News
Over 600 UNC-Chapel Hill faculty have signed a letter (original, archived copy) condemning the interference and overreach of the North Carolina legislature, the UNC System Board of Governors, and the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees whose actions violate the principles of academic freedom and shared governance that undergird higher education in N.C. and the U.S. If enacted, we believe that these measures will further damage the reputation of UNC and the state of North Carolina and will likely bring critical scrutiny from accrediting agencies that know undue interference in university affairs when they see it.
News coverage of the faculty letter:
The UNC-Chapel Hill chapter of the American Association of University Professors calls upon Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz and Provost Chris Clemens to publicly support and defend UNC students, faculty, and staff who are supportive of Palestinian rights or critical of Israeli policies and practices. In this particular case, in this political climate, blanket statements about the first amendment, such as the one circulated at the beginning of the semester, are not enough.
See the full UNC-CH AAUP statement calling on Chancellor Guskiewicz and Provost Clemens to support free speech supportive of Palestine.
The AAUP report of the Special Committee on Governance, Academic Freedom, and Institutional Racism in the University of North Carolina system continues to spark discussion locally and nationally:
The American Association of University Professors has released a report of the Special Committee on Governance, Academic Freedom, and Institutional Racism in the University of North Carolina system. The report considers the influence of the North Carolina state legislature on the systemwide board of governors and campus boards of trustees. It discusses how political pressure and top-down leadership have obstructed meaningful faculty participation in the UNC system, jeopardized academic freedom, and reinforced institutional racism.
The special committee focused in-depth on UNC‒Chapel Hill as the flagship campus, but also examined events across the entire system. Through interviews with more than fifty individuals across the UNC system, the report details the pattern of political interference from the legislature and unilateral decision-making from university leadership that has increasingly come to affect the entire UNC system, with clear violations of AAUP-supported principles of academic governance set forth in the 1966 Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities.
See the recording of the press conference at UNC Chapel Hill announcing the release of the report.
The report has received local and national press coverage:
The UNC-Chapel Hill chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) supports the academic freedom of Kylie Broderick and of all instructors at the University of North Carolina. We condemn the recent efforts of Israeli officials and North Carolina politicians to interfere with the teaching practices of UNC-Chapel Hill instructors. We call on administrators at UNC-Chapel Hill and the UNC System to vigorously defend all UNC instructors from such interference. See the entire UNC-Chapel Hill AAUP statement on academic freedom, free speech, and the course “Conflict over Israel/Palestine.”
In other news, outgoing UNC-Chapel Hill Provost Robert Blouin has announced that the funding of the UNC Library will be cut by $2 million in the current academic year and by $3 million the following year. The UNC-Chapel Hill AAUP chapter strenuously objects to such cuts at an R-1 research university of UNC-Chapel Hill’s stature, which these cuts would put at risk. We call on the UNC Board of Governors (BOG) to rescind the austerity cuts inflicted on Chapel Hill by the BOG’s own business model. We further call on our campus administration to exhaust every remedy before proceeding to cut our Library holdings, jeopardizing the achievements of UNC faculty, researchers, librarians, and students, and undermining the national reputation of UNC-Chapel Hill. See the entire UNC-Chapel Hill AAUP statement against cuts to library funding.
Finally, the national AAUP has launched a special committee to investigate a pattern of egregious violations of principles of academic governance and persistent structural racism in the University of North Carolina System. Among several issues the report will discuss is the widely publicized mishandling of the tenure case of New York Times writer Nikole Hannah-Jones, the influence of the gerrymandered state legislature on the systemwide board of governors and campus boards of trustees, and how the use of political pressure has obstructed meaningful faculty participation in the UNC system. See the AAUP announcement of its special committee to report on structural racism and violations of shared governance at UNC.
Our next chapter meeting will be Friday, August 27, from 12:30 to 2pm Eastern.
On the agenda:
- Clusterf*ck redux
- J-School update
- CAS Caucus
- Tenure rights (and ongoing appeal case)
Zoom URL: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89387480339
Meeting ID: 893 8748 0339
Please invite any interested colleagues. Our meetings are open to all UNC instructors, and you need not be an AAUP member to attend chapter meetings.
For the Zoom password, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
On May 20, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) posted a statement condemning the UNC-CH Board of Trustees (BOT) for failing to award tenure to Nikole Hannah-Jones (statement updated June 21, 2021 to clarify that the the BOT did not reject Hannah-Jones’s tenure recommendation but failed to act on it).
