Women Ask To Replace Fleming

Two women's groups at the University of Michigan yesterday protested Michigan president Robben W. Fleming's appointment to a committee of five college presidents appointed by the American Council on Education.

President Bok will chair the committee which will work to clarify HEW guidelines and procedures used to implement affirmative action plans required by HEW for the hiring of minority groups and women within universities.

PROBE, an ad hoc group of women faculty and students formed last spring when HEW earmarked Michigan as one of a number of universities guilty of discriminatory hiring practices, issued a statement yesterday calling for Fleming's resignation from the committee.

The Commission for Women, a committee of 15 women faculty members appointed by Michigan to moniter university progress in implementing hiring plans, "noted Fleming's appointment with dismay."

"Good Intentions"

"Fleming may have good intentions," their statement read, "but he is in no position to give advice on discrimination against women considering his poor record of cooperating with HEW in the past and his failure to implement the imposed guidelines."

Last spring Michigan was one of the first universities investigated by HEW for discriminatory hiring practices. While HEW threatened Michigan with the loss of government contracts if it did not submit an affirmative action plan for minority hiring. Fleming circulated a letter among other college presidents denouncing the HEW demands as unreasonable, according to the Michigan Daily.

PROBE has also filed a class action suit with the U.S. Department of Labor charging Michigan with failure to implement its minority hiring plan which calls for a 2.1 per cent increase in the number of women at Michigan over the next three years.

Fleming commented yesterday in an interview with the Michigan Daily that he thought the charges of failure to implement the plan were unjust. "We talked with HEW some months ago and erased a few questions that had been left standing, but as far as we know there is no further problem," he said.

Women's groups at Harvard have not protested the newly formed committee. The Permanent Committee on Women met yesterday but did not discuss the college presidents's committee, according to Gail T. Parker, assistant professor of History and Literature and a member of the committee.

Suspicion in HEW?

"Maybe it's just that we don't really know enough about the committee to see what heinous things they are going to do." Parker said, "but I think Michigan women may be underestimating the suspiciousness of HEW when they conclude that there will be collusion between the presidents and HEW officials."

The national convention of the Women's Equity Action League (WEAL), meeting in Washington today, also denounced the formation of the committee. Petitions calling for the committee's dissolution were circulated at the convention and will be presented next week to Logan Wilson, president of the American Council on Education and the man who appointed the committee