University of Akron

COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY GOVERNANCE: UNIVERSITY OF AKRON The report of the investigating committee concerns actions by the governing board and administration of the University of Akron to terminate the appointments of ninety-seven full- time faculty members, in July 2020, after invoking the “force majeure” provision in the collective bargaining agreement and thus nullifying the reduction-in-force pr. [...] The committee found that the governing board and administration, by invoking force majeure and terminating the appointments of almost one hundred full-time faculty members, disregarded the governance standards set forth in the Statement on Government of College and Universities and provisions of Regulation 4c of the Recommended Institutional Regulations on Academic Freedom and Tenure: no elected f. [...] In response to the AAUP staff’s request for comment on the draft text of this report, the UA administration and Akron-AAUP submitted a joint letter announcing “significant developments at the University of Akron” that, the letter states, “bear on the contents” of this report. [...] However, as the investigating committee’s report notes, the new collective bargaining agreement, while removing the phrase “such as force majeure” from its retrenchment article, retains the rest of the language, which permits the administration—when the board and administration deem circumstances to be “catastrophic”—to set aside the CBA’s already weak provisions governing termination of appointme. [...] In the light of these stated improvements in conditions for academic governance at the University of Akron, attested to by the UA administration and by Akron-AAUP, the Committee on College and University Governance makes no recommendation to the AAUP’s governing Council regarding the imposition of a sanction on the institution.