[Emeriti-faculty] Meetings

Friends,

Thank you, and especially thanks to Alex, Anna, Peggy and Tony, for today’s meeting with President Monaco. I think it went very well.

Our next department meeting will be next Monday, April 9, 12:00 – 1:15 pm, Robinson 250.

The primary agenda item will be our Faculty Position Requests for AY 12-13. I hope that we will be ready to make a collective decision by the end of the meeting.

I would ask those who have a request to put forward to circulate a draft formal description and rationale by this Friday, April 6, including Position Description, Rationale, Plan for Attracting Faculty of Color and Women Candidates, and Resource Needs. I am attaching the two requests that we submitted to the Administration last year as examples and templates.

Please attend the meeting if at all possible; as you know, these are among the most important decisions we make as a faculty. If you will not be able to attend the meeting, you may convey your preferences to me via email, or you may give your proxy to any member of the faculty who will be in attendance. In the latter case, please let me know who has your proxy. I would suggest naming a proxy as a backup even if you convey your preferences via email, in case issues arise that you do not anticipate. All voting will be by secret ballot.

Requests are due in the Deans’ Office by April 27. In the solicitation of requests, the Deans included the following paragraphs (boldface in original):

In light of the president’s strategic themes announced this spring, and in keeping with the university’s emphasis on interdisciplinarity more generally, we encourage requests that contribute to interdisciplinary programs as well as the core mission of departments.

With regard to the School’s mission, we continue to use the opportunity, with each and every hire, to increase the overall excellence of the Arts and Sciences faculty. We endeavor to build faculty excellence broadly with a particular strategic interest in increasing the racial, ethnic, and international diversity of our faculty, and in supporting interdisciplinary fields that foster cutting-edge research and student experiences. There is considerable evidence to suggest that increasing the number of faculty of color can improve the racial and ethnic climate on campus and improve learning outcomes for all students, as well as making it possible to build diverse research teams that make better, more creative decisions. Interdisciplinary research and learning enable us to think about how to solve problems that draw on multiple disciplines and have inherent complexity that extends beyond any single discipline.

In the current academic year there have been 13 searches for tenure-track faculty across the 25 departments in Arts and Sciences. A&S finances are very tight – there is currently a deficit of several million dollars – so I anticipate that the number will be, if anything, smaller next year. Three positions have been set aside for cluster hires in the area of Race and Ethnicity. Accordingly, I believe it is highly improbable that we will receive approval for two positions, and it is essential that we make a very strong case for whatever position or positions we request.

I look forward to a thoughtful, respectful and productive discussion next Monday.

Roger

Roger Tobin

Professor and Chair

Department of Physics and Astronomy

Tufts University

617-627-5461

http://rtobin.phy.tufts.edu/