pugh@esprit.cs.umd.edu (Bill Pugh) (03/08/91)
There was an article in the March 3rd issue of the Washington Post:
Stanford President Sets Initiative on Teaching.
Some details from the story (by Kenneth Cooper):
The president of Stanford University, in a paper released today,
proposes extraordinary policy changes designed to ease the conflict
between faculty research and teaching demands, including limiting
how many scholarly articles are considered when professors seek
tenure.
...The main change Kennedy proposed in "an essay to the Stanford
community" would limit the number of scholarly writings that
the college will consider when deciding whether to hire, promote
or grant lifelong tenure to faculty members. A faculty advisory board
must approve the change.
Kennedy labeled "disturbing" a report last year from the Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching that nearly half of faculty
members believe their scholarly writings are merely counted -- and not
evaluated -- when personnel decisions are made.
"First, I hope we can agree that the quantitative use of research
output as a criterion for appointment or promotion is a bankrupt idea,"
Kennedy said. "The overproduction of routine scholarship is one of the most
egregious aspects of contemporary academic life: It tends to conceal
really important work by its shear volume; it wastes time and valuable
resources."
...
The article mentions a number of other proposals, such as faculty peer
reviews of teaching to supplement student evaluations.
Does anyone have more more details? If somebody has the actual report from
Kennedy would we get it posted to the net? (If someone could fax it to me,
I'll have it scanned and posted). If nothing else, could someone with
access to the report cite what the proposed limit is on the number of
articles to be considered when a professor seeks tenure?
Bill Pugh
Assistent Prof.
Dept. of Computer Science
Univ. of Maryland, College Park
(301)-405-6707 (FAX)
pugh@cs.umd.edu