Former UNC officials: We see many troubling signs on the horizon at Carolina
The writers are a former UNC-Chapel Hill Chancellor and former UNC-CH Board of Trustees chairman.
UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees chairman David Boliek ended his Feb. 20 Opinion piece with the statement, “You can’t be for something and against it at the same time.” We think he entirely misses the point.
We agree with Boliek that, in many ways, Carolina has never been stronger. Applications are up, external research funding has reached record levels, and the Campaign for Carolina reached its $4 billion goal a year early. All this is happening in spite of the damage our governing boards are inflicting. It is happening because of the leadership of Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz and the hard work of faculty and staff before the unprecedented politicization and governance overreach of the past 10 years.
We see many troubling signs on the horizon. Just as termite destruction can go undetected until the building starts to collapse, persistent politicization and governance overreach is taking a toll on Carolina.
The Board of Trustees created a policy to insert themselves into Tier II hiring, for positions like associate vice chancellor and associate and assistant deans. This new process is unnecessary overreach that gums up the works, hurts morale and productivity and makes life more difficult for administrators and deans. It should be reversed for the good of the campus.
The Nikole Hannah-Jones tenure debacle, as well as the fight over Silent Sam, had a negative impact on faculty, staff and students of color.
While the faculty received their first state funded increase in compensation this year, from 2008--2018 average salaries at peer schools rose more than 30% while Carolina salaries rose less than 15%. As a result, Carolina has slipped from ranking in the middle to ranking in the bottom quartile.
The Board of Trustees is silencing key members of the community. In May 2021 the Board stopped inviting faculty, graduate students and University employees to address Board meetings. They were later reinvited, but only for a tiny portion of the time they have historically been given. Actions like this chip away at trust and contribute to the slow destruction of the University from the inside.
The Board of Trustees has even considered inserting itself into the admissions appeals process. Following through with such overreach would be yet another blow to stability and trust at Carolina.
In his penultimate paragraph Boliek states, “it would be much more productive to suggest positive initiatives that make Carolina better, not tear it down.” We have and will continue to offer suggestions.
First, acknowledge the critical role that the faculty, staff and administration play in maintaining UNC-CH’s excellence and let them do the job of teaching, research and running the campus without policies that interfere with day-to-day university operations.
Second, acknowledge and take seriously the letter signed by all former faculty chairs asking that faculty chairs, now and in the future, have a place at the Board of Trustees table. It has not been discussed, simply discarded.
Third, the Board of Governors and Board of Trustees must respect the tradition of shared governance. Trust our leaders, staff and faculty to run the university. Give them the freedom to run the school unencumbered.
Finally, we suggest that Carolina should strive to be both great and good, by which we mean that excellence should always be our goal but not our sole criterion. We should also strive for moral and ethical leadership. The quality of goodness has always defined Carolina. It is our most important legacy. It is how we changed North Carolina, and indeed, the South.
James Moeser is Chancellor Emeritus of UNC-Chapel Hill. Roger Perry is co-founder of Coalition for Carolina and former chairman of the UNC-CH Board of Trustees.
