As originally conceived, tenure was supposed to protect academic freedom. Professors with tenure wouldn’t have to worry about being fired for saying or writing things that bothered the administrators or trustees. The American Association of University Professors used to defend tenure like a junkyard dog.
No more. As a number of recent cases have shown, tenure won’t protect professors who say or write politically incorrect things. Moreover, a large and increasing percentage of the faculty now works without tenure.
In today’s Martin Center article, Walt Gardner laments “Tenure’s False Promise.”
After discussing the Joshua Katz case at Princeton, Gardner writes, “Long after the Katz affair has faded from memory, tenure itself will continue to be controversial. This is because tenure is an anachronism in today’s labor market and is under pressure from both outside and within the academy. Outsiders can’t understand why they don’t have it in their own jobs, and insiders say that it’s unfair, or unjustly handled. The secretive process that governs many tenure decisions merely exacerbates the issue.”
He argues that tenure works against the interests of students because most tenured faculty members won’t make time for them. Moreover, tenure is based on research publications, but the ability to crank out such publications is of no benefit to the students. Professors absorbed in the publish-or-perish routine are often poor teachers.
Tenure cries out for reform, and has for decades. Gardner points out that just one state, Georgia, has taken any steps toward modifying it. He concludes, “The best hope is that public colleges will follow suit, with private ones eventually falling in line when they see the benefits to all stakeholders. Colleges, of course, will survive the metamorphosis, but they may be unrecognizable to traditionalists. That’s a good thing.”