SENDING LETTERS TO THE REPORTER
The reporter welcomes letters from the readers commenting on its stories and content. Letters should be limited to 800 words and may be edited for style and length. Because of space limitations, the Reporter cannot publish all letters recieved. They must be recieved by 9 a.m. Monday to be considered for publication in that week's issue

Clarifying remark made at meeting with Provost

Editor:

I am writing this letter to clarify the out-of-context publication (in the April 3 issue) of a part of my comment made at the March 27th meeting of engineering faculty with the Provost.

The current enrollment crisis was a topic of discussion in this meeting.

I commented that in the last few years to fulfill our enrollment goals we have admitted students who are ill-prepared in math and sciences. I suggested that we should seriously think about offering a remedial math course to improve their math skills and we may be able, thereby, to reduce the current attrition rate. This is not a new idea. In a recent book on American colleges titled "Bright College Years: Inside The American Campus Today," the author reports that remedial math is one of the highest-enrolled courses in U.S. colleges.

I also commented that to reduce the attrition rate, the instructors of freshman courses at UB must improve their personal interaction with students, provide encouragement for learning and show real concern for their education. In this context, I mentioned that a number of students in my sophomore engineering mechanics class have complained that they felt intimidated by their freshman instructors at UB. They mentioned that, for example, in introductory physics classes, students are told to look to their left and look to their right, and told that one of them won't pass the course.

Recently, after publication of your story, I again asked my junior class about this "look to left and look to right" comment. Their recollections are specific but further public argument on this issue will be unproductive. The physics department might want to refer to a recent survey of engineering students published in the Nov. 22, 1996, issue of "The Engineers' Angle."

In retrospect, my specific comment concerning the reported attitude of some instructors in introductory physics hurting our retention rate was not carefully phrased and was certainly undiplomatic. I had no idea that there was a reporter in the room and the content of our discussion would be published as a news report. I certainly overstated my hearsay evidence to sharpen the debate. In my opinion, engineering, mathematics and physics at UB should work together to develop our engineering students' ability to think about and understand fundamental concepts without feeling intimidated.

Sincerely,
Shahid Ahmad
Associate Chairman
Department of Civil Engineering

Has fair solution to issue of graduate athletics fee

Editor:

I believe that I have a fair solution to the question of whether or not graduate and professional students should be required to pay an athletics fee. All new graduate students should be required to pay the fee at the same rate that undergraduate students pay. For existing students the fee should be listed on their tuition bills as an optional payment. If they pay it they will be allowed to enter athletic contests free as all other students. If they do not pay they should be required to pay to go to the games. Those students who do not pay the fee should also not be allowed to use any of the athletic facilities at UB.

This is a fair system because the incoming students cannot complain about being given a new fee while in school, since the fee is being imposed on them from the time that they matriculate at UB. Those graduate students already at UB will have an option to get a benefit for paying a fee, and if they do not pay the fee they will not get certain benefits that they now receive for free.

Ronald Balter
Class of 1980
via e-mail

First they came for Statistics; then they came for UB

Talk about "DEJA-VU ALL OVER AGAIN." Eight years ago, an article appeared in the Reporter, over the by line of David M. Snyderman, entitled "Statistics: home, sweet home in the Medical School?" I wish to inform the readers of the Reporter that the issue of the existence of the Department of Statistics has emerged yet again, but this time the consequences are not only dire for the discipline of statistics, but also for the entire campus of SUNY at Buffalo, and its conduct as the flagship center of the SUNY system.

This sad tale begins May 1996. I, as chairman of the Department of Statistics, was called into the office of John Naughton, dean of the UB medical school, who informed me that Provost Headrick had decided to merge Statistics with the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine (SPM). However, it appears that it was Dean Naughton himself who put forward this proposal and that, further, the use of the word "merger" was a smoke screen. Naughton's proposal called for the disappearance of the Department of Statistics and its Biostatistics Unit, as well as its undergraduate majors program and its graduate programs. Because of this announcement, I sought an appointment with Provost Tom Headrick, and met with him in his office in early June 1996. I presented the case for the continued existence of the department to him, and it was agreed at the end of that meeting that the provost would think about this case, and give his decision "soon." In fact it was four (4!) months later in a letter to me, dated Oct. 2, 1996, that he reaffirmed the decision that in essence Statistics be amalgamated into SPM: "Šamong the options UB has, I believe your dean's recommendation is the preferred path." Also, "...Statistics within SPM will play an important but supportive role in a research and intellectual enterprise not (emphasis mine) focused on the main theoretical concerns in statistics as a discipline." Those learned in Greek and Latin will understand the translation‹from now on, statisticians, you will not practice your profession, but assist SPM members with using the products of the Discipline of Statistics to set up studies, clinical trials, etc., and analyze and help interpret the data so generated. But as far as teaching and research in statistics, well, that's to be terminated.

