University of Minnesota faculty members are concerned about the Administrative Hiring Task Force. 

Provost Rachel Croson charged the task force to document and clearly explain the current hiring authority for center director positions at the University, without inclusion of academic freedom. 

The executive committee of the University’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors wrote to the task force asking members to resign. 

The task force, announced in July 2024 and officially charged on Nov. 25, 2024, was established in direct response to the  job offer to Raz Segal was rescinded after he said Israel’s military campaign in Gaza was “textbook genocide.”

The College of Liberal Arts interim Dean Ann Waltner offered Segal an academic position in the History department and a directorship position, as per CLA constitution’s hiring policy. Former Interim President Jeff Ettinger rescinded the offer. 

Former task force member Steven Ruggles said he disagreed with the decision.

“It seems to me that presidents shouldn’t get involved,” Ruggles said. “The idea that we’re going to be scared, that we can’t have somebody in that kind of position who is an expert on genocide and Holocaust studies, I mean that’s what the center does.”

Willam Jones, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) University chapter president, said every position at the University requires academic freedom as a protection, including directorships. 

“It’s not simply an administrative position, but it’s an academic position. And therefore academic freedom is really important for that position,” Jones said. “The Center of Holocaust Studies considers really controversial and difficult questions.”

In a letter to task force members, the AAUP said the task force fails to “encompass the central issue of academic freedom.” Jones said he is deeply concerned that the task force may ignore this concept.

“It’s a little bit puzzling. The goals shifted somewhat, and it wasn’t clear why that happened,” Jones said. “I suspect that it happened because if it was going to take on academic freedom, then it would have a much bigger charge.” 

Despite no direct reference to academic freedom in the charge, Task Force Chair William McGeveran said it is still a part of the work being done. 

“A lot of the policies that we’re looking at have components in them, including our tenure policy,” McGeveran said. “It’s naturally coming to be part of the conversation when you assess the landscape. So it is coming up and it’s being discussed.”

Croson’s involvement in this committee is also alarming to some faculty members. She received a vote of no confidence in the CLA assembly in June. Michael Gallope, the vice-chair of the CLA Assembly, was pivotal in the no-confidence vote. 

“This doesn’t make any sense. If someone is the recipient of a no-confidence vote from the Senate because of something they did, it is improper for this individual to subsequently appoint a handpicked committee to reconsider what the Senate already deliberated,” Gallope said.

Gallope said the issue surrounding administrative hiring is crucial and is concerned the task force will not be thorough enough. 

“You can’t run a University if you are afraid of disagreement or controversy. It just doesn’t work,” Gallope said. 

There is concern that this task force should have been created in the University Senate through one of the numerous standing committees. McGeveran said because the task force’s charge is so specific, its role takes place outside of shared governance.

“It’s meant to be an opportunity to interpret the existing policy, it’s not writing any policies, but interpreting,” McGeveran said. “Shared governance is where you assess policies and change them. That’s not what we’re doing. This task force isn’t organized to make decisions.”

Despite that, former member Ruggles chose to step down from the committee on Jan. 13 over concerns of overstepping shared governance. 

“I am persuaded by the argument that the task force undermines the University’s system of shared governance,” Ruggles said. “The task force is an ad hoc arrangement that bypasses the Faculty Senate and the Senate Committee on Faculty Affairs.”

The task force was charged to provide a report by March. McGeveran said that is still the goal.