| AAU PUBLIC AFFAIRS
REPORT
November 1, 2001
Issues Update: Still at it: The end of October has come and gone and Congress remains in session. Congressional leaders are now aiming to wrap everything up and adjourn by Thanksgiving, but hitting that target seems less and less likely with each passing day. Most appropriations still remain unfinished and there is still no consensus on economic stimulus legislation and a variety of other must-pass items. In any case, whenever Congress does adjourn it does not plan to do so in the usual manner. Instead, it will adjourn "subject to the call of the chair," which means that it could reconvene at any time to take up any business which is judged vital, such as providing additional emergency appropriations for military and security purposes. Where things stand: As this is being written, the House has passed its versions of all of the 13 FY2002 appropriations bills except its Defense bill. The Senate, as usual, is further behind and has 3 bills left to pass (Labor/HHS, which is on the floor now; District of Columbia, which is awaiting floor action; and Defense, which the Senate hasn't drafted yet). Among the 10 bills that have passed both chambers, compromise versions of 2 have been worked out by House-Senate conference committees, passed by both chambers, and sent to the President (Interior and Military Construction), and compromise versions of 3 more are still awaiting final floor action in both chambers (Energy and Water, Legislative Branch, and Treasury/Postal). Compromises are still pending on the other 5 bills that have passed both houses (Agriculture, Commerce/Justice/State, Foreign Operations, Transportation, and VA/HUD). As usual, unappropriated programs are being kept running through so-called continuing resolutions. Here's how appropriations are shaping up so far for programs of greatest interest to the AAU:
The White House signaled last night it will seek a reordering of federal budget priorities, with programs not related to fighting terrorism or enhancing security under scrutiny for reductions or elimination. All this talk notwithstanding, it should be remembered that next year will be a congressional election year in which the control of the House and Senate will once again be up for grabs. And that being the case, members of Congress from both parties will have a hard time making deep cuts in popular domestic programs, no matter what the Administration proposes. In any case, it appears that the outline of next year's budget battles is already taking shape. See Attachment 4 for the full text of the Washington Post article quoted above. It's not over 'til its over (I): The last issue of this newsletter noted that Congress was developing a package of anti-terrorism legislation that could have implications for universities in such areas as student-record privacy and access to hazardous biological agents for research. A final version of that legislation has now been passed and signed by the President. See Attachment 5 for an AAU summary of the bill. In the end, the potential concerns the university community had about various aspects of the legislation were pretty much settled in the final version. However, this legislation is not the end of this matter as far as the matter of hazardous biological agents is concerned. On October 28, two days after the President signed the anti-terrorism bill, the Washington Post published a front-page article about lax federal oversight of biological agents and toxins used in research (Attachment 6). The article emphasized that "these lax controls make the nation's universities, health agencies and laboratories easy targets for would-be biological terrorists." It also emphasized that "a 1999 bill that would have closed many of these gaps . . . . died amid strong opposition from universities."1 Although the anti-terrorism bill that has been enacted had some provisions dealing with access to biological agents and toxins, it did not address the full range of security concerns cited in the Post article. Security at university laboratories that handle hazardous biological agents is currently governed by Centers for Disease Control guidelines that can be found online at www.cdc.gov/od/ohs/biosfty/bmbl4/bmbl4toc.htm. As this is being written, various legislative proposals are being developed in the Senate in the wake of the Post article to tighten lab security. In addition, it has been reported that all research institutions that handle hazardous biological agents and toxins are being contacted by the FBI and asked for information, and that the FBI has been using subpoenas to obtain information from universities and others in some cases (Attachment 7). Needless to say, it would be a mistake for universities to take lab security issues lightly in this climate. It's not over 'til its over (II) The last issue of this newsletter noted that Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) was preparing legislation that would impose a six-month moratorium on international student visas to give time to institute a series of reforms in the student visa program. Feinstein has since dropped her proposal for a moratorium and there seems to be little support in Congress for such a move. However, the broader issue of student-visa reform is moving forward rapidly. The President has called for reform in this area, Feinstein has introduced a revised bill, and Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) has introduced a bill of his own. Some in the higher education community have been having trouble with finding the right things to say about this issue. See Attachment 8 for recent congressional testimony by American Council on Education President David Ward that seems to accomplish that. Still pending: The last issue