UNC fails to award tenure

[howardlander]

The most recently founded school that has been successful that I can think of is Liberty. Say what you will about the Falwells, Jerry Sr. founded it in 1971 and now not only is it a reputable university, they also have a very impressive athletic department.

I'm not sure I'd call Liberty a reputable university. My daughter was considering attending Randolph College, a small liberal arts school that is also in Lynchburg. I was attending a prospective parent event with the University President (I think) and a fair amount of other parents. One of the parents asked something like "This is a small school, what if my child wants to take a class that isn't offered here?". The President answered by saying that Randolph had cooperative agreements with some of the other local colleges and proceeded to discuss the strengths and weakness of each of them. I think he mentioned Sweet Briar, University of Lynchburg and 1 or 2 others that are fairly close. The parent followed up by asking about Liberty: the college President simply answered "No". That tells you what at least one of their local peers thinks about Liberty.

[CameronBornAndBred]

I'm not sure I'd call Liberty a reputable university. My daughter was considering attending Randolph College, a small liberal arts school that is also in Lynchburg. I was attending a prospective parent event with the University President (I think) and a fair amount of other parents. One of the parents asked something like "This is a small school, what if my child wants to take a class that isn't offered here?". The President answered by saying that Randolph had cooperative agreements with some of the other local colleges and proceeded to discuss the strengths and weakness of each of them. I think he mentioned Sweet Briar, University of Lynchburg and 1 or 2 others that are fairly close. The parent followed up by asking about Liberty: the college President simply answered "No". That tells you what at least one of their local peers thinks about Liberty.

I'm not going to debate reputation, but there is an undergraduate enrollment of over 47,000 students that were ok in making their choice. At the very least, and pertinent to the initial discussion, it's very hard not to call that a modern day success story for any school that was founded only 50 years ago.

[Deslok]

I'm not going to debate reputation, but there is an undergraduate enrollment of over 47,000 students that were ok in making their choice. At the very least, and pertinent to the initial discussion, it's very hard not to call that a modern day success story for any school that was founded only 50 years ago.

I'm not going to debate Liberty's status(though will note my wife got her Masters of Teaching from there, as they were early into online education so she could do almost all of it while overseas).

But I'd also just note one other school, Olin College of Engineering makes Liberty look ancient, since it only started graduating students this century. It hasn't made huge waves that I've noted, but among engineering schools it is respectable.

[cato]

Is Roy still recruiting?

Just as hard as he has been the last few years.

[PackMan97]

UNC's rep is that the state government is affecting academic integrity. Today's article in the NYT (now picked up by other news outlets) will not help. Will its academic reputation be just fine? Yeah, probably. It used to be stellar.

Rich of them to be upset now that it's the state government. When it was the athletic department, no one cared.

I'm not sure I'd call Liberty a reputable university.

This is an opinion. I don't call UNC a reputable university, but only fellow State fans and a handful of other hardcore ACC fans agree with me.

[budwom]

I'm not sure I'd call Liberty a reputable university. My daughter was considering attending Randolph College, a small liberal arts school that is also in Lynchburg. I was attending a prospective parent event with the University President (I think) and a fair amount of other parents. One of the parents asked something like "This is a small school, what if my child wants to take a class that isn't offered here?". The President answered by saying that Randolph had cooperative agreements with some of the other local colleges and proceeded to discuss the strengths and weakness of each of them. I think he mentioned Sweet Briar, University of Lynchburg and 1 or 2 others that are fairly close. The parent followed up by asking about Liberty: the college President simply answered "No". That tells you what at least one of their local peers thinks about Liberty.

does Randolph-Macon still exist, or is it now just Randolph?

[duke79]

It's harder than it looks. I can't think of an outstanding institution that was founded in the last 100 years (UCLA was 1919); my other alma mater, Rice University, dates to 1912 (there had to be a murder mystery solved first).

Moreover, Trinity College was a well-respected academic institution before 1924, one of the six founders of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.

Yea, maybe even with $50 billion, it would be very hard to start today (and make a success of it) a full-fledged university, with an undergraduate college and a med school, law school, business school, graduate programs, etc.

