The Lame Duck’s Letter 1

Now that I am almost gone, some thoughts about what I have learned, and what I believe the School should do to thrive and flourish.

I’d stress the importance of institutions over personal politics. As I figured out quite a long time ago, there are two types of politics: one is based on personal favors, and another on some sort of an institutional authority. Every time I made a decision, I tried to treat it as a precedent. Many of my colleagues will recall my question: what is the story I can tell others justifying this decision? This is not just about our Charter (which may need some tweaks or revisions), but about a culture of appealing to the rules, to rational justification, and of demand for transparency. Looking back, I wish my decisions would be challenged more, and that people would read and use the Charter, the BOT Policy and other documents more often. Directors come and go, but the collective will and determination of faculty and staff must be institutionalized to maintain good political culture. The other option is to reduce the internal politics to that of personal favors and trade offs, of blocks and petty squabbling.

Our Charter and other university policy do cuments allow for a great flexibility, yet they spell out principles. For example, the Director has the power to assign people to classes. In addition, we have a pecking order of priorities AND the principle of rotating all perks and burdens (no seniority in class assignments). These three things balance each other. For example, when I assign someone to teach out of the pecking order, it is not an exercise in arbitrary power, not at all – I must have a good rationale for the decision. Not necessarily published or spelled out, but always ready if and when someone asks. My point is – people should ask; it is good for the system, and keeps the Director in shape. The same goes to all other decision makers. When a program coordinator says “I don’t want so and so to teach in my program,” there has to be a plausible rationale, some body of evidence, not just an arbitrary opinion. And was my job to ask for that. Many of these conversations remained invisible, mainly to protect someone’s privacy. However, all business should be conducted as if it could become public at any time. It is what Eugene calls the newspaper headlines test: would you like the story to appear in a newspaper, and would it still be defensible?

I am recommending one addition to out governing system: the Executive Committee consisting of all full professors, with advisory powers to the School Director, and with the charge to monitor fairness and transparency of major decisions. Some other schools have that, and I believe it would be good for STE, too. The committee would not have any actual decision-making power, but could help the new Director to get a sense of our history, traditions, and rules of conduct. It could be called as needed by the Director or any of the members.