University President Michael Lovell fielded questions about shared governance, the campus Master Plan and the university budget during last week’s annual Faculty Forum.
The Faculty Council reviewed submitted questions from faculty and staff before consolidating them based on topic.
“I hope we have an interesting and enlightening conversation about issues that are important to Marquette faculty,” said Lynn Whittenberger, Faculty Council chair and metadata librarian at Raynor Memorial Libraries.
The forum was moderated by Electrical Engineering Professor Jim Richie. Lovell spent a few minutes specifically answering each pre-approved question before answering additional questions from audience members.
“For full transparency, to make sure we answer the questions as well as we can there are several members of the university administration also here depending on which direction the question goes,” Lovell said.
Lovell emphasized the need to fundraise for new innovation to enhance the value of each student’s educational experience.
“We need to consider to costly rethink the question, ‘How are we teaching our classes?'” Lovell said. “Are we giving our students the skills they need?”
Lovell also addressed innovating Marquette’s faculty-led research, which has a Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education ranking. Jeanne Hossenlop, vice president for research and innovation, said Marquette’s Carnegie Classification ranking has grown significantly.
“As we grow our resources for research, both from external and internal sources that grows our expenditures,” Hossenlop said. “As that’s one of the things that we’ve doubled – more than doubled – in the last five years.”
Faculty members were also concerned about academic security for all professors. This concern comes after tenured Political Science Professor John McAdams was almost fired after his role in a 2014 controversy.
“Tenure is something that is very important in the academy, and I think that we should be very careful not to let anything, whether it be political or otherwise, you know, or economic, change the ways we operated for hundreds of years,” Lovell said.
That response received a round of applause from faculty sitting in the back of the room.
The Faculty Forum was live-streamed for Marquette faculty who were unable to physically attend. According to Whittenberger, the event’s recording will later be made available to watch online.
Eric Blair • Apr 20, 2016 at 12:13 pm
““Tenure is something that is very important in the academy, and I think that we should be very careful not to let anything, whether it be political or otherwise, you know, or economic, change the ways we operated for hundreds of years,” Lovell said.”
Truly a bizarre statement coming from Lovell.
Doublespeak if I’ve ever heard it.
Paul Quirk • Apr 17, 2016 at 2:48 pm
McAdams was not “almost fired.” He was fired unless he apologized. Since he did not apologize, he is apparently actually fired. The faculty concern about academic freedom is welcome but is coming a year and a half late. One wonders what the applause meant, given that MU is perhaps the first university in the US to fire a professor for committing journalism.