University faculty members concerned about the lack of professor involvement regarding recent and future changes to the University have asked the American Association of University Professors to evaluate the reorganization’s process.

“A month or two ago, a group of faculty contacted our office with concerns about what the Board of Supervisors had done in consolidating positions and also concerns about restructuring of the system,” said B. Robert Kreiser, associate secretary for the Department of Academic Freedom, Tenure and Governance. “In both of those areas, concerns were that they were acting without consultation to the faculty.”

Based on their review, AAUP’s members are preparing a letter to the Board of Supervisors and the University’s administration about the “extent to which the Board appears not to be acting in conformity with generally accepted standards of governance,” Kreiser said.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Hank Danos did not return The Daily Reveille’s phone calls Tuesday.

The AAUP cannot force LSU to comply with the principles and practices that are widely accepted in the academic community, Kreiser said.

“But when it doesn’t, the public — especially the academic public — becomes aware the degree of respect the University and the administration pay to the principles,” he said. “At LSU, it doesn’t seem like much.”

Faculty Senate President Kevin Cope said the public should know how the University is handling the merger and reorganization.

“The public needs to be put on notice that LSU is not doing its business according to the national standards, best practices and widely accepted professional norms,”          Cope said.

The University is already on the AAUP’s list of censured administrations because of the firings of Deputy Director of LSU’s Hurricane Center Ivor van Heerden and tenured senior professor Dominique Homberger, according to Kreiser.

“With the censure, job notices in many fields are listed with asterisks saying if they go to LSU, they will be going to an institution that does not show respect to academic freedom and tenure,” Kreiser said.

The situation does not reflect well on higher education in Louisiana and “the way in which the authorities — including political authorities — show their respect for higher education,” he said.

Cope said the Board of Supervisors has “blown LSU out of the water.”

“Why is it that suddenly it became an urgent matter to reorganize the institution?” Cope asked. “…The Board is acting on an obsession and an irrational act of faith.”