校园不信任投票表明大学管理层和教职员工之间的分歧正在扩大
【中美创新时报2025 年 1 月 1 日编译讯】（记者温友平编译）在新英格兰地区，从莱斯利到萨福克再到艾默生，教授们对校园领导层投了比以往任何时候都多的反对票，这表明大学管理层和教职员工之间的分歧正在扩大。对此，《波士顿环球报》记者Diti Kohli 作了下述详细报道。
在新英格兰各地的大学里，不信任投票越来越多。
莱斯利大学的教授们在短短三年内三次聚在一起投票，决定他们的校长是否适合继续任职。然后，就在 5 月以来，艾默生和布兰迪斯大学也采取了类似的举措，以引起大学校长的注意——或者将他们彻底罢免。 （埃默森最终选择支持其校长。）本月，近 80% 的萨福克大学教职员工投票谴责其领导，这是强烈反对的措施，但并未要求罢免。
据媒体报道，自 2014 年以来，新英格兰各地大学的教职员工已发出大约 20 次不信任或谴责投票，是十年前的两倍多。
从北岸社区学院的丹佛斯校区到缅因州庞大的州立大学系统最远的地方，到处都有这样的投票，其灵感来自全国范围内不信任行动的上升，包括哥伦比亚大学、加州州立理工大学洪堡分校等。
“这些投票是教职员工明确表达担忧的呼声，他们担心学校正在发生一些他们不满意的事情，”大学和学院理事会协会主席 Framroze “Fram” Virjee 说。 “这可能是一个可怕的诊断，一场关于大学核心走向的拉锯战。”
投票不能强制领导人下台，因为解雇权通常掌握在大学董事会手中。相反，他们主要在象征意义和力量展示方面拥有权力。但专家表示，如果投票过于频繁或过于轻率，权力可能会减弱。
近年来的不信任投票浪潮也表明，玻璃办公室里的大学高管和教室里的教师之间的分歧正在扩大。大学领导层和教职员工之间的共同治理——曾经是美国高等教育的标志——在过去 40 年里已经逐渐消失，因为大学管理人员的数量激增了四倍，以至于他们的人数和薪水都超过了教授。
随着大学面临一系列危机，这种分歧的紧张局势正在加剧：随着出生率下降，入学率下降将持续下去，这加剧了许多大学的预算紧缩。陷入困境的学校已经削减了学术项目，裁员并实施了重组计划。虽然这些举措可能是避免运营损失的必要措施，但当教师们觉得自己没有得到咨询时，这些举措可能会让他们感到痛苦。
其他时候，不信任投票是由文化纠纷而非财务纠纷引发的。2020 年，温特沃斯理工学院的教师们发起了反对疫情期间重新开放计划的投票；2022 年，缅因大学奥古斯塔分校的校长遴选过程暗中展开；6 月，格林菲尔德社区学院关于多样性、公平和包容性的报告被压制；今年春天，在几个校园里，还有对亲巴勒斯坦抗议活动的处理。
美国大学教授协会康奈尔分会主席丽莎·利伯维茨 (Risa Lieberwitz) 表示，此类投票的激增表明，越来越多的教师正在诉诸“核选项”来迫使变革。
“它们不会凭空而来，”利伯维茨说。 “之所以发生这种情况，是因为存在持续的治理问题、对学术自由的尊重、解决财务问题，或者只是因为教师感到被忽视。”
例如，萨福克大学的教授们多年来一直目睹班级规模不断扩大、薪酬落后于通货膨胀率、终身教职人员逐渐被低薪兼职人员取代，直到本月他们才投了不信任票。
萨福克大学政治学和法律研究教授肯·科斯格罗夫 (Ken Cosgrove) 表示，压垮骆驼的最后一根稻草是本学期教师退休金和医疗保健福利的削减——他说，这表明教授不受重视，也是波士顿市中心机构“公司化”的标志。
“这是一场关于业务运营方式、如何做出和呈现这些决定的斗争，”科斯格罗夫说。“我们只是想参与其中。”
虽然不信任投票带有戏剧性，但其影响却千差万别。例如，与立法者或公司董事会成员不同，教职人员通常在大学治理中不具有法律影响力。根据 2017 年对 57 项行动的研究，大约一半的不信任投票导致了校长领导层的更替。在当地，成功率并不高。
萨福克大学发言人在一份声明中表示，校长玛丽莎·凯利“已明确表示，她将继续与教职员工和所有萨福克选区合作，确保我们履行重要使命，促进学生取得成功。”
在莱斯利，校长珍妮特·斯坦迈尔经受住了教职员工的三次不信任投票，同时仍得到大学董事会的支持。事实上，即使在第三次投票之后，董事会主席汉斯·施特劳奇也致信教职员工，重申董事会“一致全力支持”斯坦迈尔，他正在推动一项全校重组计划，并且教职员工的一些担忧“与事实不符”。
加州大学高等教育研究中心高级研究员约翰·道格拉斯 (John Douglas) 表示，即使大学校长被罢免，不信任投票往往也是众多原因之一，“并非导致校长下台的唯一因素”。
以布兰迪斯大学为例。批评者指责前校长罗恩·利博维茨 (Ron Liebowitz) 应为学校严重的预算短缺、裁员和警方对校园抗议的反应负责，9 月，教职员工对他发起了不信任投票。一周后，利博维茨突然辞职。
一位高级管理人员告诉《波士顿环球报》，教职员工投票并没有直接导致利博维茨辞职，校董会“在投票结束前已经做出了决定”。
（莱斯利拒绝置评，布兰代斯大学没有回应有关该行动的问题。）
马萨诸塞大学波士顿分校政治学教授、前任教务委员会主席 C. Heike Schotten 表示，不信任投票确实导致预期结果的情况可能会对教职员工产生深远影响。
2018 年，马萨诸塞大学波士顿分校的教职员工对其领导层投了不信任票，试图阻止马萨诸塞大学系统收购牛顿的艾达山学院。交易成功完成，艾达山学院成为马萨诸塞大学阿默斯特分校的一部分。但变化已经在进行中：Schotten 表示，投票迫使管理人员公开解决这个问题，并在几个月后马萨诸塞大学波士顿分校临时校长辞职中发挥了作用。
“教职员工有发言权的事情非常少，”Schotten 说。“这是一种利用治理文件中为我们规定的权力之外的权力并以合法性的形式夺取权力的方式。”
不信任投票也有负面影响。紧张的气氛可能导致行政部门采取纪律处分措施，或加剧与上级沟通的中断。
投票后缺乏变化可能会令人沮丧，马萨诸塞大学阿默斯特分校的一些教授就是这种情况。5 月，该校教师齐聚一堂，举行了近十年来的第一次大会，并对校长哈维尔·雷耶斯投了不信任票，因为他允许警察暴力镇压校园抗议活动。
如今，雷耶斯仍在任，教师们回到课堂，但他们的倡导却毫无成效。马萨诸塞大学没有回应置评请求。
“我们中的许多人都对他在这里的所作所为感到困惑，”投了不信任票的社会学教授塞德里克·德莱昂说。“你知道他们说什么。没有追随者的领导者只是一个散步的人。”
题图：2024年12 月 24 日，波士顿萨福克大学弗兰克索耶大楼一景。近 80% 的萨福克教职员工投票谴责其领导层，这是一种强烈的反对态度，但并未要求罢免。Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff
