Reporter Volume 25, No.9 October 28, 1993

By MARK WALLACE
Reporter Staff

The Faculty Senate should make a commitment to affirmative action not
only through the structure of the President's Equal Opportunity and
Affirmative Action Committee but also in the make-up of the Faculty
Senate itself, Edward Jenkins of the Department of Learning and
Instruction told the Faculty Senate Executive Committee last week.
	"The FSEC should make a commitment to equality, justice,
fairness, mutual respect, and even more difficult, to righting some
wrongs," Jenkins said. "It's imperative to show yourself faithful to
these principles."
	In order to "avoid cynicism" about affirmative action that is
"born of lack of effectiveness," Jenkins called on the FSEC to appoint
more women and minorities as chairs both of committees and of the
Senate itself, and noted that it was crucial to have women and
minorities on committees other than the affirmative action committee.
It is important to avoid the stereotype that minorities are involved
only in certain issues, and in certain numbers, Jenkins said.
	Jenkins said that he believes that the equal opportunity and
affirmative action committee should be composed primarily of faculty
with tenure, and staff with continuing appointments. Such a committee
should not be dominated by administrators, Jenkins said, because their
first commitment would always be to the office for which they worked.
And untenured faculty would tend to be in more endangered positions,
and so might feel less willing to speak out about affirmative action
issues, he said.
	"I believe that the affirmative action committee should
consist of dedicated, informed, courageous members, who are tolerant,
able to accept criticism, not easily offended, and who have a vision
of how affirmative action should operate, and who are willing to work
hard," Jenkins said.
	Loyce Stewart, associate director of the Office of Equal
Opportunity/Affirmative Action, said it is the goal of her office to
monitor UB and report to federal agencies on whether UB is in
compliance with affirmative action laws, and to aid in recruitment on
all hires. But she added that the office is not currently involved in
faculty retention issues, and that no follow-ups are being done by her
office on why UB loses faculty and staff. But retention is a
particularly important issue, she said, because UB tends to lose more
minorities than it gains, sometimes to retirement, but often for
reasons that are not known.
	William George of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering asked
about the sources of the agenda of the affirmative action committee.
Stewart responded by saying that UB's affirmative action agenda is
"based on what is law." She pointed out that UB is required to report
on the percentage of women and minorities that it has in each area of
the university, and compare that to a percentage of the number of such
people qualified to work in those areas. The government requires UB to
come up with goals to correct deficiencies in all areas, she said.
	Jenkins pointed out that crucial to any affirmative action
program is a campus environment that celebrates tolerance and
diversity. He said that the issue of atmosphere is "qualitative and
harder to figure." Referring anecdotally to several racist incidents
he has witnessed on campus, including racist graffiti, and to recent
reports of hate crimes in The Spectrum, Jenkins said that the
atmosphere of UB has a lot to do with "what UB will tolerate or
accept. Tolerance of people who are different can be promoted," he
said.
	Margaret Acara, co-chair of the President's Panel on Review of
Search Procedures, said that she became aware of a lot of intolerance
incidents anecdotally, that information on such incidents was not
currently being gathered officially, and that many people who might
report such issues might also fear being labeled as whistle-blowers.
She suggested that there be some place at UB for official reporting of
such incidents.
	Samuel Schack of Mathematics said that there was great
difficulty in trying to deal legislatively with tolerance problems. He
said that the development of a campus "speech code" might lead to
"much worse abuses." He also suggested that UB should become involved
in trying to figure out how to get more women and minorities to pursue
careers in many disciplines, instead of simply trying to compete with
other universities for the same limited pool of applicants.
	Jenkins responded by saying that he did not believe that UB
needs a speech code to be able to effectively address affirmative
action issues.
	David Banks of Anthropology said that he wished that the
charge to the equal opportunity and affirmative action committee was
broader and did not focus solely on recruitment and retention, but
made more reference to the general environment of UB and to
communication on affirmative action issues. He added that he hoped
that UB could appear "as a model" for other universities on
affirmative action issues, and would like to see that included in the
charge.