Dig.ni.fy Winter Issue - January 2024 | Page 132

professors from their positions. Oftentimes, institutions which find themselves stuck with underperforming tenured faculty usually end up

hoping for a graceful exit rather than undertaking the costly exercise of looking for reasons to terminate.

•Budgetary constraints: Typically, researchers with academic tenure receive salaries at the top end of the institutional salary range. And wage costs for tenured researchers tend to remain inflexible even during changing economic conditions. Critics say that having to pay

high-end salaries to tenured staff is unfair as it restricts institutions from hiring younger, more talented people who may perhaps be paid at the lower end of the pay scale.

•Pressure to publish: Academic tenure is oftentied to research productivity, which can create immense pressure for professors to publish as much research as possible and in reputed global journals. The constant pressure to prove themselves often pushes professors to join the race to “publish or perish;” this focus on quantity over quality can have a negative impact on the field of study.

•Resistance to change: While an advantage for those with academic tenure is being able to influence and shape the direction of their departments, the flip side is also true. Some tenured professors may resist change and innovation, as they may be invested in the status quo. This can create unnecessary barriers to new research ideas and ways of thinking.32

Tenure might well have made sense when it was first introduced in the 1900s and then in the 1940s and 1950s with McCarthyism and then in the 1960s with civil rights and the

Vietnam War, as academics were often challenged for their teachings and/or belief

systems. There is even an argument that tenure was critically important in holding the line against the role corporations placed in the

1970s and 1980s and beyond when trying to influence research projects through grant funding. But today is a different time.

First, free speech and diversity of thought is clearly embedded in American society – so much so that protest is part and parcel of everyday life throughout the nation. If there is to be a concern over ideological influences, it comes not through academia – as diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives evidence – but

through political party infighting. Claims on the right of undo Marxist influences in higher education are quickly dismissed for their rhetoric and claims of the left against state initiatives (such as De Santis’ takeover of the liberal New College in Florida)33 are quickly addressed by faculty resignations. Each confirms alternative pathways to justice exist, without the need for tenure protections. As does the fact that there are significantly more institutions from which students may select, given there were 5,196 postsecondary institutions in the United States in 2021 from which students could choose.34

Second, there is no scarcity of highly qualified academicians. “Between 2010–11 and 2020–21, the total number of master’s degrees conferred increased by 19 percent, from 730,900 to

866,900 degrees. During this time, the number

of doctoral degrees increased 18 percent, from 163,800 to 194,100 degrees.”35 There is, in short, a highly competitive pool of individuals who

The question thus becomes: will ending legacy

preferences eliminate discrimination and promote more equitable admissions to elite schools? The answer is no.

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