Junior English Faculty Meet With Bok, Spence

Expressing frustration over two recent tenure denials, the English Department's junior professors met with President Derek C. Bok and Dean of the Faculty A. Michael Spence Monday afternoon to complain about the promotion process.

In a session lasting nearly two hours, the professors argued that Harvard's tenure system was slanted against junior professors seeking promotions within the University, faculty members said yesterday.

Specifically, the junior English professors said they told Bok and Spence that they needed more paid leave time to build up their credentials by writing books. Harvard now grants only one semester's paid leave to junior faculty.

"The junior faculty as a whole was very eloquent in expressing some very genuine discontent and doubts about how the administration and department have handled matters and stressed the need for a more coordinated effort if there is going to be any bite to Spence's stated policy of the last three years," said Associate Professor of English Joseph A. Boone, who was denied tenure by the English Department in November.

Boone was referring to Spence's 1985 annual report, which said the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) needed to increase the possibility that more junior professors from within the University would receive lifetime posts here.

Despite Spence's goal, many junior faculty in the English Department continue to say that the promotion process does not offer them a reasonable chance at securing senior posts.

The junior professors cite the English Department's unusually poor hiring record, saying that it has tenured only one junior professor in the last 25 years.

The two most recent tenure denials were to Boone and Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities Deborah E. Nord. Bok, who has the final say in tenurematters, denied Nord's tenure bid in March afterthe department's senior faculty had approved it.

Nord yesterday said she had not attended thesession because it would not have been"appropriate." However, she said she supported thejunior professors' goals.

This week's meeting was set up by Bok andEnglish Department Chair Robert J. Kiely,professors said. In separate interviews yesterday,Kiely and Spence refused comment on the session,both calling it "confidential."

But junior English professors readily discussedthe meeting and what several called their"frustration" over the tenure denials.

In addition to more paid leave time, the juniorfaculty members said they discussed the need forchanges in FAS' tenure process with Bok andSpence.

According to Assistant Professor of EnglishJeffrey D. Knapp, who attended the session, juniorfaculty at comparable institutions generally havefewer administrative responsibilities and get morepaid leave time.

Knapp said he he has made informal inquiries atPrinceton, Columbia and Yale about their juniorfaculty policies. And other professors said thatthe English Department also endorsed their pleafor more leave in a letter to Spence last month.

Professors also said the English Departmentshould change the way in which an ad hoc committeeof outside scholars evaluates candidates fortenure before delivering a recommendation to Bok.

"I think there was a general sense in themeeting, and among the junior faculty and evenamong the senior faculty, that the present ad hocsystem doesn't work very well," said AssistantProfessor of English Allen H. Reddick, thedepartment's head tutor. "I don't think that's anygreat secret."

"A significant number of the people who areevaluating a junior candidate don't know thatcandidate and don't know what the contributions ofthe faculty member has been," said AssistantProfessor of English Nancy Ruttenburg.

Ruttenburg added that ad hoc committeesunfairly compared junior faculty's research withthat of the leaders in the field who have had moretime to publish. She also said ad hoc committeemembers often are not specialists in the field ofa tenure candidate.

In other departments, Spence convenes an ad hoccommittee to judge tenure candidates only afterthe department has recommended them. But sincelast year, a committee of outside scholars hastaken part in the English tenure process from thebeginning.

In an unusual move, Spence appointed theEnglish Department's committee as a permanent bodyto help break a hiring logjam that had stagnatedthe department's tenure process in recent years.But Ruttenberg said the committee had not improvedthe lot of junior members of the department.

Junior professors have said that when they comeup for tenure, they are not sure how the committeewould handle their cases, since it was set upprimarily to appoint full professors from outsideHarvard. However, committee members haverepeatedly said they would also consider internalcandidates.

Junior faculty members who attended the meetingsaid they were skeptical about whether any realchanges would come about as a result of themeeting with Bok and Spence, but they added thatit was an important forum for airing theirconcerns.

"We're extremely proud of being here and we'reextremely proud of the job we do," Reddick said."We really are all proud that we stood togetherand voiced our concerns on really sincere feelingsof disillusionment at being junior faculty membersat Harvard.