Now the national leadership of the AAUP has posted a statement on the UNC Board and Nikole Hannah-Jones, calling on the Board “to immediately reverse its mistaken move to withhold tenure and accept the faculty's recommendation that Nikole Hannah-Jones be appointed to the Knight chair with tenure.”
UNC-CH AAUP chapter member Hassan Melehy has written a commentary for the Academe Blog on “The Right-Wing ‘Renewal’ of Higher Education in North Carolina pointing out that the Board’s failure is just the latest example of the influence over the UNC System Board of Governors and the UNC–CH BOT exercised by conservative activist groups like the Raleigh-based James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal.
At Slate, UNC-CH professor Alice Marwick and UNC-CH professor and UNC-CH AAUP chapter member Daniel Kreiss have written an article on “The Conservative Disinformation Campaign Against Nikole Hannah-Jones” that puts the situation at UNC-CH in the broader context of “a long-term conservative battle against public higher education and the teaching of American racial history.”
The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill’s Board of Trustees (BOT), apparently bowing to pressure from the UNC System’s Board of Governors (BOG), has rejected failed to act on a tenure recommendation that had the full support of UNC-Chapel Hill Hussman School of Journalism and Media’s faculty and Dean and of UNC-CH’s Chancellor. By blocking Nikole Hannah-Jones’s appointment with tenure, the BOT and BOG have once again engaged in administrative overreach at UNC-Chapel Hill and violated the rules of faculty governance and academic freedom.
The Chapel Hill chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) objects in the strongest possible terms to this latest egregious attack on the core principles of academic freedom and shared governance. We join the Hussman School faculty in demanding that the BOT immediately reinstate approve Hannah-Jones’s original appointment with tenure.
All UNC system and campus administrators must respect the faculty's central role in hiring and tenuring our colleagues and defining educational programming.
See the full UNC-CH AAUP statement on the revoking of Nikole Hannah-Jones’s appointment with tenure (statement updated June 21, 2021 to clarify that the the BOT did not reject Hannah-Jones’s tenure recommendation but failed to act on it).
The UNC-Chapel Hill chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) is opposed to the current policy of allowing the UNC System President to name a finalist candidate for chancellor searches at UNC campuses.
The Board of Governors’ recent appointment of Darrell Allison as Chancellor at Fayetteville State University—after a normal search had created an initial list of finalists that did not include him—demonstrates that the current system is in violation of the AAUP’s principles of shared campus governance.
See the full UNC-CH AAUP statement on UNC chancellor searches.
The AAUP national office has sent a letter of concern to the chair of the Board of Trustees at Fayetteville State University regarding their recent selection of Mr. Darrell Allison as chancellor. The faculty senate at Fayetteville State has passed a resolution urging the board to rescind the offer on the grounds that Mr. Allison “lacks the requisite academic experience necessary to serve as the leader of an academic institution.” See also this special report at NC Policy Watch. It appears that the UNC System is once again subordinating the principles of shared governance.
The state AAUP meeting will be held this Saturday, March 13, from 1 to 3PM via Zoom.
The meeting’s agenda will be to discuss how shared governance and academic freedom have fared at different North Carolina institutions during COVID. The plan is to have members of each institution represented in the state conference briefly address the following questions, which relate to issues of institutional governance during the pandemic:
How would you characterize the decision to change course delivery methods in response to the COVID-19 pandemic?
How would you characterize decisions to reopen the campus during the COVID-19 pandemic?
How would you characterize budget decisions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic?
In general, how influential has faculty participation been during the COVID-19 pandemic, and to what degree has faculty participation changed since the COVID-19 pandemic?
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, have academic programs, majors, or minors been eliminated, or have no programs been eliminated?
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, has the administration or board declared a financial exigency or fiscal emergency, or has there been no such declaration? Have there been terminations of faculty appointments, including faculty layoffs, or have there been no such terminations?
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, has the administration or board unilaterally declared existing institutional regulations, such as sections of the faculty handbook, as no longer in force?
Have faculty at your institution faced any academic freedom issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic?
What are other current concerns faculty have at your institution?
If you are interested in attending, please contact Michael Behrent at michaelcbehrent@gmail.com to request the Zoom link. It will be made available to any AAUP member or faculty member who requests it.
Our next chapter meeting will be Friday, March 5, from noon to 1:30pm EST.
The meeting link and agenda will be posted next week. If you would like to suggest an agenda item, please contact one of the officers by Monday, March 1.
