What you can do for your faculty

My fellow students, spare a thought for your professors.

Attending UNC, it’s easy to assume that great, motivated instructors will always be around.

After all, we love this school; why wouldn’t they want to teach here?

But it’s a tough time for faculty motivation right now.

State budget cuts have meant a general pay freeze since early 2009. At the same time, there has been attrition among some of the best faculty.

With limited funding for counter-offers, UNC is hard-pressed to compete as some faculty are offered more lucrative opportunities elsewhere.

The numbers tell the story: Retention success slumped to 41 percent last year, down from roughly 65 percent between fiscal years 2002-03 and 2007-08. UNC ultimately lost 78 faculty to other offers last year, more than double the total in 2007-08.

So when faculty chairwoman Jan Boxill tells me morale is down, it’s hardly a surprise.

But is there anything that we students can do about it?

Some people seem to think so.

Student Body Vice President Zealan Hoover has formed a student task force on faculty retention, welcoming support from key representative student groups on campus.

On the face of it, the idea of student efforts keeping faculty at the University seemed a little pie in the sky. It’s rather like little Johnny hoping Mommy and Daddy won’t get divorced, if only he asks nicely enough and does his chores on time.

But that doesn’t mean faculty are laughing. Boxill thinks the effort has potential, particularly if there’s a focus on ways to increase student/faculty interaction.

She says attendance at office hours is a start. And broader student participation in research work, both with individual professors and through research centers, has an impact on faculty relationships with the University.

“If you get students you want to work with, then you don’t want to leave them,” Boxill noted.

“And then (staying at UNC) becomes a loyalty issue.”

Student interest in research centers certainly can’t hurt either. Many have experienced drastic cuts as state spending has contracted, and students could make a real difference.

Other initial ideas also focus on increasing faculty/student connections, as well as integrating interested faculty into campus life.

Hoover and the students involved are planning focus groups with faculty members, with support from Boxill and others.

And whatever the result, hopefully their efforts alone demonstrate students care about the climate for faculty here.

After all, it can’t be easy succeeding as a professor ­— with or without tenure — even in the best of times.

Between the teaching, research and service, faculty have to build their own worlds here, with nothing like the support structures we enjoy as students.

It’s hardly too much effort on our part to do what we can.

So, my fellow students, ask not what your faculty can do for you — ask what you can do for your faculty. (With apologies to JFK.)