Permission to Advertise/Interview/Hire - USM Forum -- Message Board

Date: Mar 3, 2006

Permission to Advertise/Interview/Hire

Date: Mar 4, 2006

ALL of Psychology's searches have been cancelled. . . but CISE gets to search for 14.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

HEST wrote:

ALL of Psychology's searches have been cancelled. . . but CISE gets to search for 14.

All 10 cancelled!!!!!!!! Preferential treatment maybe???? Sounds like Psychology's getting the proverbial shaft!!!!! None of CISE's cancelled????? WOW!!!!

Date: Mar 4, 2006

I'm not sure we had 10 positions. . . but I'd sure as hell agree with the shaft comment. I hope AAUP and the FS jump all over this. . .

Date: Mar 4, 2006

HEST wrote:

ALL of Psychology's searches have been cancelled. . . but CISE gets to search for 14.

Allow me to add a bit. A table summarizing the status for permission to proceed with searches was disseminated by the dean, and made public. This document also included SCH productivity and so on. Psychology has 10 vacancies and was initially given permission to advertise for some of these in the Dean's plan. These were ALL pulled by the Provost. In contrast ELR has 6 vacancies, and was given permission to search for 5 (this is the Dean, Associate Dean, and Ex Assistant to the President's department). CISE has 9 vacancies, and was given permission to search for these plus 5 brand new lines, for a total of 14. Psychology has the highest SCH/FT faculty ratio in Spring 2006 according to the Dean's data (213). ELR the lowest (97). CISE is in the middle (136). Also, LIS had 3 vacancies, but was only given permission to search for 1. LIS has the second highest SCH/faculty ratio in the college (147). It's all very interesting.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

So what was the rationale for pulling psych's searches? I've been out of town. . .

Date: Mar 4, 2006

HEST wrote:

So what was the rationale for pulling psych's searches? I've been out of town. . .

I am not privy to the Dome's thinking. This may be totally coincidental, but psychology does have quite a few critics of this administration. CISE and ELR have quite a few supporters. But this could be a spurious relationship...

Date: Mar 4, 2006

this may not address the particulars of COEP, but staffing analyses were done before departments were given permission to interview. except for a few special circumstances (interviewees were bringing grant money with them), the staffing analyses drove a great deal of the decision-making. at least that's what i heard from my chair.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

stinky cheese man wrote:

this may not address the particulars of COEP, but staffing analyses were done before departments were given permission to interview. except for a few special circumstances (interviewees were bringing grant money with them), the staffing analyses drove a great deal of the decision-making. at least that's what i heard from my chair.

Well, who conducted the "staffing analyses"?? I've always considered the Psych Dept to be a thriving one - one that actually hasn't been on the ELR/CISE merry-go-round in the past few years. I actually wonder how nepotism doesn't enter into this "staffing analyses" - maybe it's because of March 5 quickly approaching that I question this stuff, but it makes way too much sense to me. Psychology actually seems to keep faculty - making this state of the COEP even more shameful

.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

again, i don't know the particulars of the COEP situation. the data were provided by the institutional research office. i, like you, think of psych being one of the really strong departments in the university. however, when i calculated my department's SCH/FT ratio (and i'm not really sure what went into the denominator that mitch presented) and compared it to psychology's, my department's was much higher than psych's, by a factor of about 100. i'm not trying to justify what went on in COEP, cause i don't know.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

stinky cheese man wrote:

again, i don't know the particulars of the COEP situation. the data were provided by the institutional research office. i, like you, think of psych being one of the really strong departments in the university. however, when i calculated my department's SCH/FT ratio (and i'm not really sure what went into the denominator that mitch presented) and compared it to psychology's, my department's was much higher than psych's, by a factor of about 100. i'm not trying to justify what went on in COEP, cause i don't know.

SCM-

If you beat out psychology by a factor of 100, you are probably generating 40,000 SCH with a faculty of one, or about 1,000,000 SCH if your department is the size of psychology. That would be impressive.