附原英文报道：
Campus no-confidence votes are a sign of widening divide between university executives and faculty members
From Lesley to Suffolk to Emerson, professors have issued more votes than ever against campus leadership, a sign of the widening divide between university executives and faculty
By Diti Kohli Globe Staff,Updated January 1, 2025
A view of Suffolk University’s Frank Sawyer Building in Boston on Dec. 24. Nearly 80 percent of Suffolk faculty voted to censure its leaders, a measure of strong disapproval that stops short of calling for removal.Pat Greenhouse/Globe Staff
At colleges across New England, no-confidence votes are piling up.
Three times in as many years, professors at Lesley University came together to cast ballots over whether their president was fit to continue in her post. Then, just since May, similar moves to grab university presidents’ attention — or remove them entirely — occurred at Emerson and Brandeis. (Emerson ultimately chose to support its president.) And this month, nearly 80 percent of Suffolk faculty voted to censure its leaders, a measure of strong disapproval that stops short of calling for removal.
Since 2014, faculty at universities around New England have issued roughly 20 votes of no confidence or censure, more than double the decade prior, according to media reports.
They’ve happened everywhere from the Danvers campus of North Shore Community College to the furthest stretches of Maine’s sprawling statewide university system, drawing inspiration from a nationwide uptick in no-confidence actions that include Columbia University, Cal Poly Humboldt, and beyond.
“These votes are transparent calls of concern by the faculty that something is happening with the institution that they are not happy with,” said Framroze “Fram” Virjee, president of the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges. “It can be a dire diagnosis, a tug of war for where the heart of a university is going.”
The votes cannot mandate that leaders step down, since firing power usually lies with universities’ boards of trustees. Instead, they’re powerful mainly in their symbolism and show of force. But experts said that power can wane if the votes are wielded too often or too lightly.
The wave of no-confidence votes in recent years is also a sign of the widening divide between the university executives in glass offices and instructors in classrooms. Shared governance between college leadership and faculty — once a hallmark of American higher education — has eroded over the last 40 years, as the number of university administrators has ballooned fourfold, to the point they outnumber professors in both size and salary.