In the meantime, here are some recent news items of interest:
Daily Tar Heel article about our chapter's statement calling for the Chancellor to resign
WUNC story about the statement
Daily Tar Heel letter to the editor in response to the February 19 Faculty Council meeting
Daily Tar Heel op-ed by UNC Reinvest, a group whose goals are aligned with the budget recommendations of Another UNC is Possible
Daily Tar Heel article about Another UNC is Possible
Statement on Government of Colleges and Universities from the the AAUP National office
Please invite any interested colleagues. Our meetings are open to all UNC instructors, and you need not be an AAUP member to attend chapter meetings.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
The serial dishonesty displayed by the UNC-Chapel Hill chancellor and his associates regarding the most sensitive and important matters confronting the University in recent years has eroded our confidence in UNC's leadership. The members of the UNC-Chapel Hill Chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) urge Chancellor Guskiewicz, and others who have contributed to UNC’s pattern of institutional dishonesty, to step down.
See the full UNC-CH AAUP statement on UNC administrators' serial breaches of trust.
Our next chapter meeting will be this Friday, February 5, from noon to 1:30pm EST.
Agenda:
- Spring Semester / reopening: new and ongoing concerns - 20 minutes
- Budget - AUNCiP, VITAE “pause”, other updates and strategies - 20 minutes
- Faculty Governance - increasing democracy and representation - 20 minutes
- Chapter officers - proposal to extend terms a year, hold elections Fall '21 - 5 minutes
- Other issues and concerns, open discussion until 1:30
Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88268257314
Meeting ID: 882 6825 7314
For the Zoom passcode, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
Please invite any interested colleagues. UNC instructors need not be AAUP members to attend chapter meetings.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
As many of our departments are scheduling next semester's courses, and
crucial decisions for Spring are being made, the UNC-CH chapter of the
AAUP invites all UNC students, employees, and community members to an
open meeting on Friday, Oct. 30th from Noon - 1:30pm EDT.
https://unc.zoom.us/j/96570533947?pwd=WTFSOUxZUTgzNjE1emxHOC9DZklKQT09
UNC's plan to reopen campuses for the start of the Fall semester was
fundamentally flawed and doomed to fail. Across the U.S., young adults
ages 18 to 22 saw a 55% increase nationally in Covid-19 cases in
August. And now, in North Carolina, hospitalization rates are the
highest since July. This meeting will provide a space to share
concerns and experiences and to exchange ideas, and we will hear brief
reports from the working groups (Strategy, Finance, Governance) that
emerged from our open meetings this summer.
This fall the groups have developed a detailed analysis of UNC's
budgets and governance, titled “Another UNC is Possible.” A summary
statement will be discussed at the meeting.
UNC’s financial crisis did not begin with Covid-19, and now that we're
facing economic losses as a result of the pandemic, new approaches—to
the Spring semester and beyond—are needed.
Please distribute widely. All UNC students, employees, and community
neighbors are welcome.
The officers of the UNC-Chapel Hill Chapter of the American
Association of University Professors (AAUP) strongly condemn an
unprecedented policy revision that will be proposed to the Board of
Governors of the University of North Carolina this Thursday, September
17, 2020.
See the full UNC-CH AAUP statement against changes to chancellor searches.
As of August 17, 279 students and 45 employees at UNC-CH had tested positive, according to UNC-CH Campus Health (a rate of over 12%). Many of us were, therefore, relieved by yesterday's announcement that all undergraduate instruction at UNC-Chapel Hill would move on-line starting today, August 19.
But we are not out of the woods yet. Our leaders are making no move to send students home and have no plans to close the dorms. There will be no effort to reduce density at fraternities and sororities, over which the university has limited jurisdiction. In short, the threat of continued viral spread will remain high. Campus workers, the entire communities of Chapel Hill and Carrboro, as well as many students are still vulnerable.
The situation at other UNC campuses, forced by the BOG to stay open, is likely to get just as bad or worse. Clusters have already appeared at ECU, Appalachian State, NC State, and UNC-Wilmington.
In light of these conditions, we are asking you once again to join us in a call on our leaders to intervene. We have prepared a letter to Governor Cooper and other state leaders asking them to order all system campuses to close their dorms to all but the students who must stay on campus and to move instruction on-line. Simply fill out the form at the link below.
Click here to read and send a letter urging Governor Cooper and state and county health directors to close campus residences to most students and move all system instruction online.