of this newsletter noted that the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee had rescheduled to October 16 a previously postponed hearing on the related issues of protecting human subjects in research and dealing with financial conflicts of interest in research. That hearing has now been postponed again to some uncertain date in the future. Given the lateness of the year, it may well be that the hearing will now be pushed over into next year. Update: The last issue of this newsletter noted that the AAU was preparing to release a report that would make specific recommendations for strengthening universities' oversight of financial conflicts of interest in research. That report was released October 9. The report deals with both individual and institutional conflicts of interest and breaks new ground in various ways. See Attachment 9 for the press release. The full document is available on the AAU website at www.aau.edu/research/COI.01.pdf. The report did not get any coverage in the major media since the major-media correspondents who normally cover such things were preoccupied with bioterrorism issues. But the report was cited in various trade publications (Attachment 10). It was also cited as "an important contribution" by the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), a watchdog group that has been critical of previous university conflict-of-interest efforts (Attachment 11). However, CSPI also warned that "time will tell whether the AAU's sensible report triggers improvements or simply gathers dust on deans' bookshelves." The AAU does plan to monitor institutional followup to the report. It's not over 'til its over (IV): The last issue of this newsletter reported that a motion had been filed asking the Maryland Court of Appeals to reconsider a portion of a ruling it had issued in August in a case involving two lawsuits against the Kennedy Krieger Institute, a research facility affiliated with Johns Hopkins University. Specifically, the motion had asked the court to reconsider its finding that it is illegal in Maryland for parents or guardians to give consent for children or legally impaired adults to participate in nontherapeutic research that poses any level of risk. The motion, which was filed by the institute and supported by the AAU and others, contended that this finding would bar most research involving children and legally impaired adults in Maryland. On October 11, the court denied the motion to reconsider that finding. However, as it did so, the court, in effect, said it hadn't really said what everyone thought it had said in August. In August, the court had held that "in Maryland, a parent, appropriate relative, or other applicable surrogate cannot consent to the participation of a child or other person under legal disability in nontherapeutic research or other studies in which there is any risk of injury or damage to the health of the subject." But on October 11, the court said: "In the [August] Opinion, we said at one point that a parent 'cannot consent to the participation of a child . . . in nontherapeutic research or studies in which there is any risk of injury or damage to the health of the subject.' As we think is clear from Section VI of the Opinion, by 'any risk' we meant any articulable risk beyond the minimal kind of risk that is inherent in any endeavor." In effect, the court's October 11 statement brought the court's position into conformity with current federal regulations, which allow pediatric research that presents "no greater than minimal risk to children." Johns Hopkins officials said the October 11 statement "will permit our researchers to continue to conduct their studies in accordance with the terms laid out in the federal regulations." But members of the Maryland state legislature are not so satisfied. In an October 23 hearing on the matter, several lawmakers indicated they were still upset at the court's excursion into this area. They indicated they may seek to enact legal protections for researchers who conduct research on humans as long as that research follows federal guidelines. See Attachment 12 for the court's October 11 statement, and Attachment 13 for a Washington Post story on the October 23 hearing. Trendlines: As ye sow . . .: The efforts to launch a peace movement to protest the U.S. response to the September 11 terrorist attacks do not seem to have gained any real traction among students so far. But it does appear that September 11 and its aftermath are reviving another campus-related phenomenon of the past: the so-called culture wars among faculty. Evidence of this is not hard to find. At the local level, faculty activists who are critical of U.S. policies and actions before and after September 11 have come under sharp attack on some campuses and in surrounding communities. Nationally, conservative commentators have used these activists' statements as an occasion to step up their criticisms of universities generally and of humanities and social-science faculties in particular. And even mainstream media have entered the fray: Newsweek magazine recently published a "My Turn" column by a Harvard-educated Marine Corps officer who decried the "antimilitary elitism" at the nation's top universities, and the more-or-less liberal New Republic magazine has launched an "Idiocy Watch" that regularly ridicules September 11-related comments the magazine considers especially outlandish--many of which have come from academics. Against this background, faculty activists are now expressing concerns that free speech is under assault, and that academic freedom is threatened. But those concerns may not get a very sympathetic hearing in the outside world. Rightly or wrongly, a lot people out there have heard a lot of stories over the years