PERSPECTIVE ON THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA : Get Faculty Back to the Classroom : Letting teachers teach more and administer less would ease the system-wide financial crisis on campus.

The University of California faces a temporary financial crisis, and its faculty and administrators need to do some hard thinking about how to meet the problem without doing long-term harm to the institution.

The regents last week voted to raise student fees by $650, or 40%--the largest increase in UC’s 123-year history--and to limit enrollment by accepting only the top 12.5% of high school graduates, instead of the current 14.25%. One thousand non-teaching jobs are being eliminated, the opening of a new campus is being delayed, and merit-pay increases for faculty are being put off for six months.

Students leaders complain that too much of the financial burden is being put on them and too little on the university. Regent Yori Wada echoed that complaint, saying, “There is a perception in the general public that the professors teach too few classes.” The cry is for more teaching and less research.

The response from university officials: We will not allow UC’s reputation for research and scholarship or the quality of the institution to deteriorate.

And they shouldn’t. The increase in students fees is eminently reasonable. Total annual costs will remain less than those at 23 other state universities. Moreover, UC plans to increase aid to needy students.

At the same time, however, it is not unreasonable to ask faculty to teach more. One additional course a year would not jeopardize the quality of faculty research. The tension between teaching and scholarship is a false dichotomy. Attentive instructors know that even a semblance of good teaching requires them to keep up with developments in their field and that such reading usually stimulates a professor’s research interests. There are, of course, some faculty members who give up on their scholarship and teaching and cannot be fired because of the tenure rule. They are, however, the exception--but would that some way could be found to send them packing or at least force them into early retirement.

There are also some faculty members who continue to teach well but, for whatever reasons, abandon scholarly inquiry. Most of these people are denied merit increases and limp along on lower pay than other, more productive faculty members. The university might want to consider asking these people to increase their teaching loads and work at raising the quality of their teaching to the highest possible level; in return, they could receive the merit raises they’ve been denied.

Many of my colleagues at the university will take exception to these suggestions, saying that they are already far too burdened by huge classes and a system of governance that consumes considerable amounts of faculty time. They are correct on both counts. Classes at UCLA have swollen to unacceptable proportions, and the burden of administrative work is nightmarish. Additional courses will go far in relieving the overcrowding in undergraduate classes.

The administrative burden is another matter. The real tension for UC faculty is not between research and teaching, but between research and teaching on the one side and seemingly endless meetings about everything from curriculum to recruitment and promotion of faculty on the other. I became a university professor out of an interest in teaching and writing history. In the current world of university governance, I’ve partly become a recruiter and mediator on faculty advancement. And I admit that I struggle to do as little of this as possible. There is a quality of corporate bureaucracy to university life that consumes far more faculty time than it should and diverts people from scholarship and teaching.

I do not make light of the fact that decisions about hiring and promotion and curricula reform need to be made, but I think the university would be better served by reducing the layers of bureaucracy through which these decisions must pass. Before a faculty member can introduce a new course, it has to win approval from several committees, which rarely turn anything down. Similarly, faculty advancement to the upper reaches of the professorship requires an effort that often takes two years and faculty time that could be used for instruction and research. Surely, some way can be found to simplify these procedures. For example, a number of universities have all but eliminated the associate professor rank, making faculty members full professors when they are given tenure. UC, however, still requires an elaborate promotion process for advancement from associate to full professor. Little, if anything, is gained by continuing the distinction. The UCLA Law School has removed it without a loss in national standing. The vital consideration here should be how to get faculty members out of committee meetings and back into the classroom, the library and the lab.

Many UC faculty think of themselves as being on the cutting edge of political thought and as attentive citizens devoted to advancing the well-being of society. The current financial crisis in the state gives them the chance to act on their beliefs. They can volunteer to teach an additional class next year and by so doing help keep the doors of opportunity open to deserving high school graduates who might otherwise be denied admission to the university. It’s called putting your money where your mouth is.