|
HomePage |
|
|
|
|
From The Faculty Chair
I write to you this month about The MIT Faculty Newsletter (FNL). I have been asked by President Vest to chair an ad hoc committee to provide a review of the FNL. In addition to myself, the committee consists of Professors Nazli Choucri, Bob Jaffe, and Dave Marks, and Kirk Kolenbrander, special assistant to the President and Chancellor; Lily Burns, staff associate in the President’s office, will staff the committee. We are to report back to the President by mid spring, and in particular, we are to address the following questions: What needs does the FNL serve? What might the FNL be? How should the FNL be staffed, organized, and funded? One impetus for the review is that MIT provides annual funds on the order of $50,000 to cover production and support costs for producing the FNL.
We are just getting started and seek your help and advice. As background we have taken a look at the origins of the FNL, and have some observations on the current state of the FNL.
If you have read this far, you’re at least aware that we have a faculty newsletter. But how did it originate? The founding of the FNL is described in the March 1991 edition of the FNL, Vol. III, No. 5. In 1988, a group of faculty members, led by Professor Vera Kistiakowsky, was concerned about the decision processes that led to the closure of the Department of Applied Biological Sciences. Professor Kistiakowsky distributed on March 10, 1988, a four-page note, “Does MIT Need a Faculty Newsletter?” In the note, which is labeled Volume 0, Number 0, she describes the need for a newsletter as follows:
“A group of faculty members which has been discussing the recent events concerning the Department of Applied Biological Sciences has concluded that difficulty in communication prevents faculty consideration of the problems except in crisis situations. There exists no channel for the exchange of information between faculty members and for the discussion of problems at MIT, since neither Tech Talk nor the faculty meetings serve these purposes. Therefore we decided to explore the desirability of a newsletter, and one purpose of this zeroth edition is to see whether there is support for such a publication. It is only being sent to approximately 10% of the faculty, so we would be grateful if you would share it with your colleagues.”
A set of faculty stepped up as volunteers to form an Editorial Board for the newsletter, and they produced the first issue, which appeared in October 1988. I gather that this was a grassroots effort that relied on funding and support from a variety of sources, including the administration. Nevertheless, the intent from day one has been to keep the FNL independent from the administration. By 1991, there were 8 – 10 issues a year, with each issue being 16 – 20 pages. The March 1991 edition reproduces a memorandum of understanding that was co-signed by the Editorial Board of the FNL and by Professor Henry Jacoby, then the chair of the faculty. The mission for the FNL is stated as part of this memorandum:
“The mission of The MIT Faculty Newsletter is to serve as a vehicle for the exchange of views among faculty, for publication of information of interest to members of the faculty, and as a forum for debate on issues of concern to the faculty. We recognize the particular needs of junior faculty and underrepresented minorities, as well as the concerns of related groups including postdoctoral fellows and technical staff.”
This memorandum goes on to describe a governance structure, whereby the FNL is managed and governed by the Editorial Board. The Board consists of at least nine faculty members from all parts of the Institute, and has mechanisms for renewing itself by recruiting new members.
So that’s a bit about the background on the origins and intents of the FNL. Over the last decade the FNL has been a regular publication providing valuable information and opinion on a wide range of topics and issues. It has also been the publication outlet of choice for reports of Institute committees and task forces, such as the Committee on Women Faculty in Science and the Task Force on Student Life and Learning.
Yet, to be provocative, let me offer two observations as a way of stimulating some reactions and inputs.
First, the FNL is no longer a faculty newsletter. The faculty no longer writes the majority of the content in each issue, in sharp contrast with the first volumes, which were entirely authored by faculty. And the readership goes well beyond the faculty; I suspect that the FNL gets read more by the administrative staff and students than by the faculty, based on the limited feedback that I have gotten since becoming the faculty chair. The FNL has migrated into a periodical for the MIT community, with a series of regular features like this column; as such, it provides a nice complement to Tech Talk.
Second, whereas the FNL does provide a lot of useful information, over the past few years it has not really been “…a vehicle for the exchange of views among faculty” nor “…a forum for debate on issues of concern to faculty.” Based on a quick perusal of the last five years, I estimate that at most a quarter of the content of any issue could be viewed as being an “…exchange of views” or “…debate on issues of concern to faculty,” and often much less. (And much of this was about one issue, the aftereffects of Reengineering …) Again, this is in contrast to the earlier volumes where much of the content could be classified as an exchange of views or debate by faculty. For instance, in April 1989, six faculty responded to the question “who should be the next president of MIT?” with thoughtful columns, each providing his or her perspective on what type of leadership was needed by MIT at that time.
So let me end by posing some questions. What would you like the FNL to be? How might we use the FNL to build community across the faculty? How might we increase faculty participation in the newsletter? Is the FNL the right medium for the faculty to raise and discuss issues? How might we make the Newsletter more controversial? And what are the types of issues that you’d like see discussed and debated? On behalf of our committee, I’d appreciate any input you’d like to offer.
|
HomePage |
|
|
|
|