Skip to content
ADVERTISEMENT
Sign In
  • Sections
    • News
    • Advice
    • The Review
  • Topics
    • Data
    • Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
    • Finance & Operations
    • International
    • Leadership & Governance
    • Teaching & Learning
    • Scholarship & Research
    • Student Success
    • Technology
    • Transitions
    • The Workplace
  • Magazine
    • Current Issue
    • Special Issues
    • Podcast: College Matters from The Chronicle
  • Newsletters
  • Events
    • Virtual Events
    • Chronicle On-The-Road
    • Professional Development
  • Ask Chron
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Professional Development
    • Career Resources
    • Virtual Career Fair
  • More
  • Sections
    • News
    • Advice
    • The Review
  • Topics
    • Data
    • Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
    • Finance & Operations
    • International
    • Leadership & Governance
    • Teaching & Learning
    • Scholarship & Research
    • Student Success
    • Technology
    • Transitions
    • The Workplace
  • Magazine
    • Current Issue
    • Special Issues
    • Podcast: College Matters from The Chronicle
  • Newsletters
  • Events
    • Virtual Events
    • Chronicle On-The-Road
    • Professional Development
  • Ask Chron
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Professional Development
    • Career Resources
    • Virtual Career Fair
    Upcoming Events:
    Student Housing
    Serving Higher Ed
    Chronicle Festival 2025
Sign In
Shared Governance

AAUP Rebukes Southern U. at Baton Rouge Over Faculty Layoffs

By Peter Schmidt April 4, 2013

The American Association of University Professors has accused Southern University at Baton Rouge of violating basic principles of shared governance, tenure, and due process in laying off 19 tenured professors and shrinking faculty salaries during the last academic year.

To continue reading for FREE, please sign in.

Sign In

Or subscribe now to read with unlimited access for as low as $10/month.

Don’t have an account? Sign up now.

A free account provides you access to a limited number of free articles each month, plus newsletters, job postings, salary data, and exclusive store discounts.

Sign Up

The American Association of University Professors has accused Southern University at Baton Rouge of violating basic principles of shared governance, tenure, and due process in laying off 19 tenured professors and shrinking faculty salaries during the last academic year.

In a new report, the AAUP argues that faculty members were all but completely shut out of the process through which the Board of Supervisors of the Southern University system and the administration of its flagship at Baton Rouge declared that campus to be in a state of financial exigency in October 2011 to pave the way for layoffs.

The campus’s administration, the report says, similarly gave faculty members there little voice in deciding which faculty positions to terminate, and then laid off faculty members with far too little notice or regard for tenure rights.

“In some cases,” the report says, “department chairs were unaware that members of their department had been selected for layoff.” Nearly all faculty members’ appeals of their terminations were denied through a process the report characterizes as failing to meet AAUP standards.

The report, by an AAUP investigative committee, expresses doubt that the campus even had a big enough budget shortfall to warrant the declaration of financial exigency. It notes that during the 2011-12 academic year, the campus administration transferred nearly $2-million to a laboratory school and to athletics programs over the objections of the Faculty Senate. The added athletics spending was to deter the National Collegiate Athletic Association from demoting the campus from Division I to Division III.

At the same meeting in which it declared a financial emergency on the campus, the report says, the system’s Board of Supervisors voted to adopt new policies that limited faculty involvement in handling the crisis and curtailed the due-process rights of faculty members whose jobs were put on the chopping block. In doing so, it suspended policies that in 1987 got it off the AAUP’s censure list, where it had been for nearly 20 years after suspending or removing dissenting faculty members without cause in the late 1960s.

Censure Vote Expected

The administration initially did let the Baton Rouge campus’s Faculty Senate participate in an effort to get tenured faculty members there to pledge to accept 10-percent reductions in their salaries through voluntary furloughs. The administration scrapped that effort, however, and moved on its own to cut salaries by 10 percent, the report says, when furlough pledges were signed by just 60 percent of faculty members rather than the 90 percent it had sought.

Edward Pratt, a university spokesman, declined this week to comment on the AAUP report. In a letter reprinted in the report, the campus administration argues that it “did everything possible to avoid fiscal exigency” and could not have balanced its budget over the past two academic years without such a declaration. It disputes the report’s assertions regarding its effort to save money through voluntary furloughs, saying that many faculty members retracted their pledges once it became clear others were not on board.