about certain kinds of speakers being shouted down--or simply denied a forum--on campuses, and about campuses enforcing rigid speech codes and denying access to military recruiters. (Indeed, the faculty's concerns may not be getting a very sympathetic hearing among students, either. A new nationwide survey by Harvard University's Institute of Politics indicates that nearly four out of five U.S. college students support U.S. airstrikes in Afghanistan, and more than two thirds support the use of ground troops there.) See Attachment 14 for a collection of clippings that illustrate and discuss these matters. See Attachment 15 for a Washington Post story on the Harvard survey. Hard times (I): Budget conditions continue to deteriorate in various states, threatening state appropriations for higher education. Currently, special legislative sessions to deal with revenue shortfalls are underway or being contemplated in at least eight states. And analysts say this trend is likely to spread. See Attachment 16 for several recent articles that provide details on the situation. Hard times (II): The endowments of U.S. colleges and universities have also been feeling the effects of the nation's economic downturn. Even before September 11, the majority of institutions responding to two limited surveys reported flat or negative endowment returns for the FY2001 academic fiscal year, which ended July 1. Based on the results of those surveys, the Chronicle of Higher Education October 19 said the average rate of return for all college and university endowments will almost certainly be in "negative territory" for 2001 for the first time since 1984. The Chronicle commented: "It is too soon to say whether 2001 ended a golden era of outsized fund raising and investment success by higher-education institutions, or if the current period is simply a lull. A lot may depend on whether the already weakened economy is driven into a full-scale recession in the wake of the September 11 attacks." See Attachment 17 for the Chronicle's report. Same old story (I): The College Board October 23 released the results of its latest annual survey of tuition increases at U.S. colleges and universities. The survey indicated that tuitions and fees increased this fall by an average of 5.5 percent at private four-year institutions and 7.7 percent at public four-year institutions. At the same time, the College Board said, the amount of student aid granted from all sources increased by 7.1 percent. The rate of inflation for the last 12 months has been less than 3 percent. Coverage of the College Board's report was muted by the media's current preoccupation with national security issues. But the Associated Press moved a story that began with a statement that "the long-standing trend of college costs outpacing inflation worsened this year" (Attachment 18). And the Washington Post, which has paid almost no attention to non-security related matters since September 11, managed to clear space on Page A2 of its October 24 editions for a quite lengthy story of its own (Attachment 19). See Attachment 20 for the College Board's news release. Full details are available on the organization's website at http://www.collegeboard.com/. Same old story (II): See Attachment 21 for an October 10 New York Times editorial sparked by the announcement that University of Michigan president Lee Bollinger had been hired to succeed George Rupp as president of Columbia University. The editorial begins by hailing the move as a "coup" for Columbia, calling Bollinger a "moral role model" and a "distinguished educator." But it then notes that "Columbia has declined to reveal what it is paying Mr. Bollinger," and observes that "the speculation over his salary is another sign of the bidding war under way for top-level university presidents." The editorial goes on to say the following about this bidding war:
The job of university president is increasingly about attracting money, and schools feel that high salaries are necessary to bring in first-rate people who can lead the academic community, run a large bureaucracy and raise the tens of millions of dollars in private donations that are necessary for the schools to thrive. Other hard-to-get university stars, like sports coaches and medical school faculty members, also attract extremely high salaries. Academics who can compete on that rarefied level have also begun to arm themselves with headhunters and lawyers, like professional athletes shopping for new contracts. Same old story (III): As this is being written, a coalition of labor organizations and other groups is in the midst of staging "Campus Equity Week," which consists of rallies and demonstrations on campuses and at state capitols to protest conditions for part-time faculty. The events are scheduled from October 28 to November 3. To give impetus to this series of events, the American Federation of Teachers has released a report entitled "Marching Toward Equity." AFT says the report documents the exploitation and overuse of part-time and non-tenured faculty. The report says that nearly half--43 percent--of all the nation's faculty are now classified as part-time, even though these faculty work an average of 36.9 hours a week. It emphasizes that these faculty "earn a fraction of what full-timers earn for teaching the same or comparable courses," and its says 80 percent of them work without employer-funded healthcare coverage or a subsidized retirement plan. See Attachment 22 for AFT's press release on these matters. The full text of the "Marching Toward Equity" report can be found on the AFT website at www.aft.org/higher_ed/downloadable/Marching_Equity.pdf. Not the same old story?: The National Association of Graduate-Professional Students (NAGPS) last month released the