We are also calling another meeting of faculty, staff, and students from UNC-CH and from other UNC campuses to discuss the situation and our next steps.
Please join us at the link below on Friday, August 21 at 12 noon ET.
https://unc.zoom.us/j/94358093237
For the Zoom password, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
Please reach out to one of the AAUP officers with questions, etc.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
We hope to see you there!
The AAUP is hosting a meeting for all UNC System workers July 23 12-1:30PM.
Agenda:
1. Reports back
a. Town Hall and Day of Action (10 minutes)
b. Letter and petition to the Board of Governors (10 minutes)
(context: “off ramp” is not up to individual campuses; call for reports projecting 25/50% budget shortfalls; meetings Wed/Th.)
c. Others (10 minutes)
2. Next Steps
a. Friday's UNC-CH “faculty conversation” (5 minutes)
b. Commission on Campus Equality & Student Equity Recommendations to Roadmap Taskforce and University Leadership (10 minutes)
c. AAUP resolution and template (along the lines of ECU's, but inclusive of campus constituencies including graduate students and campus workers) (10 minutes)
d. UNC Graduate Workers Collective call for white, tenured faculty to strike (10 minutes)
e. Others and Discussion (20-25 minutes)
This meeting is open to all UNC system workers. For the Zoom meeting ID and password, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
Please reach out to one of the AAUP officers with questions, etc.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
We hope to see you there!
Since Maria DeGuzman and Michael Palm sent the petition signed by UNC instructors to the Chancellor and Provost, our AAUP chapter has hosted two meetings open to anyone at UNC concerned about the administration's “roadmap” for this fall. Working groups were established to focus on: campus workers, graduate students, undergraduates, a cross-campus network, the Chapel Hill community, and the press.
We're holding the next ’big group’ meeting on Thursday, July 9 from noon to 1:30pm, via Zoom.
AAUP meetings are open to all UNC-CH faculty and instructors, including graduate students. For the Zoom meeting ID and password, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
Please reach out to one of the AAUP officers with questions, etc.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
We hope to see you there!
We have posted the full list of signatories to our petition expressing concerns about Fall 2020 teaching at UNC-Chapel Hill.
We will hold another meeting (via Zoom) next Thursday, June 25, from noon to 1:15PM Eastern time. The Zoom meeting ID and password are the same as last week's meeting.
Time will be devoted in the meeting for working groups focused on: faculty-grad student collaboration; outreach to all campus workers, other campus constituencies, and the Chapel Hill community; and working with the press.
Please contact one of the AAUP officers with other suggestions for working groups or to get involved, and please spread the word to interested colleagues.
AAUP meetings are open to all UNC-CH faculty and instructors, including graduate students. For the Zoom meeting ID and password, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
We will hold a membership meeting via Zoom on Friday, June 19 Thursday, June 18, 12-1pm Eastern time, to discuss UNC’s plan to reopen this fall.
For the Zoom meeting ID and password, please email info@unc-ch-aaup.org or DM @unc_ch_aaup, or contact one of the officers below.
AAUP meetings are open to all UNC-CH faculty and instructors, including graduate students.
If you have any particular questions or concerns, or information from your department that you would like to share, please contact one of the officers in advance of the meeting:
Karen Booth karenmbooth@gmail.com
Michael Palm mwpalm@gmail.com
Jay Smith jaysmith711@gmail.com
Our November chapter meeting will be Friday, November 22, 12–1pm, in 306 Bingham Hall.
Please spread the word to interested colleagues and graduate students. You need not be a member to attend.
Note that last week the state-wide NC AAUP Conference revived its blog with a report on the October meeting in Chapel Hill with Rudy Fichtenbaum, President of the national AAUP, Jasmine Banks, Executive Director of UnKoch My Campus, and faculty from Appalachian State, UNC-Charlotte, Elon University, Shaw University, Duke University, UNC-Greensboro, North Carolina Central University, and UNC-Chapel Hill.
Our next meeting will be Thursday, October 24, 4–5pm, in 108 Bingham Hall.
Please spread the word to interested colleagues and graduate students. You need not be a member to attend.
Our next meeting will be Wednesday, September 25, 3–4pm, in 569 Hamilton Hall.
The agenda will consist of planning for the state conference (see below) and next steps concerning the Program in Public Discourse (formerly Civic Virtue and Civil Discourse).
