Tenureless U: at Florida Gulf Coast University, tenure is out and multi-year contracts are in

Black Issues in Higher Education, Oct 16, 1997 by Joni James

FORT MYERS, Fla. - The narrow band of habitable land between the Gulf of Mexico and Florida's Everglades is where a band of 150 pioneers have staked their claims.

But on this academic frontier in southwest Florida, one of the basic foundations of American academia is out of favor. At Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) - the nation's youngest university - tenure is out and multiyear contracts are in.

On opening day in late August, the only faculty with tenure or on a tenure-track were the thirty who had transferred to FGCU after the University of South Florida (USF) closed its Fort Myers branch to make way for the new university.

It's the other 120 faculty - those who moved to Fort Myers, often from tenured jobs at established schools - who have taken the biggest risk. They are accepting three- to five-year renewable contracts, and they know that the United Faculty of Florida - the union that represents them - isn't ecstatic about their arrival.

Under pressure from the state Board of Regents to help reform tenure at the state's nine other universities, the union agreed to allow FGCU to have multiyear contracts. But it doesn't necessarily endorse the idea, saying multiyear contracts may make it hard for the university to attract and keep top faculty members because tenure remains popular throughout academia.

"We decided an experiment [at FGCU] would be appropriate," said University of North Florida Professor Tom Mongar, the union's president. "But we're going to go back and look at the results."

Indeed, the world is watching FGCU. But so far, there isn't much to see.

For all the hoopla, the tenureless hiring did not appear to affect the university's applicant pool - some positions netted 200 applicants - or its enrollment of 2,700 students, which is 200 more than anticipated. The numbers for both the applicants' pool and enrollment probably benefitted from the slow academic job market and Florida's growing wave of high school graduates.

"The problems we had recruiting faculty were the same problems all Florida [public] universities have," said Suzanne Richter, FGCU vice president for academic affairs. "We couldn't pay them enough."

Richter said the problem was particularly acute for minority faculty, such as a Black nursing professor from New York who turned FGCU down after her home institution offered her a $5,000 raise.

What the school does offer, however, is a pioneer spirit, something that appealed to many faculty who were tenured elsewhere.

"My thought is tenure isn't the reason I became a professor," said business professor Hudson Rogers, a native of Trinidad who had tenure at the University of Southwestern Louisiana. "I'm here because not many people get a chance to say, 'We started a university.'"

So far, it's not affecting faculty governance either, said Associate Professor Thomas Harrington, one of the USF tenured faculty now on board at FGCU. He'll serve as the interim faculty senate president until elections are held in November.

"We've made sure, in setting up the governance system, that you know if someone is a full professor or not but you have no idea what their contract is," Harrington said. "From my perspective, the press has made this much more of an issue than we have on campus. If it wasn't for reporters calling me, I wouldn't be talking about it."

The biggest test, faculty members agree, will come when it's time to renew faculty members' contracts.

"I'm one of those people who believe that if a person performs well they are going to do well whether they are tenured or on a multiyear appointment," Harrington said. "I know there are people who don't believe that, but I do.

"We really won't know until next year," he admitted. "If we find out eighty faculty are fired, I might give you a different answer. But I don't think that will be the case."