results of an online survey of current graduate students and recent Ph.D.s. Survey respondents were asked about their satisfaction with their doctoral program, and to grade their program's implementation of reforms recommended by the AAU, the National Academy of Sciences, and others. About 32,000 individuals from 5,000 doctoral programs at 400 institutions participated. Although the participants were self-selected, NAGPS says the survey results deserve attention because of the large number of respondents and because the respondents' demographic characteristics mirror those of the overall graduate student population. In addition, NAGPS says the survey results generally track the results of other, smaller surveys. Interestingly in light of the media attention paid to graduate student unrest, the survey found a high level of overall satisfaction with doctoral programs. Eighty-one percent of the respondents said they were generally satisfied with their program, 86 percent said they were satisfied with their advisors, and 80 percent said they would recommend their programs to prospective students. The survey also suggests that recommended reforms are being implemented, at least to some degree. The survey report states: "There is reason to be encouraged about the future. Those who have not yet received their degree report a higher satisfaction with nearly all of the best practices than students who received their degree in or before the year 2000." But the survey also found widespread concerns about some of the specific issues that have been raised by the AAU and others. Specific findings about such matters included the following:
As might be expected, levels of satisfaction and concern varied widely among students in different disciplines. For example, engineering students were far more satisfied with guidance and placement services for nonacademic careers than students in the humanities. The survey was conducted during the spring and summer of 2000 and funded by a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. See Attachment 23 for a press release and an executive summary. Full survey results--including satisfaction ratings for specific programs at specific universities--are available on the NAGPS website at http://survey.nagps.org/index.php. Info Tech Update: Great expectations: eCornell, Cornell University's for-profit, online education venture, this month is launching a program of noncredit courses that will lead to a professional certificate in human resources management from the university's School of Industrial and Labor Relations. This is the first in a planned series of noncredit professional-certification programs that the university hopes will enroll as many as 5,000 students by next June. Only about 100 students are currently enrolled in eCornell courses. See Attachment 24 for the Chronicle of Higher Education story, which notes that some Cornell faculty are still not happy about the venture. One step at a time: Virginia's State Council of Higher Education has decided to back the creation of a degree-granting distance-learning institution. The proposed institution, Virginia Virtual University, would not offer any courses of its own; instead, students would earn degrees by taking online courses offered by any of the traditional universities in the state. The state legislature still has to sign off on the idea. See Attachment 25 for the Chronicle of Higher Education's account of the proposal, which quotes one key legislator as voicing a common concern about ventures of this kind:
If this is a smoke-and-mirrors way to deal with the increased enrollment projections on the cheap, I don't think the legislature will be interested. If it's a way to provide further educational opportunities, then we'll be more likely to support it. AAU Notes: Thinking big: The University of Maryland has launched a $650,000 advertising campaign that includes a perhaps unprecedented TV buy that will account for about half the campaign's cost. The TV buy involves 60-second spots that will be run for two weeks in the Baltimore and Washington, D.C., markets during NFL and World Series games and top-rated network programs. The campaign also includes print advertising in area publications, street banners, and Web advertising. The goal, university officials say, is to increase awareness among opinion leaders, alumni, and the public of the university's emergence as leading research institution. The campaign is being financed by private gifts to the university's foundation. The university's ads are quite striking, and informal conversations with people in the capital area suggest they are having a major impact. See Attachment 26 for a Washington Post story about the campaign. See Attachment 27 for an example of a print ad, from the November 1 editions of the Post (the original of this ad was published in full color in a full-page format). Thinking incrementally: Ohio State University's College of Mathematical and Physical Sciences has developed a calendar that has been distributed to every high school and 4-H extension office in the state. The calendar marks significant scientific achievements and events across the ages. Not coincidentally, it also highlights OSU science and mathematics programs of particular interest to prospective students, such as undergraduate research opportunities and a summer mathematics program for talented high schoolers. University officials have sent copies of the calendar to the state's congressional delegation, with a letter explaining that the calendar constitutes "an example of the sustained efforts that Ohio State is making in the area of pre-collegiate mathematic and science education." See Attachment 28 for some photocopied excerpts. The actual calendar is printed in four colors