Who Runs Cornell? (Part 2) | FACULTY GOVERNANCE COMMITTEE PRESENTS RECOMMENDATIONS

sHORTLY AFTER THE UNEXPECTED and unexplained ouster of President Jeffrey Lehman '77, the Faculty Senate decided to review the roles of the trustees, administration, and faculty in governing Cornell. They named the seven-member Faculty Governance Committee (FGC) in November 2005, with ILR professor Risa Lieberwitz as its chair (see Currents, January/February 2006). In March, the FGC completed its work and presented a detailed report to the Senate; the report urges an enhanced and expanded role for the faculty in how the university is run.

Balance of power: The Faculty Governance Committee’s final report states that "making faculty perspectives and expertise an integral part of university governance . . . promotes decision-making consistent with the University's core mission."

The FGC's work, explains Lieberwitz, fell into three areas: (1) defining the issues of faculty governance; (2) researching the recent history of faculty governance at Cornell and several peer institutions; and (3) interviewing key individuals--administrators, trustees, and faculty--at Cornell and other schools. "We wanted the way we did our work to reflect the issues that we were looking into," says Lieberwitz. "One of the things we were most concerned about was open consultation. So all along the way, we talked to a lot of people, got a lot of input, and asked people to react to what we were reporting."

The FGC gave a progress report to the Senate in May 2006 and then turned its attention to formulating its recommendations. It presented a draft at the November Senate meeting, and faculty members offered their responses at a forum held later that month. The FGC considered the additional input, revised its draft, and presented its 17,000-word "Final Report and Recommendations" on March 14. A resolution was passed, stating that "the Senate receives the report and calls on the dean of faculty and the University Faculty Committee to initiate further consideration of the recommendations."

The FGC report cites "a series of events of the past decade that have now caused the faculty to express concern over their lack of influence in university governance." These incidents are spelled out in Appendix C of the report. Aside from the Lehman resignation, they include the reorganization of the Division of Biological Sciences; the creation of a dean for Computing and Information Science; the founding of eCornell; the proposed dismantling of the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning; the decision to raze Redbud Woods for a parking lot; and several Day Hall initiatives that directly affected faculty status and compensation. All of these events, states the report, generated concerns about "a pattern of the administration and Board of Trustees making unilateral decisions, which have been presented to the faculty as a fait accompli or where there has been insufficient faculty consultation." (Appendix C also includes an account of one issue where faculty governance worked well: the creation of the Faculty Advisory Committee on Tenure Appointments.)

Concerns about unilateral decisions, notes the report, are not unique to Cornell, but are representative of a national trend in which universities are increasingly being governed by a business model. If this continues, the FGC asked, "will the University be able to maintain the institutional goals and values central to its role in a democratic society; that is, will the University preserve a commitment to its public mission and the culture of collegiality, community, openness of communication, and consultation that are part of academic freedom and shared governance?"

The report presents eight recommendations "designed to improve and strengthen faculty governance at Cornell and by so doing, improve the overall quality of the University." Several of the recommendations call for increased consultation between the University Faculty Committee (UFC)--the executive committee of the Faculty Senate--and the Cornell administration and trustees. There is also a recommendation that the dean of faculty-- who is elected by the professoriat, not appointed by the president--attend the president's regular weekly meeting with other senior administrators. That hasn't happened yet--and may not. "President Skorton's logic is that if he invites a representative of the faculty, then doesn't he also have to invite representatives of the students and the staff?" says neurobiology and behavior professor Charles Walcott, the dean of faculty. "My argument would be: no, the faculty is different. I have private meetings with the president, and that surely is a fine thing, but that doesn't integrate the faculty into the structure of running the University."

The report also recommends that both the dean of faculty and the UFC report to the Senate about their meetings with the administration and trustees, and that the president meet at least twice a year with the faculty as a whole. Increased faculty participation in governance is urged, with recommendations for the conduct of faculty committees as well as increased faculty participation in future searches for the president, provost, college deans, and other senior administrators. "Involving more faculty in governance is an important issue," says Walcott. "It tends to happen only when there's a crisis, and recently there have not been any issues so upsetting to the faculty that they are worried about it. But if we decided to ban all parking on central campus, for instance, I think we could fill Bailey Hall."

The overall thrust of the FGC's recommendations, says Lieberwitz, reflects a strong desire not only for increased faculty participation in governance but for such participation to yield consensus on important issues. "The other thing that goes along with all of these issues," she adds, "is our recommendation for interpreting confidentiality narrowly.None of this will work if you increase consultation with some groups but then say it's confidential-- it simply adds another layer of people who know something but don't share it with the whole faculty."

Administration response to the report has been encouraging, says Lieberwitz. "President Skorton said that he believes strongly in consultation," she says."He emphasized that the liaison role of the UFC is important, and that it's the most efficient way for the governance structure to work."Walcott echoes this, saying that his meetings with both Skorton and board chairman Peter Meinig '61 have helped to "build trust and build a relationship" that bodes well for the future.

