1940 "Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure" marks the mature linkage of academic freedom and tenure. This statement has been incorporated, often verbatim, in the handbooks and policies of hundreds of colleges and universities. Even the courts have come to recognize it as the yardstick for measure adherence to proper standards of academic freedom and tenure. However, this statement has roots in the struggles for academic freedom in the first half of the twentieth century.
The founding of the American Association of University Professors in 1915 was accompanied by a declaration: "General report of the Committee on Academic Freedom and Academic Tenure." Its central theses were that in every institution there should be an unequivocal understanding as to the terms of appointment, and that the tenure of professorships after ten years of service should be permanent, subject to certain provisions for removal upon charges. These ideas were expanded in a 1925 "Conference Report." However, it was the 1940 Statement that stated the case most forcefully.
Central to the 1940 Statement was the claim that tenure was a means to certain ends: (1) freedom of teaching and research and of extra mural activities, and (2) a sufficient degree of economic security to make the professor attractive to persons of ability. Also the probationary period was shortened to seven years. The 1940 Statement has been approved by most of the major educational organizations in America.
In the Indiana State University Handbook , Section III, under conditions of employment, states "Indiana State University ascribes to the AAUP guidelines for academic freedom, faculty duties and responsibilities." [3-1] Also included is a section on Academic Freedom" "All members of the faculty are entitled to academic freedom as defined in the Statement of Principles of Academic Freedom and Tenure formulated by the Association of University Professors in 1040 and which has been widely accepted by American colleges and universities."
The Board of Trustees of Indiana State University in Appendix B of the Indiana State University Handbook state: "The Board shall recognize and does recognize all existing rules and regulations and policies of the University now in existence covering the tenure and employment and salary provisions of the administrative and instructional staff and hereby ratify the same as published by the University in the year of 1969 in the Indiana State University Handbook, and as amended." [A B-2]
It is important that the present policies of academic freedom and tenure, as set forth in the 1940 AAUP Statement and in the Indiana State University Handbook be maintained. Certainly periodic evaluation of faculty is necessary for efficiency and is simply good personnel policy. However, ongoing evaluation should be disconnected from the question of tenure. At present the faculty is evaluated on many levels: Periodic evaluations of non-tenured faculty; evaluations for promotion; evaluations for compensation, including merit; evaluation for graduate faculty status; and evaluation for sabbatical leaves. Post-tenure evaluation, in most of its proposed forms, simply adds an additional layer of administrative "red tape" and paper work. Even more importantly, what is the purpose of such post-tenure evaluation? If it evaluation which might lead to termination, the Indiana State University Handbook already includes specific provisions for termination of faculty members. If the evaluation is for faculty development, why not call it faculty development? Obviously the pattern set by the Presidential Evaluation and the current evaluation of administrators has as its goal the increased effectiveness and productivity of the administrators, and the evaluations are to remain confidential. I remain unconvinced that the university will be strengthened by connection periodic evaluation of tenured faculty to the issue of tenure. Rather, I believe the effect will be negative. I conclude with the proverb: "If it is not broke, don't fix it!"
