When Florida Gulf Coast University opened its doors in the fall of 1997, it presented faculty applicants with the rare opportunity to shape the growth of a new institution, but also became one of a relatively few colleges nationwide not to offer a tenure system.
Instead of granting professors the long-term security of tenure, the university hires faculty members for fixed contracts, typically of three years duration, which are subject to renewal or discontinuation -- based on the recommendations of a supervisory committee -- upon their conclusion.
The university, located in Fort Myers in southwestern Florida, has a total of 215 faculty members. A small number of these who transferred early on from a now defunct branch of the University of South Florida retained their tenure, but all new hires have been made under the multi-year contract system, according to university spokesperson Susan Evans.
"The system allows us to be responsive to changing market need," Evans explained. "Also, there are people from outside the academic world who like the idea of everyone being judged on their performance."
While Evans emphasized that only four professors had failed to have their contracts renewed over the past five years, faculty members at the university said the lack of tenure has had subtler negative effects.
Roger Green, an assistant professor in the division of public affairs, said the number of faculty members leaving the university voluntarily has been "a little higher than one would ordinarily expect."
According to Green, the multi-year contract system also generates concern in the minds of prospective applicants, leading them to shy away from a university that offers a heavy workload and uncertain job security without the promise of a greater salary.
In consequence, Green said, "there is pretty strong agreement that we are not seeing the size of applicant pools that we should be seeing."
And while the danger of having one's own contract ended might seem remote, the very threat of having an arbitrary decision cast down -- deans can overrule even favorable performance reviews -- creates inevitable tension among faculty members, Green said.
In response to the perceived shortcomings of multi-year contract terms, a faculty panel led by Green proposed a new system two years ago that would provide instead for "continuing contracts."
Under the system, faculty members receiving favorable reports from superiors would automatically have their contracts renewed, thereby eliminating some of the uncertainty inherent in the institution's present system.
Two years after the original recommendations were made, the new system has yet to be implemented, though Evans said it has largely been approved and will go into effect "some time this year."
However, Green said matters have been complicated by the far-reaching reforms of the Florida State University system. Recent years have witnessed the disbanding of the state's Board of Regents and the appointment of new trustee boards at each university.
"I would say it is impossible for me to make any confident prediction" about the fate of the continuing contracts system, Green said. "It will hinge on whether or not it meets with a positive reception among the trustees."
Denise Heinemann, a tenured faculty member who serves as grievance officer on the local chapter of the United Faculty of Florida, said that, if implemented, the new system would "make us a more attractive place to work."
"Those of us who are tenured believe that it is really in the best interest of the faculty and the university to do this," said Heinemann, a tenured doctor of public health in the university's college of health professions.
The approval of continuing contracts would ease the concerns of many existing faculty members and allow professors to concentrate more on the business of the university, according to Heinemann.
"I think it's going to be a very positive recruitment factor as well," she added.
Green, for his part, said the change was important for the image of a university, which, after nearly five full years of existence, no longer has the added appeal of novelty.
"That kind of portrayal could once be used, but we're nearing the point where we're just another university, and we have to compete with a large number of similar institutions for faculty," he said.
Though no plans for implementing a full-blown tenure system are in the works, Evans said she felt the new continuing contracts will suffice to meet the concerns of the faculty.
"I think the fear and anxiety have decreased" since news of the new system came out, she said.
Green sounded a more cautionary note.
"The proposal is very much subject to the politics of the process right now," he said. "It's really up in the air as to whether this will receive final authorization."
