Report critical of UI graduate programs
MOSCOW, Idaho – The University of Idaho’s graduate programs are stuck in the past, resistant to change and lagging behind other schools, according to an independent report commissioned by the school and released this month.
Some faculty leaders were chagrined by the findings, saying the study was “deeply flawed.”
The 435-page draft report by Yardley Research Group, a Pennsylvania-based higher-education consulting firm, criticized some departments for focusing too heavily on undergraduate education, saying they should have bolstered efforts to secure research grants and contracts, publish books and papers, and do other scholarly activities.
It also says many faculty members have been slow to cooperate as the Moscow-based school tried to dig its way out of a financial crisis exacerbated by its ill-fated 2002 attempt to expand programs in Boise.
Faculty is “overly concerned with trivia and do not feel they have an obligation to help with larger issues” because they believe the “fiscal crisis … is the fault of administrators and needs to be fixed by administrators,” the report says.
Dale Graden, a history professor and former president of the faculty union, said he was appalled by the criticism. Many programs are doing fine work, but simply weren’t recognized by Yardley, he said.
“To me, it almost verges on being disgraceful, some of the comments they made about faculty culture,” said Graden. “That’s a joke. That’s a complete farce. The people I know work from morning to night, seven days a week.”
President Tim White said recently he sees a turnaround at the school after revamping enrollment management and public relations department, and bringing in a fresh administration to shake up the institution and infuse it with new energy.
UI Provost Doug Baker, who arrived in 2005, called the report a regular physical at the doctor’s office. The results may be a “little harsh” and would have likely been different had they reflected changes made in the preceding 12 months, he conceded.
Still, Baker said this provides another opportunity for educators and researchers to redouble their efforts at revamping what the report described as an institution in decline.
“I’m proud of our faculty, because the institution is now at a point when it can go through this type of stem-to-stern examination,” Baker said. “You get probed, prodded and poked, and sometimes you find that you need to lose a few pounds and exercise more.”
According to the report, some faculty members have a “mistaken sense of national prominence,” despite being outperformed by peers. It concluded that graduate programs began to suffer after the UI began to emerge from its fiscal crisis of the last few years, in part because research faculty decided to leave for jobs elsewhere.
The report says many departments used the crisis as an excuse for doing little or no research.
“The best response to the financial crisis would have been strategic reduction and elimination and corresponding marshaling of resources to build existing strength,” the Yardley team wrote. “Instead, the university continued to do everything it once did, with the consequence that most of what it is doing is not nationally competitive.”
The report concludes the decline in the quality of graduate programs can be traced, at least in part, to continued squabbling inside the university.
“Obsession with long-standing conflicts among faculty, upper administration, departments, colleges, institutes, and branch campuses is a key factor,” the report said.
In a summary that accompanied the report, Baker said the document wouldn’t be used as a tool to eliminate faculty, but rather as “a catalyst for discussion about and implementation of improvement in key areas.”