The AAUP’s report on the Baton Rouge campus comes as the association is moving to revise its guidelines for colleges that are considering declarations of financial exigency. Nevertheless, Jennifer J. Nichols, a senior program officer in the association’s department of academic freedom, tenure, and governance, said in an e-mail that the conclusions in the report on Southern University would have been the same even if the proposed new guidelines had been applied.

The association is expected to vote on whether to censure Southern University at Baton Rouge at its annual meeting, in June. The institution is one of several public colleges in Louisiana that have run afoul of the AAUP in recent years. Southern University’s New Orleans campus was placed on the AAUP’s censure list in 2007, but then taken off after it reinstated most of the professors whose furloughs had triggered the action.

We welcome your thoughts and questions about this article. Please email the editors or submit a letter for publication.
Share
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Email
About the Author
Peter Schmidt
Peter Schmidt was a senior writer for The Chronicle of Higher Education. He covered affirmative action, academic labor, and issues related to academic freedom. He is a co-author of The Merit Myth: How Our Colleges Favor the Rich and Divide America (The New Press, 2020).
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

More News

Protesters gather outside the Department of Education headquarters in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 14, 2025 to protest the Trump administrations cuts at the agency.
An Uncertain Future
The Education Department Got a Green Light to Shrink. Here Are 3 Questions About What’s Next.
Susie West and Dianne Davis-Keening, U of M Extension SuperShelf coordinators.
A 'Connector' Severed
Congress Cut a Federal Nutrition Program, Jeopardizing Campus Jobs and Community Services
PPP 10 FINAL promo.jpg
Bouncing Back?
For Once, Public Confidence in Higher Ed Has Increased
University of California, Berkeley chancellor Dr. Rich Lyons, testifies at a Congressional hearing on antisemitism, in Washington, D.C., U.S., on July 15, 2025. It is the latest in a series of House hearings on antisemitism at the university level, one that critics claim is a convenient way for Republicans to punish universities they consider too liberal or progressive, thereby undermining responses to hate speech and hate crimes. (Photo by Allison Bailey/NurPhoto via AP)
Another Congressional Hearing
3 College Presidents Went to Congress. Here’s What They Talked About.

From The Review

Photo-based illustration with repeated images of a student walking, in the pattern of a graph trending down, then up.
The Review | Opinion
7 Ways Community Colleges Can Boost Enrollment
By Bob Levey
Illustration of an ocean tide shaped like Donald Trump about to wash away sandcastles shaped like a college campus.
The Review | Essay
Why Universities Are So Powerless in Their Fight Against Trump
By Jason Owen-Smith
Photo-based illustration of a closeup of a pencil meshed with a circuit bosrd
The Review | Essay
How Are Students Really Using AI?
By Derek O'Connell

Upcoming Events

07-31-Turbulent-Workday_assets v2_Plain.png
Keeping Your Institution Moving Forward in Turbulent Times
Ascendium_Housing_Plain.png
What It Really Takes to Serve Students’ Basic Needs: Housing
Lead With Insight
  • Explore Content
    • Latest News
    • Newsletters
    • Letters
    • Free Reports and Guides
    • Professional Development
    • Events
    • Chronicle Store
    • Chronicle Intelligence
    • Jobs in Higher Education
    • Post a Job
  • Know The Chronicle
    • About Us
    • Vision, Mission, Values
    • DEI at The Chronicle
    • Write for Us
    • Work at The Chronicle
    • Our Reporting Process
    • Advertise With Us
    • Brand Studio
    • Accessibility Statement
  • Account and Access
    • Manage Your Account
    • Manage Newsletters
    • Individual Subscriptions
    • Group and Institutional Access
    • Subscription & Account FAQ
  • Get Support
    • Contact Us
    • Reprints & Permissions
    • User Agreement
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
    • California Privacy Policy
    • Do Not Sell My Personal Information
1255 23rd Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20037
© 2025 The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education is academe’s most trusted resource for independent journalism, career development, and forward-looking intelligence. Our readers lead, teach, learn, and innovate with insights from The Chronicle.
Follow Us
  • twitter
  • instagram
  • youtube
  • facebook
  • linkedin