Showdown at Pierce : Stop Feuding or Lose Jobs, Faculty Told

Feuding Pierce College agriculture professors who have scuffled during faculty meetings and derided one another in classrooms have been ordered to end their squabbling--or find other jobs.

The edict from acting college President Jean Loucks was disclosed Thursday as administrators at the Woodland Hills campus revealed that the state community college chancellor’s office has been asked to scrutinize the strife-ridden agriculture department.

The chancellor’s inquiry will occur early next month, officials said. It will come on the heels of a separate effort 3 weeks ago by the Los Angeles Community College District to referee the dispute through an outside mediator.

Agriculture professors say the mediation effort was largely unsuccessful.

They say the department’s 11 faculty members remain divided over whether the 40-year-old college’s agriculture curriculum should be revamped, who should change it and what kind of development should occur at the school’s 200-acre farm.

Curriculum Revision

The dispute has been festering for 2 years after former college President David Wolf announced that he was planning to revise the curriculum in hopes of boosting sagging enrollment in agriculture classes.

Since then, tempers have often flared as professors disagreed over which classes should be scrapped and which should be added.

The result has been incidents of pushing and shoving at agriculture department meetings and reports of personal attacks between teachers in front of students. Last year, the feud spilled into the Woodland Hills residential community when rival groups of professors sent separate letters to homeowners about an off-campus development controversy.

Loucks’ admonition came Wednesday when she called the entire agriculture faculty in for a private tongue-lashing, according to several teachers.

She ordered an immediate halt to classroom politicking by the professors and told them to stop talking to outsiders about internal school problems. She forbade professors from using college photocopy machines in their fight and instructed them to “walk away and say nothing” if provoked by a co-worker.

Advised to Follow Policy

A teacher’s union representative who sat in on the meeting reportedly advised the professors to follow Loucks’ new policy. The representative said that to do otherwise would amount to insubordination--something the union could not defend teachers against, according to one of those at the meeting.

“She said she will not tolerate these actions any further,” said the professor, who asked not to be identified because of the ban on talking to outsiders. “Otherwise, find another place to work.”

Loucks could not be reached for comment late Thursday.

But the head of an independent agriculture department support group said Loucks’ move followed an appeal for peace made last week. “I met with Jean Loucks and discussed how students are being terrorized by what’s going on in the department,” said Loretta Kemsley, president of Friends of Pierce Farm.

Mediator Joseph F. Gentile, a labor relations attorney, also recommended forceful action by the Pierce administration, campus officials said.

Officials say the Nov. 23 mediation session was set up by the college district at the request of the faculty union. Gentile also reportedly recommended that “unbiased parties” be summoned to help work out a truce.

That recommendation prompted the action by the state chancellor’s office, faculty members said Thursday.

Agriculture department chairman Mick Sears could not be reached for comment late Thursday. Earlier, however, he told the Pierce College student newspaper, the Roundup, that he is doubtful the faculty rift will easily be solved.

“If the magic fairy came down and touched us all and said ‘no more antagonism,’ could we live together?” Sears asked. “I don’t know. There’s an awful lot of water under the bridge.”