Faculty blast Herbert in emergency session

Faculty members will get a rare emergency session of the Bloomington Faculty Council to voice their discontent with IU President Adam Herbert's job performance, specifically his decision not to select College of Arts and Sciences Dean Kumble Subbaswamy as the next IUB chancellor.\nIn a meeting organized following Herbert's decision, 130 faculty members signed a petition for the emergency BFC session. In an unofficial vote, more than 100 faculty members supported Subbaswamy for chancellor, said Political Science Chair Jeffrey Isaac. \nConcerns about Herbert's presidency were expressed in at least three formal letters circulated among faculty following his decision to extend the search for the next chancellor and vice president of academic affairs. \nRobert Eno, chairman of the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, said he spearheaded efforts to organize a meeting after becoming inundated with letters and e-mails discussing Herbert's decision. Eno said it was important to unify communication as dialogue increased between faculty members who were anxious to express their ideas and concerns.\n"I realized we were not going to be able to accomplish anything by e-mail and we were not going to get results we would be able to control," Eno said. "So it seemed to me that the best idea was to do the old-fashioned thing and just talk, which we do very rarely on this campus." \nIU law professor Fred Cate served as moderator at the meeting, which was open only to faculty members and members of the chancellor search committee and was closed to the press. Cate said that of the 31 individual speakers, many commented directly in support Subbaswamy, who Herbert passed up for the position. He said two others simply requested information regarding this fast-growing issue while one person opposed Subbaswamy's candidacy. \n"There were a lot of concerns expressed about the search process, the secrecy, the idea of redoing a search that was just done," Cate said. "There were the largest number of comments of concern about the academic leadership of the University, and particularly the president." \nCate said the BFC was invited to sponsor the meeting but that BFC President Ted Miller pointed out emergency BFC meetings can be called only under special circumstances. An emergency session can only be called at the request of a council majority or by a petition that includes at least 50 faculty members' signatures. \nCate said 130 names were added to the petition calling for an emergency meeting of the BFC, something that has never been done. The last time the IU faculty met en masse was 1971.\n"Universities are odd creatures," Cate said. "There's a feeling that the president and the trustees have largely ignored or marginalized the faculty in these issues, and we would like to be helpful in moving the University forward."\nIsaac and Susan Gubar, a professor of English, each drafted letters, signed by more than 30 faculty members.\nChemistry professor Ted Widlanski circulated a third letter to which 51 faculty members attached their names at the meeting. The letter, a revised version of one circulated Wednesday among faculty, suggests that finding strong candidates is hindered when an interim administrator holds office for too long.\n"The president's inability to realize this, and complacency in relying on an interim administration, calls his judgment seriously into question," the letter states.\n"It's about people being allowed to say what they need to say," Widlanski said. "Herbert is going to be really pissed off by this whole thing, and my name is at the top of that letter."\nWidlanski is the CEO of the METACyt initiative, and said he believes his job will be in jeopardy due to his dissent. He said the faculty has an obligation to do what they think is in the best interests of the University and he is willing to support whatever consensus is reached even if it differs from his own.\n"A lot of us on this campus were pinning our hopes that we'd get a really good chancellor here that would make things better," Widlanski said. "(Herbert) has had problems with Dean Subbaswamy, he doesn't like him, but Subbaswamy is the most capable administrator who has walked onto this campus in many years."\n"The guy's doing a really bad job, but if we get a good chancellor in to work with him, then the guy has two and a half years left to limp through his presidency," Widlanski said. "And then he'll be gone. We'll get a new and better president."\nInterim IUB Chancellor Ken Gros Louis said similar instances of dissent have occurred but never with this level of intensity.\n"I think it's fine to praise Dean Swamy, but I don't think the letter writers have full knowledge of why the president made his decision," Gros Louis said. "Thus they question his judgment without being fully aware of his reasons."\nIU spokesman Larry MacIntyre said it is premature to speculate that Herbert's job is at risk due to faculty discontent. \n"President Herbert is very aware of their concern and he takes it very seriously," MacIntyre said. "He believes the faculty who have organized are very sincere and believe strongly in their position."\nMacIntyre also said Herbert believes Subbaswamy to be "an outstanding individual."\n-- Managing Editors Tony Sams and Mallory Simon contributed to this report.