SOME INSTITUTIONAL MEMORY IS BETTER LOST. "Retiring faculty strain UWGB" runs the lament. (That's the University of Wisconsin's Green Bay campus.)

The UW System reported that the retirement crunch could hit hardest in the state’s 11 four-year universities besides UW-Milwaukee and UW-Madison. Those smaller universities typically do not have the depth in faculty to withstand frequent retirements.

“In the sciences area, many of those who are retiring now are some of those who came to the university when it was originally started in the late 1960s,” [science education professor Scott] Ashmann said. “They’ve given the university its stability. To lose that living history of the university is something that is difficult in making some decisions because you don’t always know the context and what has happened in the past.

“However, having new blood and new ideas is good, as well. But I don’t know if it’s always good to have a huge amount of turnover in a short amount of time.”

On the other hand, given the suspect origins of this university, some new context might be in order.

The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay is one of six schools profiled in a new book, The Innovative Campus (Oryx Press, 1999), which takes a look back at groundbreaking higher education institutions of the 1960s and early 1970s.

Author Joy Rosenzweig Kliewer devotes the chapter "Eco U in the 1990s" to what she sees as UW-Green Bay's success in honoring its roots as an innovative, experimental institution.

"UW-Green Bay is a bold survivor of the alternative higher education movement of the 1960s and early 1970s," she writes. "Over the past three decades, the campus has kept alive its distinctive interdisciplinary structure despite budgetary cutbacks, a merger, and a changing social and political climate."

Right. You could probably fill a deck of cards (I know, I know, it's time to update that deck) just with Sitzpinklern from the peer institutions Ms Kliewer mentions.

Along with UW-Green Bay, The Innovative Campus profiles Pitzer College in Claremont, Cal.; the New College of the University of South Florida in Sarasota; Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass.; the University of California, Santa Cruz; and Evergreen State College in Olympia, Wash.

The six schools experimented with a range of innovations, from individualized majors and independent study, to no-letter grading, student participation in curriculum development, and academic organization by broad, interdisciplinary areas rather than by narrow, specialized departments.

Kliewer says innovation - commonplace as college enrollments doubled nationwide during the 1960s - dwindled by the late 1970s with a recessionary U.S. economy, widespread enrollment declines and a shift in student values toward careerism and away from personal self-exploration. She contends, however, that the colleges that emerged can serve as models for present-day institutions as they prepare to meet new challenges.

Kliewer said she chose to spotlight UW-Green Bay because of its history as an interdisciplinary, environmentally oriented institution. Also of interest were the widespread attention it received in higher education circles and its position as a distinctive public university in a largely mainstream, Midwestern higher education system.

There might be a simpler explanation for the sagging popularity of these Sixties-fad-inspired "alternative" models for the university.

The. Models. Didn't. Work.

The current administration at the Green Bay campus, however, is not yet ready to admit that. Back to the news story:

“We have made wonderful hires in education, the sciences, social sciences, humanities,” said Sue Hammersmith, provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs at UWGB. “We’ve hired an African-American Ph.D. in the education field. That’s going to be a significant plus for the university.”

For the color of his skin, or for the content of his curriculum vitae, Provost Hammersmith? I have some cards to fill in yet ...

The paragraph that precedes the provost's bragging is more telling.

Meanwhile, with the supply of new faculty instructors unable to keep up with the need created by the retirements — at UWGB and across the UW System — academic staff members have filled in the gaps and have become a larger percentage of those teaching on state campuses.

The reporter, however, has not taken a close enough look at reality.

Faculty members at UWGB and those at colleges and universities nationwide are reaching retirement age at the same time, and there aren’t enough people available to replace them, Hammersmith said.

“The one area where we were unsuccessful was in nursing, where there is a major shortage of faculty on the national market,” she said. “There are not nearly as many nursing Ph.D.s being produced as there are openings as people retire.

“The other reason is great competition for nurses — shortages in universities, technical colleges, and the medical field. Other tough areas are social work and business, although we did succeed in filing a business professorial position that had been open for three years.”

Also, the amount of federal funding available in the 1960s and 1970s used to train people for careers in higher education is no longer available because of severe budget cuts nationwide, Hammersmith said. Universities now compete with other industries for those with Ph.D.s.

It takes an average of six months to hire a professor, Hammersmith said. To address this issue, the university now advertises faculty openings in the fall and conduct interviews by January.

Academic staff members are paid less and are not eligible for tenure.

Data from the UW System show there were 5,416 full-time UW faculty members and 1,406 full-time academic staff members a decade ago. During the 2002-03 academic year, there were 6,718 full-time faculty members and 11,139 full-time academic staff.

Apparently, there is nobody available to correct the typographical errors and bring the faculty directory up to date at Green Bay's economics department, and a quick look at the English faculty and course offerings suggests that Green Bay is taking advantage of the industrial reserve army in that discipline. No doubt, however, there are plenty of dispersers of crying towels, assessors of the obvious and diversity boondogglers on campus.

Alas, the "there are plenty of retirements coming, get your Ph.D. now" bait-and-switch is getting a bit old. Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, you must be a Provost ...