While it may take years for all of the FGC's recommendations to be fully considered--and some may never be adopted--both Lieberwitz and Walcott believe the process itself was beneficial and contributed to a more open and cooperative atmosphere during the first year of Skorton's presidency. But the real test, Lieberwitz says, will come when there's strong disagreement about an important issue. "At some point, faculty recommendations may be at odds with the position of the administration or the trustees. How will that be worked out?"

-- Jim Roberts '71

To access a PDF of the FGC report, go to http://web.cornell.edu/UniversityFaculty/
and click on "Final Report and Recommendations."

State of the Art | FRANK ROBINSON ON THE JOHNSON MUSEUM'S EXPANSION, HIS BUNNY SUIT, AND THE INFURIATING OPEN-MINDEDNESS OF ITHACA

CAM: You've been appointed to your fourth five-year term as director of the Johnson Museum. So let's start with an easy question: What is art?
FR: I use that word in every other sentence, and I hate it. It implies "Art-witha- capital-A," on a pedestal, something different from everyday life.Whereas the whole point of a museum is to make art accessible. Art is about everything-- love, hatred, sex, envy, generosity. It's about God, about the lack of God. As you live, things just flow by; at the end of the day you've had 1,000 experiences and not really appreciated any one of them. An artist stops and makes you appreciate life disappearing.

CAM: How do you make art accessible?
FR: My background is as a teacher, so my focus is always on the student, and I've emphasized outreach. We have annual exhibitions curated by history of art majors and faculty members, a student art showcase, a student-run museum club, advisory councils of students and faculty. There are so many ways of reaching out. I just came back from postering on the Arts Quad. . . .

CAM: You put up posters yourself?
FR: We have other people who do it, but I love it because I get to look at the bulletin boards and walk around.

CAM: So you don't see yourself in a rarefied, ivory-tower sort of position.
FR: I try to maintain an air of quiet dignity. But it's hard to do that in a rabbit suit.

CAM: As in the Easter Bunny?
FR: For the annual egg hunt, when we have hundreds of kids. And I dress up as Santa Claus in December.

CAM: In your fifteen-year tenure, have you ever had to take to the barricades in defense of artistic expression?
FR: Unfortunately, no. I wish we'd have a controversy. The most controversial work of the 1990s was Piss Christ by Andres Serrano, a large photograph of the figure of Christ immersed in the artist's urine.We borrowed it and put it in the lobby, and nobody got upset. The Brooklyn Museum showed a photograph by Renee Cox of the Last Supper; all the disciples were black and she was standing in the place of Christ, nude. Rudy Giuliani threatened to stop funding the museum.We bought it, because it was a wonderful work, and we've had it up several times, and nobody complained. We are in Ithaca, New York. It's a special place.

CAM: In general, though, do you think we're living in a less tolerant age?
FR: It comes and goes. In a way, there's more awareness of art now--museums are front-page news. Controversy is an indication that people care. But I don't think we're moving backwards. Somewhere in this country, there is another Rembrandt, another Picasso, Matisse, or Michelangelo; the problem is figuring out which one. That's what a museum is about: making bets on the future.

CAM: What are the details of the museum's $17 million expansion?
FR: It will be on the north side and include a new gallery, lecture room, studio, offices, and storage, which will allow us to turn the present storage space on the fifth floor into exhibition galleries.We break ground in March 2008 and open to the public in 2010.

CAM: If the museum were on fire, and you could put one artwork under each arm on your way out the door, what would you save?
FR: Certainly the Giacometti Walking Man sculpture. After that, it would be tough. I'd be tempted to save Daubigny's Fields in the Month of June--it's an important early Impressionist painting, but it's pretty big. Or the Otto Dix Woman Lying on a Leopard Skin. However, there are some wonderful Asian things. There are 32,000 works of art in this museum, and I love them all. As I say, they're all my children.

-- Beth Saulnier

Aerial Assault | 'HELICOPTER PARENTS' ARE REDEFINING THE COLLEGE EXPERIENCE--AND MAYBE NOT FOR THE BETTER

aMOTHER ACCOMPANIES HER daughter to the first day of classes. A father calls an administrator, worried because his daughter hasn't contacted him in a day or so.

A mother wants an RA's cell-phone number so she can check on her son, who was cited for underage drinking.

These are not grade-school kids-- they're Cornell freshmen. As the Millennial Generation has come to college, so have their "helicopter parents," nicknamed for the way they hover.

In recent years, faculty and staff on the Hill have watched more and more parents arrive early for orientation or stick around for days after it's over. "Move-in weekend has become move-in week," says Susan Murphy '73, PhD '94, vice president for student and academic services. Throughout the academic year, staff are deluged with e-mails and phone calls from parents who got fast responses from high school officials and expect the same now.

"The really involved parents fall into two categories," says Brian Earle '67, BS Ag '68, MPS '71, a CALS senior lecturer who had a mother show up on the first day of his class. "First are the kind that have a really good friendship with their child, and it's mutual. They call every day--how healthy that is, I don't know. The other type does everything for the kid and gets involved in all kinds of things they shouldn't."

