Western Front - 1983 November 15

              Western Front Tuesday, November 15, 1983 Western Washington University, Bellingham, Wash. Vol. 75, No. 55
Ed dean search begins;
may decide by March
By Deanna Shaw
The search has begun for a new
dean of the school of education.
A committee formed by Pro­vost
James Talbot met for the first
time last Tuesday to discuss
plans with the objective of nam­ing
a new dean by the end of win­ter
quarter.
The committee will seek a per­son
with a background in both
education and administration
who is familiar with budgets,
personnel matters and curricu­lum
development, Marvin Klein,
acting dean of the schoofof edu­cation,
said.
Klein's two-year position as
acting dean ends June 30, and the
new dean probably will take over
July 1, if the new dean has no
contractual obligations else­where
affecting that date.
The dean of the school is
responsible for the school's two
primary departments, the
deparment of educational cur­riculum
and instruction and the
department of educational
administration and foundations,
which consist of 40 faculty
members. Another 95 faculty
members involved with teacher
education in various other
departments around campus
also report to the dean, as does
the Fifth Year office and the
school of education's admissions
office.
Advertisements will appear
soon in at least one widely-read
professional journal, the Chroni­cle
of Higher Education, and Tal­bot
said letters probably will be
sent to many universities in the
United States asking that they
encourage people to apply. Addi­tional
ads will be placed in other
journals if the committee decides
it hasn't received enough
response.
A probable deadline for appli­cations
is the end of December,
which will give applicants about a
month to reserch Western and
Bellingham and respond to the
ad, Talbot said.
Klein has not made a final deci­sion
about applying for the
position.
"I have not decided for or
against it. It's a very important
decision for me to make profes­sionally
and personally. I'll prob­ably
make a decision before the
end of this quarter," he said.
Klein currently is on leave from
the department of curriculum
and instruction and is a professor
of elementary education special­izing
in courses in early child­hood
development, reading and
language development.
The search committee is
chaired by Tom Quinlan, vice
president for student affairs.
Members on the committee
include Marie Eaton, chair­woman
of the department of
educational curriculum and
instruction, Paul Ford, depart­ment
of educational administra­tion
and foundations, Carla
Riitschman, music department,
Al Froderberg, chairman of the
mathematics department Jim
Roberts, superintendent of
schools in Bellingham, and a stu­dent
not yet named.
By Nevonne Harris
A portion of Western's faculty
will split roughly $380,000 in
merit awards despite fears that
pay raises based solely on per­formance
will lead to divisiveness
among instructors.
Merit award money could be
put to better use as a cost-of-living
raise, many faculty members
believe, including the American
Federation of Teachers that has
about 100 members at Western.
The administration, however,
believes the question of how this
merit award money is to be used
is moot because the Legislature
mandated the money for a pre­cise
purpose.
The approximately $380,000 is
Western's share of $3.1 million
the Legislature allocated for state­wide
faculty merit increases to
begin Jan. 1, 1985.
"Merit politicizes relationships
between faculty," said Milt
Kreiger, president of Western's
AFT.
"The principle makes sense,
but the application is more harm­ful
than advantageous," he said.
"In the abstract it makes a lot of
sense to a lot of people. Fighting
merit is like fighting apple pie and
motherhood."
Krieger said the union "takes
an antagonistic viewpoint of
merit on the grounds that the
salary schedule in general is too
low. Merit increases have become
a substantial part of the salary
and outweigh across-the-board
salary advances, which have been
far short of the cost-of-living over
the years.
"Tenure and promotion
reward professors as well as
merit," he said. "Merit doesn't
stand alone, and it tends to be
applied selectively and politi­cally.
It is divisive."
Krieger added that former
Western President Paul Olscamp
and current president G. Robert
Ross "are proponents of merit in
a predictable way. Merit says
quality' to the outside world and
puts the decision in the adminis­tration's
hands."
The acting dean of the College
of Arts and Sciences, PeterlElich,
said, "Merit is to reward people
performing at an exceptionally
high level in areas the univei-sity
has said are important areas of
performance—teaching and
research," he said.
"It also is an incentive to oth­ers.
But competition is not the
primary motive," he noted.
"If the exceptional teachers
aren't rewarded they will leave,
which will hurt the students. You
can't give everyone merit just
because they're breathing," Elich
said.
"The majority of the faculty like
merit for exceptional behavior.
Some don't like it on philosophi­cal
grounds. They aren't against
the concept, but would like to see
cost-of-living increases first and
then extra money for merit," he
said.
Western Provost James Talbot
said, "The merit awards are to
reward outstanding faculty per­formance.
If it creates competi­tion
it is their interpretation, not-what
it's supposed to do," he
said.
"The legislature provided us
with more money than in the
past," he said.
Previously, enough money was
given to allow a one-step merit
award to 10 or 15 percent of
faculty. This time enough money
is available for all the faculty to be
given a one-step increase.
However, Talbot said, "we
would like to give substantial pay
to a relatively few number of
faculty."
Another member of the AFT,
Evelyn Wright of English, said,
"Merit is very difficult to deter­mine.
Who has the right to say
who gets the merit increases? It is
a large amount of money and
• See MERIT PAY, page 6
Students braved ifS-kndt Winds and violent downpours as they
trudeed to classes Monday. „L , . «^ , .... L .
° Photo by Sheryl Nichols
WSL's value argued
By Elisa Claassen
and Gary Curtis '
Washington State University's
Associated Students President
Dan O'Connell said he intends to
find out if WSU students think
they are getting their money's
worth from the Washington Stu­dent
Lobby.
Many students aren't aware of
the WSL and, like Western, pay­ments
made from their tuition are
optional, O'Connell said.
The problem at WSU started
when O'Connell argued against a
$44 athletic pass fee charged with
tuition. A counter-argument then
focused on the number of dollars
spent for the #VSL. O'Connell
decided to check further into the
activities and effectiveness of the
WSL, now in its second year.
Western WSL representative
Tina Abbott said the lobby is
effective and has high visibility in
Olympia. It maintains an office,
which is open every work day.
"The people who need-to know
about the WSL, know about the
WSL. No doubt, others don't, but
they have no reason to be con­cerned
about its activities," she
said.
The WSL continually is asking
legislators if they need more
information or if they have sug­gestions
that would help law­makers
in their decisions con­cerning
higher education in
Washington state, Abbott said.
Abbott stressed that the WSL's
effectiveness can't be judged after
just one year. "People must look
at the long-term. They.can't look
at one year alone. The WSL is
doing things that will not affect
us, but will effect next year's
freshman class," she said.
WSU currently provides one-third
of the WSL budget, which
O'Connell said he sees as "a lion's
share of the funding." The Uni­versity
of Washington with 40,000
students pa}'s $15,000 compared
to WSU's 16,000 students paying
$11,000 per semester. Last year
Western's 8,500 students con­tributed
about $6,600. Central
Washington University pays
$3,200. Eastern Washington Uni­versity
and The Evergreen State
College each pay $2,200,
Some students criticized
• See WSL, page 6
Participation,
quality prevail
at co-ops
p.7
Icemen knot
Cariboo College
in Friday match
p. 8
Installations'
comprised
of sand, rocks
p. 11
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