NC Statewide AAUP Conference October 4–5
Our first AAUP chapter meeting of the academic year will be on Friday, August 30th, from noon to 1pm in Toy Lounge (4th floor of Dey Hall). Please spread the word and invite interested colleagues.
We'll forge an agenda for the year, which presumably will include addressing the UNC administration's accelerating plans for a Program for Civic Virtue and Civil Discourse, intended to have influence over the curriculum as well as programming. An advisory committee has been appointed, and Robert George has been hired as its Chair, for which he'll be paid $20k. George is Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton, the leading conservative “beachhead” within higher ed.
And please save the date:
Our chapter is hosting the annual conference of the NC statewide AAUP on October 4th and 5th.
AAUP President Rudy Fichtenbaum will give a keynote address on the evening of the 4th, and Saturday the 5th will feature a presentation and workshop with a representative from the organization UnKoch My Campus.
Our final chapter meeting of the 2018-19 academic year will be held on Friday, April 12th, from noon to 1pm, in Alumni Hall Room 205.
Among other topics, we plan to discuss the search for a new Chancellor, the Faculty Council transition and appointing AAUP representatives, and the current climate on campus.
Please spread the word to interested colleagues—you do not need to be an AAUP member to attend.
On Wednesday, February 27 the Duke Human Rights Center is holding an event that should interest AAUP members: The Koch network and academic integrity: Is there a conflict?
The network of arch-right billionaire and multi-millionaire donors built by Charles and David Koch is funding a vast apparatus of organizations to radically change public policy and the law on matters from health care and environmental protection to labor and tax policies and reproductive rights and voting, even to alter the U.S. Constitution.
The Charles Koch Foundation is now funding centers on campuses, too—including at Duke and UNC Chapel Hill. Will this presence just expand dialogue or does it represent something more disturbing?
This panel of faculty and community leaders will explore the impact on our state of the Koch political operations (and those of those of their longtime North Carolina ally, Art Pope) to address vital questions for the future of our universities, our state, and our country.
Speakers will include William Chafe (Alice Mary Baldwin Professor Emeritus of History and Public Policy at Duke), Tomas Lopez (Executive Director of Democracy North Carolina), Kate Torrey (Board Chair of Planned Parenthood Votes! South Atlantic), Rebekah Barber (researcher and writer at the Institute for Southern Studies), and Steve Boyd (Easley Professor of Religion at Wake Forest University).
See the event page for more information.
Our next chapter meeting will be held on Friday, February 15th, from noon to 1pm, in Toy Lounge (4th floor of Dey Hall). Please spread the word to interested colleagues—you do not need to be an AAUP member to attend.
Today the UNC Chapel Hill chapter of the AAUP sent the following statement to interim President Roper, the Board of Trustees, and the Board of Governors:
Since 1920, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has advocated for “meaningful faculty participation in institutional governance,” including all important “personnel decisions” and the “selection of administrators” (https://www.aaup.org/our-programs/shared-governance). The UNC Chapel Hill chapter of the AAUP urges interim President Roper, the Board of Governors and our Board of Trustees to return to the AAUP core principle of shared governance at our campus. Specifically, we insist that faculty should be at the table in the selection process for both the interim chancellor and the new permanent chancellor. This would enable faculty to move forward with confidence in our leadership and in the continued viability of shared governance between the faculty, administrators and Boards. Vital governance structures are in a state of disrepair at Chapel Hill and throughout the UNC system; including faculty in the selection of UNC Chapel Hill's next chancellor would be an important first step in carrying out the repair work that needs to be done. We understand that this matter is time-sensitive, but nothing should preclude the immediate inclusion of faculty in the making of this crucial decision.
Our first chapter meeting of 2019 will be held on Friday, January 18th, from noon to 1pm, in Toy Lounge (4th floor of Dey Hall). Please spread the word to interested colleagues.
This meeting will provide us an opportunity to assess our priorities as a chapter and discuss the crisis of campus governance surrounding the Silent Sam statue, as well as to report about ongoing AAUP initiatives in the state.
UNC Chapel Hill AAUP members Jay Smith and Sherryl Kleinman published an opinion piece in the News & Observer: “The real act of vandalism? The NC law that limits the options on Silent Sam.”
On November 9, the North Carolina Conference of the AAUP (with the sponsorship of many departments and schools across thecampus) organized an Academic Freedom Day, culminating in the resurrection of the dormant UNC Chapel Hill AAUP chapter. Read about it in the Chronicle of Higher Education: “Professors see threats to academic freedom.”