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Dear Regents:
I am the elected student president of the Journalism Board, an organization of seven students. I will be graduating next month with a BS in Journalism, an emphasis in news editorial, a BA in psychology and a certificate in International Media. I will speak to my experience as a double major. I hope to be the voice of the faculty that cannot speak out against their employer’s recommendation. The Regents are voting on Thursday, April 14.
This faculty annually accepts approximately 700 majors. We are CU-B assets; over 40% are from out-of-state like me. Echoing the on-site visit report of the accreditation committee in March, I have found each faculty member to be individually “accomplished.” In 2010, I took a digital media class; the undergraduate curriculum was completely updated to address digitization and other changes. A new version of the large 1001 introduction class for majors was taught this past fall that reflected these changes. Other changes were put on hold as a result of the Chancellor’s sudden announcement mid-August 2010, three days after the start of the fall semester.
The school’s external professional advisory board, selected by the dean, sent a “white paper” to Chancellor DiStefano, in April 2010, recommending the school be closed. Without meeting with the faculty, the advisory board ruled that the professors were against change and that the school should be discontinued. The board only worked with the dean. We students (as also the faculty) have not seen their “white paper” recommendation: Have you? Will it take a Freedom of Information Act request to get a copy? We have been taught that there are always two sides to a story; the Chancellor did not hold discussions with the faculty (or students) to hear other sides of the story.
Any disputes and “chronic dysfunction” within the faculty, noted by the on-site accreditation committee report, have not impacted me as an undergraduate student. These may exist: There are organizational conflict resolution consultants who can deal with this, ranging from CU’s own Tom Sebok Ombudsperson and Communication professor Stan Deetz, to outside specialists. When a unit generates tuition from over 700 majors a year (only a small fraction of the applicants) for a cash-strapped university, but has slowly developed a non-terminal cancer, oncologist-recommended radiation, chemotherapy and alternative medicines are tried, not murder.
Alumni contribute several thousand dollars each year to the School of Journalism and Mass Communication. I can’t imagine that my class will do the same since the faculty will be in a temporary location, looking for a permanent home. On February 14, the chancellor wrote to the president that the faculty would elect a chair and two associate chairs. On April 4, DiStefano wrote that the graduate school dean (an English professor) would appoint a chair for this predominantly professional-skills undergraduate department. How will this indecision help creatively reconstruct internal dynamics in the school I will graduate from this spring? Given the lack of ideas on (1) how to address the dysfunctional, fractious faculty and (2) desirable research, teaching and outreach quality measures, it could appear that only those faculty members who please the chancellor will find other tenured homes or continued employment.
I want to take this opportunity to present some hard facts:
a.) As a double major, about 20 percent of my undergraduate courses were taught by the 23 tenure track professors journalism professors. In the present market and the Journalism Plus degree, the faculty could be left to teach mainly 30-40 MA students and 5-6 doc students admitted each year.
b.) The undergraduate program enrolls no more than 10 percent of media studies/research majors in any year. The rest specialize in advertising, news-ed, broadcast production and broadcast news.
c.) Around one-third of the undergraduate journalism majors voluntarily choose to have second majors; many of us are also doing the certificate in international media or a certificate in technology and media arts (TAM). Must the chancellor bind us all, requiring everyone to do a combinational degree in journalism? As a double degree myself, I had to be very careful when planning my schedule to ensure that I would fulfill all the requirements. In addition, I was not able to take a dance or music class I hoped to take before graduation–would it be worth it to all students? Would parents be as enthusiastic if their children had to take another semester or year to graduate because of poor planning and this requirement? What would the financial implications be?
d.) The chancellor-recommended Journalism Plus degree and its compulsory curricular combinations is an administrator initiative. Unless it is voted in by the faculty as part of their share in goverance, the regents would be violating their own rules (See Laws of the Regents Univ of Colorado 5.E.5. Principles of Participation A and F).
If you have any questions, you can reach me at davenpmn@colorado.edu.
Respectfully,
Michelle Angelica N. Davenport
SJMC c/o May 2011
President, Journalism Board
