Faculty Handbook Leak of 2009

= Copy of Leaked Changes to the Faculty Handbook =

If anyone has a copy, please post it here.

= E-mail Response from Administration =

Submitted by: Ralph J Hexter

To: Hampshire College Faculty From: Sigmund Roos, Board Chair Ralph Hexter, President Date: October 13, 2009 Re: Draft Changes to the Faculty Handbook

It has come to our attention that a problem with administrative process has occasioned concern and raised understandably serious questions on campus, particularly among faculty. We want here to discuss what happened, what was supposed to happen, and how we will get this important process back on track.

A bit of deeper background will be helpful to understand the process itself. Concern about the state of the College's governance documents, in particular inconsistencies among them and between them and our regular practices, had been raised by the president well over two years ago. The Board and President's commitment to a full-scale professional review of documents is long-standing. The College's 2007 Self-Study, circulated for comment prior to its submission to the visiting committee, notes under Standard Three, subsection "Appraisal," that "the board has asked the president to undertake a comprehensive review to identify policies in need of revision, revise them, and ensure that they are vetted not only by the affected groups but also by counsel at each step." This remains a commitment.

As you know, the NEASC visiting committee underscored the desirability of a much broader study of governance, especially the way decisions are made across the College, and it was to respond to this that the Governance Task Force was established and has begun its work. But our realization of the need for, and our commitment to an audit of key governance documents from a legal perspective predated the accreditation review and is entirely separate from the work of the Governance Task Force. Let us reiterate: the recently appointed and charged Governance Task Force has had nothing to do with the draft of these possible changes to the Faculty Handbook. Review from a legal perspective is not within their purview. The appointment in summer 2008 of Marian MacCurdy as Special Projects Assistant to the President, with helping us respond to the NEASC recommendations a key part of her portfolio (as announced to the community July 22, 2008), finally allowed us to begin to make progress on the technical and professional review of documents. With her support, the President's Office, with the approval of the Executive Committee of the Board of Trustees, was able to arrange for readings of our key governance documents by three professionals--our regular college counsel, a second attorney who specializes in higher education law, and the Five College Risk Manager--each of whom identified potential institutional risks, many of which are found in the Faculty Handbook. The comments of these legal professionals on the Faculty Handbook, once collated and sorted, were discussed at length last spring with then VPAA/Dean of Faculty Aaron Berman, who himself proposed a minor but important change in the timing of one aspect of the reappointment process. As a result of these discussions, the administration developed a draft of a modest number of possible changes that would respond to the most important of the legal and risk management professionals' concerns. It is important that you understand that at the beginning of this project no one had any idea what our legal consultants would recommend. They performed their readings independently. Given the significance of this project, it was important to bring forward these suggested changes for a campus review and discussion prior to a faculty vote and presentation to the Board of Trustees. It was not clear what the final mode of vetting and voting would be, as the Faculty Handbook offers no clear guidelines that prescribe how changes are to be made in the document, yet another of its flaws. All this hard work notwithstanding, by late April it was clear to us that there was no way to move forward once the faculty had dispersed, so the next steps in the project were shifted to the following academic year. Once Dean Goodman was in office, Dr. MacCurdy began to bring him up to date on the point the project had reached and collected his concerns about certain elements of the draft as it then stood. These were in the process of being registered when, through a series of unfortunate miscommunications and misapprehensions, the draft in its present form was circulated on campus, not only before it was ready but before many other steps that we had foreseen had been taken. For example, Dr. MacCurdy would have met with Dean Goodman and the school deans to fully explain the possible risks and clarifications these changes were to address in order for them to hold discussions with the faculty and then get feedback prior to a formal vote. After any further changes had been made in light of this feedback, a final set of proposed changes was to have gone out directly to the full faculty with a formal memo from the president outlining the project and the rationale for each of the proposed changes.

It is unfortunate that an early draft went into circulation. The fact that it was circulated even before Dr. MacCurdy, Dean Goodman, and President Hexter had the opportunity to approve the document and without proper context and appropriate explanation has meant that the text itself has, quite understandably, given rise to serious concerns, even distress and dismay across campus, and this we very much regret. However, as we trust the above has made clear, this is a very important project for the College. The potential risks posed by what at times may seem to be very trivial flaws in the Faculty Handbook are real and must be addressed for the well-being of the College. As we had planned, Dr. MacCurdy and President Hexter will collate Dean Goodman's initial concerns as well as new ones he or the school deans have heard. These questions and the concerns of others may make further consultations with risk professionals advisable, but at some point later in the year, we will move into the iterative and interactive vetting process that had been planned. This will culminate in a faculty vote that will be passed on to the board. No changes, of course, will become final until approved by a vote of the Board of Trustees.

We would like to make a special comment on what may well have caused the most concern, the proposal to include a clause concerning fiscal exigency. This was, again, based on the advice of our legal consultants and a very preliminary draft. Even though many colleges have exigency clauses in their faculty handbooks (Mount Holyoke College and Earlham College, to name but two) and it is considered "best practice," it was not a foregone conclusion to include such a clause in the final draft. However, one of the reasons that a clear financial exigency clause was proposed is because our current faculty handbook gives the administration the option to lay off faculty in the event of, as the handbook currently reads, "financial exigencies" (Chapter Two, section VII). As currently written it neither offers protections for long-term faculty nor provides a method by which those possible layoffs would be determined and accomplished. The new language was drafted to address both of these issues. However, given the concerns that this clause understandably provokes in this current economic climate, we can table any changes or additions to this clause for separate review and discussion on a later occasion. Again, apologies for the concern and any distress inadvertently and unintentionally caused by the premature release of an important document in draft form and without the contextualization it would have had if all had gone according to our plan. We hope you understand the immense amount of work and care that went into this process up to this moment and the care and attention that we will continue to pay to it as it proceeds. It is too important to us all for a procedural gaffe to derail.