The UF Faculty Senate voted Tuesday to approve a resolution that calls on the Florida Board of Governors to delay the implementation of a statewide post-tenure review reform — with only one dissenting vote visible.
Faculty at UF already go through a post-tenure review process — the Sustained Performance Evaluation Program (SPEP) every seven years. Each public institution in Florida has their own tenure review process. Legislation passed in April allowed the BOG to implement a uniform, state-wide tenure review process for all of its universities to follow.
Senate Faculty Chair Amanda Phalin told The Alligator she plans to present a resolution to the Board of Trustees, of which she’s a member, at its meeting Friday.
“My hope is that I can work to raise enough awareness that important changes that need to be made to the regulation can be made before the regulation goes into effect,” Phalin said.
The BOG’s reform, entitled 10.0003, is redundant, and shouldn’t be adopted until four changes are made, according to the resolution.
These include the addition of a statement that supports academic freedom and tenure, identification of funding sources for post-tenure positive performance compensation, amended language regarding the regulation’s performance improvement plan and the removal of the regulation’s reference to Florida State Statute 1000.005 — also known as the Florida Educational Equity Act.
Phalin emphasized she isn’t against the concept of post-tenure review, but, in her opinion, the BOG’s proposed regulation is poorly written, was made with little faculty input and would practically end faculty tenure statewide.
“It's my impression that a lot of folks in Tallahassee and in places of power, have the sense that faculty just don't want any review or any accountability at all — and that’s not the case,” Phalin said. “We just want it to be done right, and this regulation makes things worse.”
Contact Christian at ccasale@alligator.org. Follow him on Twitter @vanityhack.
Christian Casale is a history senior and the university desk editor for The Alligator. In his spare time, he loves writing his bio for the website and watching movies alone in the dark.