Seriously, the numbers come from the Dean's office, which in turn were probably provided by IR. Psychology usually generates either the first or second or third most SCHs among ALL departments in the university. This is not too surprising, because we teach a lot of large classes (Psy 110, Ed Psych, Developmental, Abnormal, Stats), that are taken by various majors. If you have a SCH/FT faculty ratio 100 times greater than psych, you are indeed the Stinky Cheese Man. Give yourself a raise.

Your staffing analysis remark is interesting. The Dean came up with one plan, and the Dome thought it had a better idea over his objections. The information I received is that unit productivity was not part of the equation, at least for us. Rather, absolute number of sections taught for each faculty member was weighted heavily, and Dr. Thames had the time and inclination to go through this line by line. According to this incentive model, we would have been rewarded if we taught smaller undergraduate classes using more sections (say 75 students rather than 100), regardless of SCH productivity. Given that we struggle to find classrooms to teach the courses we are now offering, this doesn't seem to be an efficient approach to higher ed admin. Given their much lower SCH/FT output, and lower absolute SCH numbers, it is hard to fathom any staffing analysis that would conclude that 14 new hires, including 5 brandie new lines, are needed in CISE, but zip for psychology. What did you guys call it? Madermath? (Sorry Lisa.)

Date: Mar 4, 2006

mitch--i'm sorry and when i posted my comment i thought it could be misinterpreted. ours is about 300+ SCH/FT and that's not a factor of 100 in the way it could be interpreted.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

As a faculty senator, I've sat through many presentations over the recent years where data have been presented to defend a position or action (i.e. mid-year faculty raises, administrative raises in the face of SACS probation, etc.). Given the data that were presented by the Dean's office relative to Psychology as compared to other departments in CoEP, I hardly see the case for suspending ALL of our searches. Please tell me what other data can support such action; refereed publications? international/national/regional presentations? generated external support for graduate assistantships? editorial board responsibilities by departmental faculty? teaching evaluations? university/college/community service activities? external grants submitted/funded? I dare say I find it difficult to believe that we in the Psychology Department are deserving of having ALL our searches suspended. Prove to me that we are that unproductive in comparison to others in CoEP, and I will accept that we deserve this and kick it up another notch to do what more I can, BUT help me understand WITH DATA, or I'm just left to arrive at my own conclusions.

When I posed the question regarding the perception of preferential treatment to specific departments by the Administration, I was promised such was not the case. But, in light of the recent events, I'm looking for and need evidence to the contrary. If decisions are truly made on merit, I find it difficult to believe that we deserve none.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

The College of Business has already begun the process of filling the vacancies that were announced on this board last week. I think one department even got a bonus hire out of it all. Doty says that Thames hates him and the CoB. How can that be now?

Date: Mar 4, 2006

joe--i agree completely. here's what i think might be an issue (but i am guessing)--number of graduate teaching assistants and what do they teach (or help teach) in psychology? compare it to english (as just an example) where they teach composition 101 and 102. in my college for over 20 years the amount of scholarly activity never justified lines in a department. it was always teaching.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

bite mark analyst wrote:

The College of Business has already begun the process of filling the vacancies that were announced on this board last week. I think one department even got a bonus hire out of it all. Doty says that Thames hates him and the CoB. How can that be now?

Please, Let's keep Doty OUT of this particular thread. I can ignore it, given the fact that I know that people wouldn't be trying to change the subject unless the AAUPMB has hit a certain nerve (Thank you, Thank goodness - that the trolls have felt some emotional turmoil). Don't fall back on the COB and Doty to enhance all of the trolls and their illwills. We're going back to COEP on this thread. We won't be distorted. COB people, go back to another thread. You all are interesting enough . . . and I've posted on your threads too. So - don't appear to be anything more than a person of COB interest. If you have something to say about the COEP that's informed, state it. I think that the current state with NCATE will keep many of you riveted to your seats in the next few weeks.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

stinky cheese man wrote:

mitch--i'm sorry and when i posted my comment i thought it could be misinterpreted. ours is about 300+ SCH/FT and that's not a factor of 100 in the way it could be interpreted.

No problem (I suspected you didn't really mean by a factor of 100). Regardless 300+ SCH/FT is darn good, SCM (it's over 2 times greater than CISE and over 3 times as efficient as ELR)! I don't know your department, but what are your departmental research requirements like? I am wondering if you also train a lot of doc students as does psychology (which means we also need to teach the requisite smaller enrollment doc grad classes that attenuate SCH/FT ratios).

