Scott Walker moving to weaken tenure for state college professors

Hot Air.com ^ | June 18, 2015 | JAZZ SHAW

[Kaslin]

Scott Walker has formed a Testing the Waters Committee, which I assume has something to do with Marco Rubio’s response to the State of the Union in 2013. (Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.) The new committee will provide him with an additional conduit to raise funds between now and when he announces his presidential bid in July. But at the same time, he’s making some other moves, particularly in the area of tenure for professors at public colleges and universities.

As Republican Gov. Scott Walker prepares to campaign for president as the man who tamed Wisconsin’s unions, he’s taking on a new labor fight: weakening tenure protections for professors at public colleges and universities.

Walker insists that by allowing the University of Wisconsin system Board of Regents, 16 of whose 18 members are appointed by the governor, to set tenure policies instead of having tenure protections spelled out in state law will help give the state university system more flexibility and financial leverage.

His effort could endear him to conservatives who are scornful of what they view as higher education’s ivory tower — a perception Walker has encouraged by suggesting that “maybe it’s time for faculty and staff to think about teaching more classes and doing more work” — but it has infuriated academics and others who consider tenure a vital protection of academic freedom.

Note that Walker isn’t proposing some sort of blanket ban on tenure. That’s probably a smart play, since such an unconditional declaration of war would be yet another bruising battle to engage in just as he’s getting ready to launch a national campaign. Instead of that, he’s proposing that tenure policy be set by the Board of Regents. The effect would probably not, in all likelihood, be the same as some sort of complete ban on tenure, but it could institute some long overdue reviews and corrections.

This will likely reignite the long simmering fight over the tenure system in general. The ivory tower elite will continue to insist that tenure serves the dual purpose of protecting educators from baseless accusations while ensuring that they are not beholden to the shifting tides of political opinion. As I’ve said in the past, the sad part of all this is that those would actually be fairly persuasive arguments in a perfect world. Students may behave maliciously and irresponsibly at times and could bring false accusations against an instructor. And inside of a state run system such as the colleges, it would be nice to think that teachers were all enlightened and pure of motive. Much like judges, it’s not difficult to imagine situations where elected officials put their thumbs on the scale in terms of appointments and hiring.

And yet, tenure turned out to be such a powerful and easily abused weapon that its downside eventually swamped whatever good it hoped to accomplish. The incompetent or even abusive were shielded along with the diligent workers. And rather than providing a nonpartisan safe space for academics, our universities largely turned into liberal or even socialist enclaves where no dissenting opinions would be allowed. The tenure system was simply a tool to cement that structure in place over generations.

Of course, Walker is being accused of doing this as some sort of “stunt” to burnish his conservative credentials as he moves into the primary race. But does anyone think those credentials really needed any polishing when it comes to conservative doctrine regarding unions and universities? Sounds precisely in character to me.

[Dr. Sivana]

Why won’t Walker announce his candidacy if he is supposed to be the front runner? What is he scared of?

Reagan didn't announce his candidacy until November of 1979. On the one hand, Wisconsin has a biennial budget, and Walker wants to get that finished before he goes full-time.

Part of campaign strategy has to do with using the timing of an announcement in order to maximize publicity, etc. Some guys start in two years early (Jimmy Carter), and it works. Others wait until later (Ronald Reagan), and it works.

Each election is different. I lived and worked in Wisconsin under Walker. He's not afraid, and he's not trying to sell a book or get the #2 spot. He intends to win, and timing the announcement for a time when more people are paying attention is part of his strategy, it appears.

[Osage Orange]

Ok...one last time.

Do you not think...progressive liberal socialist marxist democrats control our state colleges?

And I will add....tenured Profs too?

[Georgia Girl 2]

“Those 1/3 are likely lying liberal socialist marxist progessive democrats that are supposedly “teaching” our future.”

You have no clue who those people are. None, nada, zippo. For all you know they are all Reagan Democrats. Hey 996 people who need to be destroyed I tell you, destroyed. Kill them. :-)

[Jacquerie]

Considering your vacuous comments regarding Article V you are an educated idiot.

[Osage Orange]

Give us some links to verify please.................

[Osage Orange]

You have no clue who those people are. None, nada, zippo. For all you know they are all Reagan Democrats. Hey 996 people who need to be destroyed I tell you, destroyed. Kill them. :-)

Taking away their tenure is "destroying" them????

You are arguing like a Liberal...

Do you realize that?

[trisham]

Agreed.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Hey here is your new bumper sticker for Scotty: Scott Walker, keeping America safe from college professors.”