Grades, roommate issues, course choices, punishment for infractions, even classroom temperature--all are aspects of freshman year that students used to handle themselves, with maybe some help from their parents now and then. Now parents tend to be in the thick of it, and many students seem to be happy that they are.

Weren't baby boomers the generation that wanted freedom? What happened?

Several things, Murphy says. College costs skyrocketed, the race to get into top schools grew more intense, and parents became consumers who demand value. Mothers and fathers saw more threats to their children in a post-9/11 world dominated by the Internet. Families became smaller, so children got more attention. Finally, the days when a student called home on a pay phone every few weeks, and wrote letters by hand, turned into the era of e-mail and cell-phone family plans. There's even a national organization called College Parents of America; it has 7,000 members and a forum with the tongue-incheek name "Hoverings."

"These parents were told all along to be active, to know their kids' friends and activities," says Lisa K'Bedford '96, associate director of Cornell's Carol Tatkon Center, an academic resource center for freshmen." But nobody told them to stop being so involved when their kids went to college." One symptom is the e-mail flood, not only between parents and children but between parents and administrators. Dean of Students Kent Hubbell '67, BArch '69, says he checks his in-box all evening: "It's either that or I find 100 messages in the morning."

Student-affairs professionals now have conference sessions with names like "Managing Millennial Parents."Websites such as the National Resource Center for the First Year Experience (www.sc.edu/fye) categorize these traits for such parents: overprotective, pushing children to achieve, distrusting authority. And their children, they say, are enormously savvy in technology, expect a great deal of themselves and others, are highly measured and medicated, and demand instant gratification.

K'Bedford arrived on the Hill as a freshman in 1992, from California. Her parents did not accompany her and did not set foot on campus until she graduated. She is shocked at how much parents do for their children now, and how the students aren't embarrassed about it. "Some parents can take a step back, but others tell me, ‘I just know he's not responsible enough to take care of himself,' " she says. "Well, in the past he would have failed and learned from it. Now parents think it's their duty to intervene."

K'Bedford says e-mail allows freshmen to send papers home to be edited by parents-- and sometimes they do much more than just edit. B. J. Siasoco '07, an RA on freshman halls for three years, says parents tend to take their child's side automatically in any problem. "The kids are good at manipulating their parents," he says. "We are placed in a bind with the restrictions of federal law, and parents place the blame on us instead of the system." (A 1974 law, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, protects the privacy of school records for any student over the age of eighteen; even parents are excluded without permission from the student.)

Many colleges are creating new staff positions to manage parent relations. Cornell hasn't, although Hubbell thinks the time is coming. He and K'Bedford say the University tries to make parents into partners, so they better understand their role. "That way, they aren't so much a crutch the kid can't live without," K'Bedford says. "It's not bad to have parents involved; it's the level of it that's become a problem."

As a parent of Millennials himself, Hubbell sees nothing wrong with his fellow baby boomers being more like friends with their kids than their parents were with them. He says students need more guidance in their first year, so parental involvement is often a plus. He also believes that the Millennials will grow up eventually. "You hope that in four years at Cornell the student will migrate toward independence naturally," he says.

Maybe so--but K'Bedford worries that some helicopter parents will follow their kids into the workplace. She tells the story of the recent college graduate who was assessed as "average" on a job review, meaning she had room to grow. Her mother called human resources and demanded a meeting.

-- Scott Conroe, MPS '98

The Science of the Very Small | NATIONAL EXHIBIT ZOOMS DOWN TO THE NANO-SCALE

what's the smallest thing you can think of? What's the smallest thing you can see? Those are questions a Cornell team hopes people will ask themselves-- and maybe even answer--thanks to a nanotechnology exhibit now traveling the country.

"Too Small to See," at Walt Disney World's Epcot park through May, aims to introduce the public to the science of the very tiny. "People come with some basic notion of what atoms are, what molecules are, and everything in the exhibit is built out of that," says Carl Batt, former co-director of Cornell's Nanobiotechnology Center and the exhibit's lead developer.

Getting non-scientists to understand just how small a nanometer is--one-billionth of a meter, or less than the length of a water molecule--isn't easy. So elements in the exhibit's central courtyard are all scaled 100,000,000 times their normal size. Visitors can walk through a silicon crystal, or make molecules from fist-sized balls representing atoms and sticks representing bonds. Other displays focus on nanotechnology applications in areas such as medicine, energy, and information technology. Visitors can even pick up and move atoms using a version of the tool first employed by IBM scientists.

Now that the exhibit has debuted at Epcot, where more than a million people are expected to see it, Batt and his collaborators are scaling the concept down into a smaller Spanish-and-English version for less economically privileged venues like inner-city science centers. In the meantime, the original will travel to Ithaca's Sciencenter for the summer and then to Exploration Space in Wichita, Kansas, for the fall.

No matter the size, the exhibits share the same goal, Batt says: "to inform the public about emerging technologies--things that will affect everybody's lives."