Our research output, quality and quantity wise, has also improved a lot over the past five years (I am very proud of my colleagues in this area). My average is about 2.7 pubs in peer reviewed journals per year, plus some peer-reviewed conference papers or presentations on the side to make the grad students happy (education counts these as pubs, but we don't). I'm pretty typical for our department. Recent years have seen a dramatic increase in our Tier 1 journal pubs (prior to Kuczaj, this was rare)--our folks have recent pubs in Journal of Applied Psych, Abnormal, Psych Methods, Assessment, J Personality, JABA, Nature, JCCP, and so forth. The rejection rates for many of these journals is 90% or more. Our SSCI entries are not bad at all for a relatively junior faculty. A good chunk of us are editors or are on editorial boards. Folks have worked hard to make a sleepy department into an up and comer with a nascent national rep in a few short years.

To be frank, I think that the switch to zero searches after we started the advertising process was meant to be a clear message to us. Had psych been allowed to go forward with even a few searches, or had the number of Ed searches been smaller, no ruckus would have been raised (we have honest folks who are willing to sacrifice for the common good if the game is not played with marked cards). To see the two ed departments get an additional financial commitment of over $1.1 million in salary and fringes while psychology gets zip is like getting stabbed in the back and then having salt rubbed in the wound. Do you know of any other department beside CISE that is getting 5 new lines (in addition to 9 replacements)? I repeat-5 new lines in a year that is supposed to be notable for our financial challenges?

Date: Mar 4, 2006

Joe Olmi wrote:

As a faculty senator, I've sat through many presentations over the recent years where data have been presented to defend a position or action (i.e. mid-year faculty raises, administrative raises in the face of SACS probation, etc.). Given the data that were presented by the Dean's office relative to Psychology as compared to other departments in CoEP, I hardly see the case for suspending ALL of our searches. Please tell me what other data can support such action; refereed publications? international/national/regional presentations? generated external support for graduate assistantships? editorial board responsibilities by departmental faculty? teaching evaluations? university/college/community service activities? external grants submitted/funded? I dare say I find it difficult to believe that we in the Psychology Department are deserving of having ALL our searches suspended. Prove to me that we are that unproductive in comparison to others in CoEP, and I will accept that we deserve this and kick it up another notch to do what more I can, BUT help me understand WITH DATA, or I'm just left to arrive at my own conclusions. When I posed the question regarding the perception of preferential treatment to specific departments by the Administration, I was promised such was not the case. But, in light of the recent events, I'm looking for and need evidence to the contrary. If decisions are truly made on merit, I find it difficult to believe that we deserve none.

Joe, the litmus test is this: Did your dean go to bat for you? Aren't positions within the college largely the purview of the dean?

Date: Mar 4, 2006

Joe, the litmus test is this: Did your dean go to bat for you? Aren't positions within the college largely the purview of the dean?

SP,

Within CoEP, I'm not quite sure if all positions are the purview of the dean? I truly don't know the answer to that. Did our dean go to bat for us? I hope so.

Joe

Date: Mar 4, 2006

HEST wrote:

ALL of Psychology's searches have been cancelled. . . but CISE gets to search for 14.

Psychology should pray for another university reorganization and hope that it will be lucky enough to find a suitable home.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

Mitch and Joe,

As you well know, my favorite COEPers, life isn't fair, life under SFT is not fair at all, and life with a daughter of SFT is the worst life of all.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

Joe Olmi wrote:

Did our dean go to bat for us? I hope so. Joe

You hope so? Hasn't somebody asked him? Ask you chair. He or she should know.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

stinky cheese man wrote:

joe--i agree completely. here's what i think might be an issue (but i am guessing)--number of graduate teaching assistants and what do they teach (or help teach) in psychology? compare it to english (as just an example) where they teach composition 101 and 102. in my college for over 20 years the amount of scholarly activity never justified lines in a department. it was always teaching.

