Medical Council

A newly-elected 39-member faculty council at the Medical School this fall assumed the power of the old administratic board and allows junior faculty to participate in administrative decisions for the first time.

Dr. Peter Reich, associate professor of Psychiatry and vice-chairman of the new council, said yesterday, "The increasing complexity of medical school administration beginning in the sixties" created a need to involve junior faculty members in "a smaller sub-faculty that would set policy for the faculty and carry out administrative functions."

The council does not have the power to make appointments to the faculty. However, Reich said, "Within the current statutes of the University," the council can be a "lively forum" where many issues, including curriculum reform and problems of student discipline are considered.

Dr. Thomas H. Wilson '52, professor of Physiology and a member of the council, said yesterday that the group was established because "there was a feeling that the administration should be more representative democratically."

Dr. Robert S. Blacklow '55, associate dean for academic programs and secretary for the council, said last night, "The faculty wanted more of a share in the decisions establishing priorities."

Blacklow denied that the faculty felt left-out of the decision making process at the Med School. "This is always a kind of paranoia," he said. "If you weren't consulted, you feel that no one else is."

Blacklow said that he hopes "lots of people take advantage" of the creation of the new council and that they "get involved," but he added, "The illusion of democracy is all decisions made by many people can't be wrong."

Roughly equal numbers of senior and junior faculty members compose the membership of the council, although the ratio at the med school is about five to one, senior to junior faculty.

The council was proposed by an administrative board committee on governance in 1973 but did not come into being until this year because of what Blacklow called the "big juggling act" of the elections process.