But I could see one of those super rich people possibly funding an existing small private college with a campus, faculty, students, etc. with a large donation in return for changing the name of the school to "Gates College" or "Bezos College" or something like that. I'm sure there are many colleges out there that would gladly change their name for a donation of $3 to $5 billion (or maybe much less). Furthermore, for some of those people, that size donation would be chump change (Bill Gates is alleged worth $143 billion and Jeff Bezos is worth even more. Bill will pay much more money than that to Melinda in his pending divorce). Williams College, near where I live, has been ranked the number 1 college by US News and Report for dozens of years and has been in existence since 1793, with a very rich alumni body and they have the largest endowment of any "college" in the country with slightly less than $3 billion. A $5 billion donation to an existing small college could almost certainly vault that school into the top tier of schools within a decade or so, I would guess.

[dudog84]

Liberty's reputation on this board is attributable solely to Seth Curry.

[moonpie23]

I guess she wasn't helping recruiting enough. Maybe she refused to set up some fake classes for athletes? I'm gonna go ask Manalishi on PackPride for the inside story on this one.

go ahead....rip that scab off...

[howardlander]

does Randolph-Macon still exist, or is it now just Randolph?

Yes, they both exist. I'm not sure why the split happened.

[CameronBornAndBred]

Liberty's reputation on this board is attributable solely to Seth Curry.

Unfortunately, unlike Duke, both Liberty football and basketball had post seasons this year.

[Stray Gator]

You had me at "UNC fails . . .."

[CrazyNotCrazie]

Unfortunately, unlike Duke, both Liberty football and basketball had post seasons this year.

Oh freedom
Oh Liberty
Oh Leave me alone
To find my own way home

[howardlander]

I'm not going to debate reputation, but there is an undergraduate enrollment of over 47,000 students that were ok in making their choice. At the very least, and pertinent to the initial discussion, it's very hard not to call that a modern day success story for any school that was founded only 50 years ago.

I agree that they are quite successful. But I have a hard time thinking of any University that teaches creationism as reputable. I do think they are accredited, so that's a point in their favor. I guess it's just a different definition of reputable.

[CameronBornAndBred]

I agree that they are quite successful. But I have a hard time thinking of any University that teaches creationism as reputable. I do think they are accredited, so that's a point in their favor. I guess it's just a different definition of reputable.

Once again, not debating their "reputation". (That will get this thread shut down faster than the original premise of it, which is minorly amazing that it's still in existence on those grounds alone.)

Just noting that above someone said that no university had been founded in modern history by someone incredibly rich.
Liberty fit that bill. Of course it wasn't Falwell solely alone writing a check, and as the financial history that I linked above showed it was in dire straits for a good while, but now the school is worth billions and is on very solid ground.
I don't care how they did it or what they teach. I wouldn't go there or send my non-existent kids there. I'm just saying they did what folks said hadn't happened in close to 100 years.

[YmoBeThere]

Yea, maybe even with $50 billion, it would be very hard to start today (and make a success of it) a full-fledged university, with an undergraduate college and a med school, law school, business school, graduate programs, etc.

But I could see one of those super rich people possibly funding an existing small private college with a campus, faculty, students, etc. with a large donation in return for changing the name of the school to "Gates College" or "Bezos College" or something like that. I'm sure there are many colleges out there that would gladly change their name for a donation of $3 to $5 billion (or maybe much less). Furthermore, for some of those people, that size donation would be chump change (Bill Gates is alleged worth $143 billion and Jeff Bezos is worth even more. Bill will pay much more money than that to Melinda in his pending divorce). Williams College, near where I live, has been ranked the number 1 college by US News and Report for dozens of years and has been in existence since 1793, with a very rich alumni body and they have the largest endowment of any "college" in the country with slightly less than $3 billion. A $5 billion donation to an existing small college could almost certainly vault that school into the top tier of schools within a decade or so, I would guess.

I think Malcolm Gladwell had a few episodes about this sort of thing on his podcast, Revisionist History. His argument was that a university with a $40 billion didn't really need any more money, that to obtain a better return on invested dollars would be to give them to a New Mexico Tech and its $47 million endowment. Maybe not your argument plus too much to the PPB side, but I did find the idea intriguing as I conclude my annual giving to my alma maters.

[howardlander]

Rich of them to be upset now that it's the state government. When it was the athletic department, no one cared.

A lot of people cared. Trust me: I was there.