SCM,

Is the number of graduate assistants strictly associated with teaching??? Does research come into play in any way??? I dare say that one can't expect a university to compete for grants and external funding withpout graduate assistant support to faculty who are expected to engage in research activities that lend themselves to grant proposals. If we hope to expand external funding efforts, we have to depart from the notion of graduate assistantships for teaching only. Without graduate assistant support for faculty research, growth in external funding will never happen!

Joe

Date: Mar 4, 2006

mitch--i'm in a doctoral degree granting unit where we direct dissertations as overloads. standard load is 3 per semester, with no 400/500 games played. research expectations are consistent with those of a doctoral unit here.

sadly, until the first staffing analysis was done about 3 years ago, we had not been able to hire in years. our junior faculty member was a full professor, having gone through the ranks while here (try 12 years). we had retirements but no lines.

i think what is happening to psych is criminal at best. but, i've been here long enough to see this happen in other colleges for years.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

stinky cheese man wrote:

i'm in a doctoral degree granting unit where we direct dissertations as overloads. standard load is 3 per semester.

I hope you don't mean 3 courses per semester. No self-respecting doctoral degree granting department would impose that on their faculty members.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

The Psych program at USM is too valuable to let the Dome deflate it. Combat it fiercely. There is no reason for it to be lessened. Take note of the Coast. Fight back. You have more allies than you realize.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

My aging memory is failing faster than I thought. I distinctly remember Dr. Greer asked Dr. Thames about "retaliation" -- didn't he assure her that nothing was further from his mind? And then there were earlier concerns about nepotism, and didn't he assure everyone that there would never be preferential treatment for his daughter?

I'm sure I heard those things. Please correct me if I'm wrong. However, since I'm not a faculty member in Psych or CISE, let me say this: if it walks like pay-back, and talks like favoritism, then it must be a duck.

Date: Mar 4, 2006

stinky cheese man wrote:

joe--i agree completely. here's what i think might be an issue (but i am guessing)--number of graduate teaching assistants and what do they teach (or help teach) in psychology? compare it to english (as just an example) where they teach composition 101 and 102. in my college for over 20 years the amount of scholarly activity never justified lines in a department. it was always teaching.

In psychology, many of our GAs serve as teaching assistants, and a good number are instructors of record. About 30% of Grad stipends are externally funded, and those students work on whatever project is funding them.

I am unclear, SCM, why GA functions should be used in a formula to allocate lines, unless you have too many GAs as instructor of record for accreditation purposes(which is not the case in CISE or ELR-ELR is purely a grad proigram). In fact, Psych probably has more GAs as instructor of record than ELR or CISE, so this was probably not part of the formula.

I agree that teaching productivity AND needs are the most important variables in resource allocation. Second is strategic development of a department to increase the enrollment and reputation of the unit. As Joe points out, neither seems to have been used in COEP. It would have been nice if the plan was shared with us, but I was informed by someone in admin that psych was being targeted for two reasons: (1) the Boss was not happy with how quickly we are increasing our external funding (but we have made great strides here without playing the Ed earmark game), and (2) he has an axe to grind with specific faculty in our department. Given that this was conveyed by someone I think you would agree is a reliable source, in the absence of convincing and compelling data, and a rational explanation for the plan, I have to assume the source is correct.

Perhaps what is missing in this thread, and is most directly relevant to AAUP, is that, once again, shared governance was tanked. The indicator for this is that neither the chair, nor faculty, have a reasonable explanation in hand for how SFT and Jay made this decision. The only information I have received, as stated above, is that SFT is targeting psychology. I was told this many months ago, and what we are seeing is consistent with this predication. Hand in hand with this goes the allocation of big bucks on the Friends and Family plan.

Does this qualify as the next stupid thing?

Date: Mar 4, 2006

joe--your response came through while i was responding to mitch's response. i wish all doctoral programs had graduate assistant support to help get grants. mine doesn't. they teach. they have to teach.

but this makes me wish for a college of social and behavioral sciences (hey mitch--been discussed for 20 years--want to make it happen?! my department would go in a microsecond from COAL).

Date: Mar 4, 2006

Mitch wrote:

The indicator for this is that neither the chair, nor faculty, have a reasonable explanation in hand for how SFT and Jay. . . .

and Cynthia, in all likelihood.