Louisiana State’s Firing of Salty Professor Renews Worries About Faculty Rights

Louisiana State University has fired a tenured professor on its Baton Rouge campus against the advice of a faculty panel, raising new questions about the administration’s respect for shared governance and faculty rights.

The Louisiana State University system’s Board of Supervisors voted last week to uphold the firing of Teresa Buchanan, an associate professor of curriculum and instruction, based on accusations she had engaged in sexual harassment and violated the Americans With Disabilities Act.

F. King Alexander, the system’s president, had called for Ms. Buchanan’s dismissal even though a faculty panel that he had appointed to hear her case concluded that the ADA charges against her were unsubstantiated and that she did not deserve to lose her job over the sexual-harassment charges. The latter allegations stemmed mainly from complaints that she had used obscene language in front of students and had spoken disparagingly to them about the sex lives of married people at a time when she was going through a divorce.

Ms. Buchanan’s termination occurred as the Baton Rouge campus entered its third year under censure from the American Association of University Professors for its treatment of other faculty members, and at a time when colleges’ efforts to protect students are bumping up against professors’ free-speech rights.

The association took steps last year to reconsider the campus’s censure status, but Henry F. (Hank) Reichman, chairman of the AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, announced at the group’s annual meeting this month that LSU had ceased trying to come into compliance with the association’s standards.

Ms. Buchanan, who had spent 20 years on LSU’s faculty training teachers to work in early-childhood education, said on Thursday that she planned to sue the university for wrongful dismissal. In doing so, she said, she hoped to send a message “about there being some sort of consequence for the university for treating someone like that.”

Ernie Ballard, an LSU spokesman, refused on Thursday to discuss the university’s handling of Ms. Buchanan’s case because it is a personnel matter and might be the subject of litigation.

Kevin L. Cope, president of Louisiana State’s Faculty Senate, said he was alarmed by the university’s decision not to follow the recommendation of the faculty panel that had weighed the charges against Ms. Buchanan.

“This actually shows a weakness not only in our procedures, but in the procedures of most universities,” where such panel’s conclusions amount only to recommendations, he said. He argued that universities such as his own needed to reconsider policies that do not hold such panels’ findings to be binding.

Mr. Cope also said his institution needed to reconsider its sexual-harassment policy in light of administrators’ decision that Ms. Buchanan had run afoul of it by using obscene language and making generalized comments about sex. “We need to sharpen some of our definitions so we don’t have the linguistic equivalent of mission creep,” he said.

Cries of Foul

Ms. Buchanan’s case began in December 2013, when her dean informed her that she was being removed from her teaching duties pending an investigation into complaints leveled against her by a student and by Superintendent Edward Cancienne Jr., of the Iberville Parish School System, where she helped place and oversee teachers in training.

Both had accused her of using inappropriate language in her work with the system’s teachers and her own students. Mr. Cancienne, who on Thursday did not return a call and email seeking comment, had gone so far as to ban her from working in his school district.

The university’s human-resources office ended up accusing Ms. Buchanan of violating sexual-harassment policies with comments that included obscene language, sexual stereotypes about men, a warning to a female student about how men lose interest in relationships, and joking admonitions to students to use condoms to avoid derailing their academic careers. The office also accused her of violating the Americans With Disabilities Act by discussing one of her students’ attention-deficit disorder in the classroom.

In an interview on Thursday, Ms. Buchanan said that at the time the accusations arose, “I was in the middle of a divorce. I wasn’t at my best.” In explaining her use of obscene language, she also said she was often hard on her own students because “I have expectations of them.” She argued, however, that students should have come to her directly if they were bothered by anything she said.

The five-member faculty panel that heard her case, in March, said she had expressed some remorse but also had defended her use of such language as part of her teaching methodology. The panel also said university administrators had not given her an adequate opportunity to defend herself or to remediate her problem through training.

The panel said that Ms. Buchanan’s comments had violated the university’s sexual-harassment policy, but found that being put through a hearing process amounted to “an adequate punishment given the nature and apparent infrequency of the noted behaviors.” The panel unanimously urged that she be given a written censure, required to formally agree to stop using offensive language and jokes in her teaching, but allowed to stay in her job.

In an April letter announcing his decision to recommend her dismissal for cause, President Alexander told Ms. Buchanan he was responding to his human-resources office’s finding that she had violated the Americans With Disabilities Act and sexual-harassment policies. He made no mention of the faculty panel’s findings. LSU’s board discussed her case in closed session last week before voting to fire her.

Ms. Buchanan said on Thursday that she had been applying for jobs for a year with little success, which she blamed partly on her age, 53, and her being overqualified for many positions. In deciding to sue Louisiana State, she said, “I don’t have anything to lose.”

Peter Schmidt writes about affirmative action, academic labor, and issues related to academic freedom. Contact him at peter.schmidt@chronicle.com.