By Chris Fauske
Interim Dean, School of Arts and Sciences
Chris Fauske, Interim Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences
There is much to think about at Salem State these days as we settle in to working with our new provost, Kristin Esterberg, begin looking forward to the highlight of the academic year (our annual commencement exercises), and do our best to further the cause of learning and education—not necessarily the same thing—in the face of stringent fiscal constraints.
But I have found time to think of other things in the midst of all the above. I’ve been thinking of a TV show I used to watch as often as I could (this was back before TiVo, DVRs, Hulu.com, and the many other technologies that are now slowly closing in on delivering the long-promised convergence of content delivery). News Radio, before the death of the great Phil Hartman, was compelling and a fine example of ensemble acting. It is of the episode entitled “Adequate” I have been thinking lately. You may recall the plot; if not, the clip linked to here sets up the running gag that takes the episode through its allotted time. The joke is not that Phil Hartman’s character thinks that ‘adequate’ is high praise. It is that he is refusing to let on that he feels the sting, and in trying to maintain his poise the dialogue becomes increasingly strained.
I started thinking of this episode recently as I participated in various gatherings where people indicated that Salem State College is doing a fine job because it is adequate, as demonstrated by the fact that we are right in the middle of the pack on almost any measure when it comes to our fellow state colleges or other peer institutions.
The constraints we operate under are not unique. We are not a wealthy institution. Our faculty are underpaid. Our students are stretched thin. This, though, is true of any number of institutions, of any number of faculty, of any number of students. In many ways we are typical of U. S. higher education institutions.
If you are in the middle of the pack, there are, by definition, members of the pack ahead of you. And here I am referring to those institutions that have demographic data almost identical to ours in terms of student preparedness for college, student commitments off campus, faculty numbers, faculty salaries relative to the cost of living, full-time to adjunct faulty ratios, class sizes, etc. How did those ahead of us get there? What can we learn from them?
The morning of the day I wrote this, I was speaking with a candidate for a faculty position and she told me one of the reasons she wanted to work at Salem State was the opportunity to help underprivileged students.
We certainly have some of them here, I told her. But not that many. Our students are representative of the vast majority of American college students, neither particularly privileged nor underprivileged. [When you consider that 70 percent of American high school students will never earn a bachelor's degree, perhaps we should even consider our students just a little ahead of the curve.]
“Well, they are not like Harvard students,” she said.
“No. They are not.” I agreed.
But Harvard students are not the benchmark by which to judge privilege, surely? If they are, then something more than 99 per cent of the population is underprivileged, hardly a meaningful statistic. Of course, Harvard students stand on one extreme of the scale. At the other extreme are students at the heroic tribal colleges, who do so much with so very, very little. In between, there are a host of colleges and universities. Salem State, I would suggest, is far closer to the mid-point of that scale. (I will leave it to statisticians and demographers to determine just where to locate the “mid-point” of such a hypothetical line and where to position Salem State on that line.) As well as our sister state colleges, there are other institutions worthy of examination. Sonoma State is one such institution, Grand Valley State another, just to select two, each from a state with budget woes that must make Massachusetts the envy of their governors and regents. There are plenty more. These are institutions that we can look to for ideas, to identify opportunities, and to allow us to question what it is we do and how it is we do it.
And I have a goal, something that I’d love to see us as a school challenge the college to achieve: to win the TIAA-CREF Theodore M. Hesburgh Award. And why not? When faced with challenges, and we certainly are, how much better to ask what we can do rather than to lament what we cannot.
It is absolutely true that what we do we do well enough.
That’s our challenge: Let’s not settle for adequacivity, as Phil Hartman’s characters says as he walks forth to continue his adequate ways.
This article is part of ASpect’s February 2009 issue, The Cutting Edge in Research and Teaching.