This is an opinion. I don't call UNC a reputable university, but only fellow State fans and a handful of other hardcore ACC fans agree with me.

Fair enough, but big time athletic departments bring big time corruption at a lot of Universities. Happily, it doesn't seem as prevalent at Duke, but that's the exception. I will never defend what UNC athletics was allowed to get away with: it was shameful and dishonorable in the extreme, but there are 10s of thousands of faculty members and researchers there who had absolutely no involvement, and who make up the actual core of the University. If we can pull back a bit from our focus on sports, to me it's obvious that the Duke/NC State/UNC academic axis is one of the driving forces in taking the RTP area from a pleasant place to live to a nationally known economic region. It ain't all about sports...

[ClemmonsDevil]

I think Malcolm Gladwell had a few episodes about this sort of thing on his podcast, Revisionist History. His argument was that a university with a $40 billion didn't really need any more money, that to obtain a better return on invested dollars would be to give them to a New Mexico Tech and its $47 million endowment. Maybe not your argument plus too much to the PPB side, but I did find the idea intriguing as I conclude my annual giving to my alma maters.

That was the "My Little 100 Million" episode. Great one

[Phredd3]

It is an endowed Professor of the Practice Chair, so I'm not clear on whether that is tenured. There tend to be quite a few professors of the practice in Sanford as they like to have faculty with extensive real-world experience who often do not have PhDs. For instance, I'm not sure what Tony Brown's tenure status is but he has now been there for 25 years after a very successful business career - one of the best professors at Duke.

At Duke, which is very traditionalist in some ways, a Professor of the Practice is never considered tenured, and I cannot think of an example of a tenured position having been awarded to someone who does not hold a PhD or MD. Tenure track is not strictly prohibited for non-terminal degrees, but it's one of those things that just isn't done. In the Department of Medicine, even PhDs are rare due to funding arrangements (PhDs typically need more hard money commitment). In the School of Medicine (which includes much more than just the Department of Medicine), most tenure and tenure-track positions are significantly soft-money funded, which is why, despite all the lovely talk earlier in the thread, the majority of tenure decisions on the medicine side of the aisle are based on grant and/or clinical support. On the University side, most tenured positions are endowed positions, which are funded by donors who have earmarked their contribution in explicit support of that seat. General endowment funds are almost never used on faculty salaries.

Mr. Brown is still at Duke and still holds his PoP position. He's not going anywhere. But he is technically not tenured. In places like journalism and the fine arts, tenure is rarely given unless the individual has done research of some kind and has a solid scholarly publication record in the field (which is rare). But position holders are very rarely fired and for most purposes are treated as if they have tenure.

As I understand it, these boundaries can vary greatly from institution to institution, and recent pressures have been toward disregarding the more traditional academic structures. Duke has so far resisted this tendency, which I think overall has been a good thing.

I'm not terribly familiar with the UNC system in this regard, but the Board of Trustees overruling a tenure recommendation for an established hard-money position is extremely rare. So rare as to easily lend itself to suspicions of a political motive. It is much more common for a university's tenure committee to overrule a school decision than for trustees to overrule the committee. However, I have no actual knowledge of the UNC situation, so I reiterate that I have nothing of real substance to add to that part of the commentary.

[mph]

I'm not sure I'd call Liberty a reputable university. My daughter was considering attending Randolph College, a small liberal arts school that is also in Lynchburg. I was attending a prospective parent event with the University President (I think) and a fair amount of other parents. One of the parents asked something like "This is a small school, what if my child wants to take a class that isn't offered here?". The President answered by saying that Randolph had cooperative agreements with some of the other local colleges and proceeded to discuss the strengths and weakness of each of them. I think he mentioned Sweet Briar, University of Lynchburg and 1 or 2 others that are fairly close. The parent followed up by asking about Liberty: the college President simply answered "No". That tells you what at least one of their local peers thinks about Liberty.

You’re reading a lot into a one word answer from the Randolph President. I’m a resident of Lynchburg and work at Liberty. There are many factors which influence cooperation between our local colleges and I’d be very surprised if Liberty’s academic reputation is anywhere near the top of the list. At or near the top of the list was the former university President who embarrassed the school and, for the most part, made cooperation with our neighboring institutions very difficult.