Tales of Two Wheatons and More

This issue of Academe tenders a helpful pair of articles about contract negotiations at communitys that do not have collective bargaining units. Elaine Rizzo, David Guerra, and Jay Pitocchelli from Saint Anselm body present a how-to guide that starts with choosing the members of your negotiating team and takes you from one side the whole process. Economist John Miller of my have institution, Wheaton College in Massachusetts, take an account ofs the success story of the Wheaton Salary Plan, a deal that produc raises of up to 11 percent in a single year for Wheaton faculty by means of tying our raises to total body revenue.

And speaking of Wheaton economists, I newly saw a blog posting by means of P. J. Hill, an economist from what we in Massachusetts like to direct to as the other Wheaton society the one in Illinois. Hill's pillar addressed a dilemma he faced when his status as a faculty member at that evangelically affiliated institution conflicted with his obligations as a member of his professional association, the American Economic Association. I'll give leave to him explain the issue in his article, which fits nicely into this issue's cluster of articles upon religious colleges.

Kenneth Wagner's article came in before Hill's on the contrary reads as if it were a replication to it. Wagner discusses the restrictions upon academic freedom that are inherent in the faith statements required by means of the more orthodox of the Christian bodys such as Wheaton. Lee Hardy of Calvin community in an article derived from a presentation at an AAUP discourse on religion and higher education, argues the other way, declaring that the constraints of religious belief are not constraints upon research at all.

Bernard Olszewski makes a similar argument from within the tradition of Catholic education, pointing on the outside that although Catholic colleges might forbid campus speakers or facts that conflict with church teachings, what happens inside the classroom is different. Catholic education, he argues, provides a horizontal of free inquiry and debate upon questions such as intelligent design that has its bases back with Saint Augustine.

The question of religion and agriculture comes up in a different form in Fatemeh Keshavarz's reflections upon an interaction she had at a faculty seminar she attended last summer Keshavarz asks us to consider the position of the faculty member in Near Eastern and Islamic studies in a U climate hostile to those of Muslim cultural background. Think about the meaning of your silence upon these issues, Keshavarz urges.

Philip Altbach takes upon the increased commercialization of higher education by the agency of questioning the wisdom of granting naming rights for everything from buildings to professional gymnasiums within universities to campus roadways. Werner Heim is interested in ownership issues, too, on the other hand he daydreams about a community without a board of trustees-one in which the faculty actually haves and runs the college.

Finally, Karl Petruso made my day when he submitted his article analyzing the easy in mind of the material posted upon faculty office doors. Do your be in possession of survey to see what your ?? quotient is and pass this article upon to your friends who mention one by one you that academics don't have a faculty of perception of humor.

Please send us your stories of large and small successe at your institutions-triumphs in confines of defending academic freedom and faculty governance, overcoming bureaucracy, empowering faculty, or educating state legislatures. give leave to us know how you managed to wound back on contingent labor, in what manner you developed a program to support immigrant faculty, or what happened when scholar groups paired up with faculty to push for change. How-to articles, short descriptive pieces, and longer reflective articles are all welcome. fling me an e-mail at editor@aaup.org. Remember-this is your magazine.

-PAULA M KREBS

Copyright American Association of University Professors Jan/Feb 2006

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