Tension over that divide is mounting as universities battle a confluence of crises: Declining enrollment, poised to persist as birth rates fall, is amplifying budget crunches at many colleges. Struggling schools have slashed academic programs, laid off employees, and implemented restructuring plans. And while these moves may be necessary to sidestep operating losses, they can sting faculty when they feel they are not consulted.
Other times, the no-confidence votes are prompted by cultural disputes rather than financial ones. Faculty launched votes to fight pandemic reopening plans at Wentworth Institute of Technology in 2020; a shadowy presidential search process at University of Maine Augusta in 2022; a suppressed report on diversity, equity, and inclusion at Greenfield Community College in June; and, on several campuses, the handling of pro-Palestinian protests this spring.
A boom in such votes indicates that more faculty are resorting to “a nuclear option” to force change, said Risa Lieberwitz, president of the Cornell chapter of the American Association of University Professors.
“They don’t just happen out of the blue,” Lieberwitz said. “They happen because there is an ongoing problem of governance, respect for academic freedom, addressing financial issues, or just because the faculty feels ignored.”
Professors at Suffolk, for example, spent years watching class sizes increase, compensation lag behind inflation, and tenured faculty be gradually replaced with lower-paid adjuncts before they took a no-confidence vote this month.
Ken Cosgrove, a political science and legal studies professor at Suffolk, said the “straw that broke the camel’s back” was a cutback in retirement contributions and health care benefits for faculty this semester — a sign, he said, that professors were not valued and of the “corporatization” of the downtown Boston institution.
“This is a fight over the way the business will be run, how those decisions are made and presented,” Cosgrove said. “We just want to be a part of it.”
While a no-confidence vote has an air of drama, its impact varies widely. Unlike lawmakers or members of a corporate board, for instance, faculty members usually hold no legal weight in university governance. According to a 2017 study of 57 actions, roughly half of no-confidence votes led to a presidential leadership change. Locally, the success rate is not as high.
In a statement, a Suffolk spokesperson said its president, Marisa Kelly, “has made clear that she will continue to work with faculty and all Suffolk constituencies to ensure we are delivering on our critical mission and advancing the success of our students.”
And at Lesley, president Janet Steinmayer has survived three no-confidence votes by the faculty, while retaining the backing of the university’s board. Indeed, even after the third vote, board chair Hans Strauch sent a letter to the faculty reiterating that the board “unanimously and fully supports” Steinmayer, who is shepherding an institution-wide restructuring plan, and that some of the faculty’s concerns were “factually inaccurate.”
Even when university presidents are toppled, a no-confidence vote is often one of a host of reasons, “not the only factor in the downfall of a campus president,” said John Douglas, a senior research fellow at the Center for Studies in Higher Education at the University of California.
Take Brandeis, for example. Critics faulted former president Ron Liebowitz for the school’s severe budget shortfalls, layoffs, and the police response to campus protests, and in September, faculty issued a vote of no confidence against him. A week later, Liebowitz abruptly resigned.
A senior administrator told the Globe that the faculty vote did not directly cause Liebowitz’s resignation and that the trustees “had already made a decision before the close of the voting.”
(Lesley declined to comment, and Brandeis did not respond to questions about the action.)
Instances where a no-confidence vote does lead to the desired result can have a profound impact on faculty, said C. Heike Schotten, a political science professor and the former chair of the faculty council at University of Massachusetts Boston.
In 2018, UMass Boston faculty members voted no confidence in their leadership in an attempt to stop the UMass system’s purchase of Mount Ida College in Newton. The sale went through, and Mount Ida became part of UMass Amherst. But changes were already afoot: Schotten said the vote forced administrators to address the issue publicly and played a role in the resignation of UMass Boston’s interim chancellor months later.
“What faculty has a say over is very small,” Schotten said. “It was a way to leverage power outside what is codified for us in governance documents and to seize power in the form of legitimacy.”
No-confidence votes can have downsides, too. Heated tensions can lead to disciplinary measures from the administration or exacerbate a break in communication with the higher-ups.
A lack of change after a vote can be demoralizing, as it has been for some professors at UMass Amherst. Faculty there gathered in May for their first general assembly meeting in roughly a decade and voted no confidence in chancellor Javier Reyes for allowing a violent police response to campus protests.
Today, Reyes remains in office, and faculty are back in the classroom with little to show for their advocacy. UMass did not respond to a request for comment.
“A number of us are mystified by what he is still doing here,” said Cedric De Leon, a professor of sociology who voted no confidence. “You know what they say. A leader with no followers is just a guy taking a walk.”