6 responses so far ↓
1 Jim Gubbins // Feb 26, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Here’s a secret. I never did a true national search for a tenure-track position because my wife said, “There are so many ugly places to live in the country, and I don’t want to be stuck in one of them.” Plus as a liberal, female minister, there weren’t lots of places in the country where she could work. I was left with a clear shot at New England and the Northwest from San Francisco up to the Canadian border. Luckily, I found a position here, but from the time of our discussion 15 years ago or so, as we’ve driven across the country on various vacations, I’ve noticed all the colleges and universities that just don’t compare to Salem State in terms of their location, history, social and econominc environment, interesting and diverse students, accomplished faculty, effective administrators, and so much more. My wife was right–why settle for less? By various measures, yes, we’re in the middle, and yet, so many students, faculty, and others in the SSC community have planted themselves, heart and soul, into this place. There are great things quietly happening all over the campus, and still, I think we are ready to take off. Hard times require hard decisions about what we value and who we are; and once we’ve made our choices clear, those choices can become rallying points for building up what’s already good, starting new endeavors for which we’re at the threshold, and letting the past go, letting what doesn’t work well go. We’re ready to become the academic beacon of the North Shore, and that’s saying alot.
2 Chris Fauske // Feb 27, 2009 at 11:35 am
We are ready to become the academic beacon of the North Shore, absolutely. But why settle for that? Why not aim to be a beacon for a far broader and disparate audience?
3 Dan Albert // Feb 27, 2009 at 2:12 pm
I am of two minds here: on the one hand, a man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for. I worry that some might let things slide with the feeling that, “It’s only Salem State” (a version of “close enough for government work).
On the other hand, I’m not convinced that given the storms in higher education generally and the changes afoot at SSC, we have an accurate measure of what excellence would look like. The biggest question I have is whether there is a trade off between excellence and inclusion.
4 Jim Gubbins // Feb 27, 2009 at 7:57 pm
Responding to Chris and Dan, I can say two things. First, about 70% of students in higher education are in public higher ed. If we can get public higher ed. just right on this campus, we provide a model for a huge swath of institutions in higher ed. A second and related point, if we can carefully match the education we offer with the students that we accept, then we can be assured of performing the excellence that counts, excellence in teaching. So it does not matter whether the bulk of our students’ SAT scores (to pick one kind of measure) are 50 points higher or lower. What matters is providing the best kind of education possible for who our students happen to be. Furthermore, as a public institution whose mission is in large part to spread education broadly among the populace and to build up the next generation of citizens, I would hope that we’d want to include those future citizens who don’t have a shot at more elite, more distant, and more expensive 4-year college educations. It’s my firm conviction that each person is of equal worth–that is, of near infinite worth. So there is no difference in privilege whether we’re teaching at Salem State, a high school, or an elite university. However, the special privilege we have at Salem State when we take on a student who shows promise for completing a 4-year degree and yet who is less prepared due to language, poor prior schooling, etc. is that we have to opportunity make an enormous impact for the good in that student’s life in terms of lifelong income, job opportunities, health, and all the other positive indicates associated with completing a 4-year degree. I want us to be a better Salem State, the Salem State that I know we can be. I don’t want us to become another school, a much more competitive school serving only a set of students who are highly prepared and highly motivated for college, and who will do just fine no matter where they end up.
5 Hope Benne // Feb 28, 2009 at 10:27 am
Salem State College is to the modern day North Shore what a monestary or convent was to Christians of the Middle Ages; a source of enormous regional pride and a place of intellectual and spiritual growth. When we publicize our events such as the Darwin Festival, Earth Day, theater productions, concerts, and celebrations for peace, and invite everyone to attend, we provide, not only SSC faculty and students, but people from all across the North Shore a chance for personal and intellectual growth. Our goal should be to maintain the many meaningful and substantive programs we already have in place. But, if Chris wants us to, let’s apply for the Theordore M. Hesburgh award so we can prove to the world we have “programs that enhance undergraduate teaching and learning.” And when we win that award, we’ll know for sure we’re winners and not just settling for adequacivity.
6 Timothy Eddy // Feb 28, 2009 at 11:32 pm
“And when we win that award, we’ll know for sure we’re winners and not just settling for adequacivity.”
We don’t have to wait ’till we win that award…. Through thoughtful reflection, and careful discussions with our fellow faculty, we already know that we’re not settling.
Leave a Comment