That will get him in the White house. :-)

[Dr. Sivana]

The Wisconsin budget deficit is not looking good either.

Walker inherited a $3 billion deficit courtesy of outgoing Dem Jim Doyle. He turned that around into a surplus within one year, which he in part returned to the taxpayers in the form of state income tax refunds and property tax relief, and in part as local property tax relief. The WEDC funding all told was just shy of $200 million dollars, or one 15th of the Doyle deficit.

Individual counties and municipalities (except Milwaukee and Madison who signed union extensions before Act 10 kicked in) also saved big money. Walker has been dealing with the deficit by cutting spending in the right places (U of Wisc system), and NOT increasing taxes.

Since you don't want to have government spend money through a business subsidy system, what else should he do besides hold the line of taxes and cut spending and sign off on Right to Work?

By the way, Wisconsin's unemployment rate is 4.4% as of April, 2015 ( http://www.bls.gov/eag/eag.wi.htm ). Since Wisconsin did not go as far in the tank during unemployment, there is not as many jobs to restore during a recovery. For comparison, Illinois is at 6%, Michigan at 5.4%, Indiana at 5.4% and Minnesota at 3.7%.

[Osage Orange]

You are losing any credibility you have had here.......

Good luck.....

[Dr. Sivana]

That’s 996 out of 3470 teaching faculty in WI so less than 30%.

If you have ever spent time on a big league college campus, you will find that tenured 30% is the tail that wags the dog of the other 70%. In the same manner, U.S. Department of Ed money is a small portion of the states' education budget, but it is enough to get them to implement Obama lunch and Common Core through much of the country.

Walker is actually attacking one of the main arteries that transmits poisons into our system. It is NOT just about the money (theough U of Wisc. DID try to hide $600 before Walker found out about it). It is about leftists using our own money to create a professional class of agitator to be used to destroy us.

[Osage Orange]

God forbid...you give this tag team real numbers.

Thanks!

[conservativejoy]

The point is Wisconsin is still 50th in new businesses, 40th in job creation, still having jobs shipped overseas. Just saw another article on that this week.

Good luck selling that as a good record on jobs. Sheesh!

[Dr. Sivana]

You have no clue who those people are. None, nada, zippo. For all you know they are all Reagan Democrats.

Besides having been a college student who knew a lot of these profs, I was also an administrator at a top 20 Liberal Arts college for 2+ years. It was bad when I was on some of those campuses decades ago, and it is worse now. A conservative academic who is not in the closet has as much chance in most academic institutions as a pro-life conservative has a chance to rise in Hollywood according to ability. Tenure is the way of locking in and perpetuating the old guard. The results speak for themselves.

[Dr. Sivana]

The point is Wisconsin is still 50th in new businesses, 40th in job creation

If you insist on cherry picking misleading stats, I can give you a math lesson. How many jobs can get created in a state with full employment? NONE. Any state with full employment is guaranteed to be in last place in job creation. Michigan had the greatest amount of job creation. That does not make Michigan a better place to seek employment.

You still don't have an answer as to what Walker should have done differently. Spending cuts, tax cuts, tax rebates, structural debt reduction, the most solvent state employee pension system in the country, right-to-work. That is the conservative approach.

[trisham]

Well said.

[Dr. Sivana]

Scott Walker, keeping America safe from college professors.

If he could figure out a way to keep us safe from the Associated Press, the New York Times and Reuters, too, I'd say we have a plan!

[conservativejoy]

Link to Wisconsin 40th Link to Wisconsin 50th

[Dr. Sivana]

Good luck selling that as a good record on jobs. Sheesh!

Here is a more personal statistic. When my company was bought out in 2009, the parent company realized that staying in Illinois made no sense, so my position was moved to North Carolina. Thanks to Obama/Illinois' economy, I couldn't afford to sell the house I built in 2006. I had an extended spell working part-time on the Internet and doing bits of consulting here and there, and it was only after Walker was elected that I was able to land a full time position as a contractor for Wisconsin DOT.

It was a 90 mile commute, but it fed the family and kept the roof over our heads. We ultimately were able to take care of the house, and I now have a better job now in Georgia, but that ONE job that Walker created is a very meaningful statistic to me.

[conservativejoy]

How about not creating the WEDC to pay back his donors while they are shipping thousands of jobs overseas?

There are states all around Wisconsin that have had unemployment challenges, but they are beating Wisconsisn’s socks off in job creation.

North Dakota and Nebraska are states that have a 3.5% unemployment rate, lower than Wisconsin. North Dakota still led the nation in new jobs.