on heavy, glossy stock. All politics is local: See Attachment 29 for a pair of campus-paper articles that do a good job of localizing an important national issue--the issue of protecting human subjects in research. The articles are from the September 28 issue of the University of California, Davis Dateline. One of them combines a broad look at the human-subject issue with an account of the university's own policies and procedures. The other article provides both national and campus perspectives on proposed changes in federal policy toward the training of human-subject researchers. In the spotlight (I): On October 7 and 8, the Boston Globe published a two-part series that took an extraordinarily detailed look at grade inflation at Harvard University. The series concluded that "Vietnam and the protest movements of the '60s led to an increase in lax grading campuswide, and that the faculty has never recovered." Among other things, it noted that "Harvard honors has actually become the laughingstock of the Ivy League," and "the other Ivies see Harvard as the Lake Wobegon of higher education, where all the students, being above average, can take honors for granted." On October 23, the Globe reported that, in response to the series, Harvard officials had given faculty members a January deadline to explain their grading practices in writing, and that a university committee would be formed to review the data and recommend whether changes to grading should be considered. See Attachment 30 for the series and Attachment 31 for the Globe's October 23 article. In the spotlight (II): Last spring, then-Harvard president Neil Rudenstine appointed a committee to recommend whether the university should accept student demands for a "living wage" of at least $10.50 an hour for its lower-level employees. The committee has not yet made its recommendation, but on October 22 it presented the results of a study that indicated wage increases for such employees had lagged far behind inflation over the last seven years. For example, the study said that when inflation is factored in, more than 80 percent of the university's janitors now earn less than $10 an hour, compared to only 20 percent in 1994. See Attachment 32 for the Associated Press story. From presidential desks: University of Southern California president Steven Sample has authored a book, The Contrarian's Guide to Leadership, which was published last month by Jossey-Bass/Wiley. See Attachment 33 for a Chronicle of Higher Education column by Sample that gives a flavor of the thing. For example:
A bit of artful procrastination--for example, never making a decision today that can reasonably be put off to tomorrow--can serve a leader extremely well. Almost all sophisticated leaders are artful procrastinators to a greater or lesser extent, but Harry Truman personified this trait. . . . Truman well understood that the timing of a decision could be as important as the decision itself. . . . But one must recognize the difference between artful and cowardly procrastination. It is one thing for a leader to delegate a decision to a lieutenant, but an entirely different--and unacceptable--thing for him to surrender a decision to fate or to his adversaries. General George McClellan is a wonderful example of a cowardly procrastinator. Taking to the airwaves: University of Minnesota president Mark Yudof and his wife Judy have launched a regular radio program that is being carried by a major Minneapolis AM station, WCCO. The program will air on the first Tuesday of every month and will cover current affairs as well as university issues. It will include guest hosts and a call-in session that will allow listeners to ask questions and voice their opinions. Yudof said he hopes the program will enhance communication with "those who pay the bills." The first program aired October 2. See Attachment 34 for an account of it from The Minnesota Daily, a student-run campus newspaper. Transitions: Alan Stone, Columbia University's vice president for public affairs, has been named vice president for government, community, and public affairs at Harvard University. The appointment is effective this month. . . . Bill Walker, who has been Rutgers University's executive director of university relations, has moved to Dartmouth College as vice president for public affairs. His successor at Rutgers is Kim Manning-Lewis. . . . Nancy Connell has been named director of News and Information Services at the University of Michigan. She was previously director of marketing and media relations at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Media Notes: LinguaFranca magazine, which has provided often-irreverent perspectives on academic life for the past decade, has suspended publication. Although the magazine had a circulation of only about 15,000, it had a devoted following within academe and in the media. See Attachment 35 for the New York Times story. -Peter Smith Footnotes 1 This assertion falls short of the facts on two counts. First, the bill the Post article referred to was never even introduced in Congress. President Clinton announced in May of 1999 that he would be proposing such a measure but members of the Administration could not agree on its exact contents and his set of proposals was never sent to Capitol Hill. A few Senate Judiciary Committee members did eventually introduce bills of their own containing similar proposals. However, those measures were introduced so late in the 1999 session that Congress adjourned before taking any action upon them, and the measures were not revived in 2000. Second, as best as the AAU can determine, no one in the university community ever lobbied against the Clinton proposals or the subsequent Senate proposals-- or even took a position on them. |