As talk about restructuring higher education swirls around Nashville, professors at Tennessee's four-year colleges feel as if they have little say about their futures.
So in hopes of injecting themselves into the debate, faculty groups within the UT system and Tennessee Board of Regents have formed an organization to lobby for academic programs and faculty.
SENATES GROUP
The Association of Tennessee University Faculty Senates has representatives from faculty senates at four-year colleges across the state. The group will meet in August to discuss the proposed restructuring of higher education.
"We don't want to be left out of the conversation," said Dr. Pedro Campa, faculty senate president at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. "I don't think this is something the governor and his star chamber can do by himself."
The new group, the Association of Tennessee University Faculty Senates, has representatives from every four-year college in the state with the exception of Tennessee Tech University, said John Nolt, the faculty senate president at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Tennessee Tech hasn't sent representatives to the group, he said.
Laws in Tennessee prevent faculty from forming a legally recognized union or calling strikes. However, professors say the cross-section of faculty will have sway among students and faculty across the state.
"We can act in unison, but we can be ignored," Dr. Nolt said. "The real power here is in the Legislature and with the trustees."
The faculty senates group will meet in August and, in the meantime, the group is keeping a close eye on how Gov. Phil Bredesen and lawmakers move to change higher education, Dr. Nolt said.
Academic faculty want to be included in any committee, whether formal or informal, that is convened to look at higher education, he said. When proposals for restructuring are made, Dr. Nolt said, the faculty group plans to issue its opinion.
Several members have been meeting with the governor's staff and lawmakers, lobbying to be included in the process, Dr. Nolt said.
"We don't have a particular reorganization plan in mind," Dr. Nolt said. "We want to study along whoever else is doing the study. We want access to the information."
Lydia Lenker, a spokeswoman for the governor's office, said Gov. Bredesen is at the start of the process of restructuring higher education and beginning "what will be an inclusive process."
By joining professors from different colleges, Dr. Campa said, faculty will get a better understanding of how university employees are treated across the state.
Perhaps UTC employees should push to move out of the University of Tennessee system under a new higher education organization, he said.
"We have always been a foster child (with UT)," Dr. Campa said. "Maybe we will be with the Board of Regents. Their salary increases and teaching load are better than what we have."
Also, the faculty senates group may help to squelch some turf wars among institutions, which could be sparked as the governor talks about a higher education model that would minimize the University of Memphis and pour more resources into UT, Dr. Nolt said.
Faculty at the University of Memphis clearly want their school to be a more dedicated research institution, he said, and faculty at UT want to defend its status as the state's flagship institution.
"That kind of rivalry can be healthy, but it can also create dysfunction, and we want to avoid that," Dr. Nolt said. "We want to focus on the system that would be in the best interest of the students. We want to see a broad cooperation among the (state's) two systems."
Howard Roddy, a Chattanooga board member with the Tennessee Board of Regents, said he feels as though board members should and will listen to faculty members when it comes to discussions about reorganizing higher education.
He said he thinks the senates group is a good idea and will allow faculty to share best practices and brainstorm solutions to common problems.
"Faculty are pretty important, just as the students are," he said. "You want to empower them."
