THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 14, 1994 TAG: 9408140042
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Long : 151 lines
Old Dominion University - through a heavy recruitment blitz, pointed reminders to chairmen and generous offers to doctoral students - has virtually doubled its share of black faculty members in the past five years.
ODU now has the largest proportion of black faculty among Virginia's state-supported four-year schools, excluding historically black colleges. Blacks make up 6.4 percent of Old Dominion's full-time faculty, state records show. Last year alone, ODU added nine black faculty members to bring its total to 41.
It is an unusual record of success in higher education. The challenge of recruiting black professors has vexed far wealthier and more prestigious colleges, such as Duke University and the College of William and Mary, which are below the 3 percent mark. The national average at predominantly white schools is about 2.5 percent, the American Council on Education says.
But the budget squeeze probably will force ODU to lose ground this fall and make it tough to stay even, let alone to add black faculty, in the future.
As of last week, Old Dominion planned to hire seven black faculty members, but eight others will be leaving, for a net loss of one, said Ruth C. Jones, the university's equal opportunity director.
ODU says the losses of the two heaviest hitters were impossible to avoid: Ulysses V. Spiva, a former education dean and current Virginia Beach School Board member, retired. And Charles E. Jones, director of ODU's Institute for the Study of Minority Issues, left to take what he calls a ``golden opportunity'' as chairman of a new African-American studies department at Georgia State University in Atlanta.
But at least three of the others - all in the College of Business and Public Administration - are gone because their jobs were cut, Jones said. Colleagues say another faculty member, Paul G. Simmonds, also in business, went to Florida State University because he was dissatisfied with the budget pinch on the doctoral program in business. Simmonds could not be reached for comment.
ODU will face more obstacles to keeping black faculty in the 1995-96 school year, when officials are predicting a cut in state aid as large as $5 million. More openings will be filled using less costly one-year appointments, which don't usually lead to tenure. Even worse is the threat of layoffs.
``I'm the most recent person hired,'' said John T. Leftwich Jr., 47, a former geologist in the oil industry who joined ODU as a geology assistant professor last fall. ``If any cuts come in my department,
I'm probably the one who's going to get cut. That concerns me more than anything else.''
But David R. Hager, an associate vice president, said the university won't adhere to a ``last-hired, first-fired mentality'' and won't cut black faculty disproportionately.
``We will continue to make progress in the areas where we have opportunities to hire,'' said Ruth Jones, the affirmative action director. ``The additional challenge will be the retention of those we've already hired.
Nathan Harris, an ODU senior from Richmond and former president of the Black Student Alliance, says it's vital to get more blacks in front of the classroom. About 13 percent of the students at ODU are black.
``You grow up in a black community and when you come to a predominantly white school, there might be only two or three blacks in the class,'' he said. ``You might feel uncomfortable speaking to a white student or a white professor. But with a black professor, there's somebody you can talk to about your problems because you can relate to him better.''
The Southern Regional Education Board thinks it's important, too. The group recently launched a $42 million campaign to get more minorities into graduate school. The number of blacks getting doctorates - a virtual prerequisite for getting tenure at a four-year school - has dropped 9 percent in the country in the last decade. That, colleges say, makes hiring black faculty members a daunting task.
``It's so difficult to recruit them because there is a very small pool, and they're very marketable, not only in higher education, but in business and industry,'' Hager said. Case in point: ODU was trying to lure a black woman just out of grad school for a teaching job in accounting. ``We laid $60,000 on the table, and she went for 70 to 75 (thousand) to Texas A&M,'' Hager said.
But ODU developed a multipronged strategy to fight the odds:
Campus visits. Administrators visited more than two dozen colleges across the country - from New York University to Indiana University - in spring 1993. They sought out black doctoral students and talked on the sly to black professors, too. But the recruiting campaigns have been stopped, a victim of the budget cuts.
Graduate fellowships. Shortly after he arrived in 1990, President James V. Koch started what he called the ``grow-your-own'' program. ODU promises to pay for three years of graduate school for a black doctoral candidate anywhere in the country. In return, the student promises to teach at ODU for three years.
``I can make appointments and talk about vacancies all day long and get a lukewarm reception,'' Ruth Jones said. ``But this always generates enthusiasm. All the other (scholarship) programs will provide you assistance to get your degree. None of them assures appointment.''
ODU gets its first graduate this month - Steve Gaither, an assistant professor of education. Hager hopes to eventually get three new faculty members a year. Though it costs the university up to $200,000 a year, Hager said it won't be cut: ``It's safe because it's a high priority with the president.''
Perks. In addition to offering competitive salaries, ODU has sometimes promised other bonuses - an attractive piece of equipment or a reduction in teaching load for one semester. Leftwich, for instance, was allowed to drop his teaching load from two classes to one in his first semester, and he got a $5,000 Macintosh computer for his research. But Jones said the university can no longer afford the teaching-load promises.
Prods. ODU has steered clear of Duke University's failed attempts to require increases in all departments. ``I think a blanket mandate doesn't work well,'' Hager said. ``You say that to mechanical engineering or oceanography, you have a hell of a problem on your hands,'' because black candidates are so few. But Hager said he has virtually ordered chairmen of the English and nursing departments to fill a spot with a minority.
And in all faculty searches, he is a lurking presence: ``I'm there to deliver a very clear message. The main verse is there should be an African-American candidate in the pool or we will want to know the reason why not.''
At the University of Virginia, where 3.1 percent of the faculty is black, students and a former board member have questioned the pace of minority hiring.
But equal opportunity director Lincoln V. Lewis said U.Va. wouldn't adopt some facets of the ODU approach.
The graduate fellowships, he said, would limit both the students' and the university's freedom. And when schools require even a few chairmen to fill slots with minorities, ``you get into the notion of quotas, as opposed to goals. No, I don't believe that should be done.''
Instead, U.Va. in 1986 created 10 ``faculty lines'' to encourage the hiring of blacks and women. Here's how they work: If a chairwoman sees an outstanding candidate but does not have a slot, the university will give her money to hire the professor. But within three years, she has to find an opening for the professor to fill.
Fourteen blacks have been hired under this system.
William and Mary approved a more aggressive affirmative action plan in May, promising to hunt harder for minorities while they're in graduate school and to hold campus forums on diversity to ensure that black professors won't leave.
Norfolk State University, where nearly two-thirds of the full-time faculty is black, has never had problems attracting blacks in any discipline, Vice President Jesse Lewis said.
``There are a number who want to work at a black institution,'' Lewis said. ``Our problem is when they get here, many are sought after by larger white schools. Sometimes we have difficulty keeping them.''
Leftwich, the geology assistant professor, points to ODU as an example that white universities, too, can attract black professors if they try: ``They not only want to increase minority faculty, but they're doing something about it. I think they've made a genuine effort to raise the numbers. If a school really wants to, they can find the people.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
JOSEPH JOHN KOTLOWSKI/Staff
Geology assistant professor John T. Leftwich Jr., one of the black
faculty members attracted by ODU's recruitment strategy, works in
his office.
by CNB