So much for collegiality and academic freedom at UB. Never mind that this would bring our Consulting Lab's activities, available to all researchers on this campus, inside and outside the School of Medicine, to a halt. And never mind that our undergraduate major and master's program would be terminated; this, in spite of the provost's oft-stated support of such programs, especially, as in the case of Statistics, if they lead to jobs. Never mind that we take care of the teaching of introductory courses in statistics, needed by undergraduates in fulfillment of their general education requirements, etc., etc., ad nauseam.

How was the decision made? Exclusively by Dean Naughton and Provost Headrick conferring, that is to say, no apparent faculty input, and certainly no input from the Department of Statistics was made or sought. Why was this decision made? Incredibly, this momentous move of destroying Statistics and its programs has not had any published justification by the administration to back it up. None, whatsoever!!

I must explain that I arrived on campus in 1993, having answered an ad for the position of chairman of statistics. Until sometime before 1973, this was one of the pre-eminent departments of statistics in the U.S.A. But in the period 1973-75, that department started to break up‹some faculty went to Harvard, Minnesota, Texas, etc. The department, since that time, except for a small hiccup in 1992-94, was neglected by the administration of UB. It had been weakened, and kept weak: Dean Naughton once remarked to me that the department was not neglected, it was abused. So, true to form, he initiated this amalgamation of Statistics into SPM. (Incidentally, in spite of the foregoing, the provost keeps using the fact that we are weak to justify this cessation of disciplinary activities in statistics at UB. In invoking the "Statistics is weak" argument, he also ignores the fact that I was brought in to strengthen the department, and that commitment to me for various resources at the time of my hiring have not been forthcoming, and are necessary to build up the department.)

However, I objected to this amalgamation and wrote Dr. Alan Saltzman a letter on Sept. 9, 1996, asking him, in his capacity of president of the Faculty Council of the School of Medicine, to have a committee look into this matter. This was done, and the report of this committee is scathing about this proposal being initiated without the consequences to the School of Medicine, in particular, and UB, in general, being thoroughly explored. It points out that there is a danger that if this proposed amalgamation goes through, "There will be no pure statisticians on campus who could develop new methods required to cope with unusual problems and new problems that result from the expansion of scientific inquiry."

We note here that statistics is the study of the experimental method. The implication of this is that by its very nature, statistics is interdisciplinary in scope. We are not a "Department of Egyptology" in that our products are used, and extensively used, in almost every branch of science, be it social or physical science.

We address, in our own research, issues such as: Given a general experimental situation, what is the best experimental design that should be utilized, and what is the best way to analyze the data in light of the purposes of the experiment? (Here, the term experiment is used in its broadest sense, and includes polling, clinical trials, studies of different educational methods, plant-wide experiments in industry, etc., etc.) We also study the effect of, and how best to incorporate, prior information, and broadly speaking, study the nature of scientific inference and the role of statistical inference. Statistics is a thriving and exciting discipline‹some 20 major research journals in the English language alone attest to this fact.

And turning to the education of our students, in this day and age when society is continually bombarded with poll results, statistics about our economy, etc., it is vital that all students take at least an introductory course in this discipline to get an inkling of what the discipline is about, to say the least. And their contact with this mathematical science serves to sharpen logical thinking. However, none of the above seems to matter with our educators at the top at UB.

There is a lot more to say about the process that led to this ill-conceived proposal. Unfortunately, it now has a life of its own, so that despite a strong case for a viable and flourishing Statistics Department to exist at UB (as affirmed in the extensive 1988 Triggle Report), the interim dean of the School of Medicine, Dr. John Wright, is undergoing his own review of the merger, and doing this in a way that contradicts the spirit of a resolution passed at the School of Medicine's own Executive Committee meeting of April 17, 1997, which urges in-depth reviews of any proposed "merger." Hence, the threat of amalgamation, premised purely on administrative fiat, is still with us, with the danger that Dean Wright will push this amalgamation through this summer, based on an inadequate review, and when, of course, relatively few faculty and students are around.

But all this is not without cost. I am referring to the fact that I have received, and am receiving, strong support from the statistical community outside of SUNY. People talk, and although I have been careful not to stress our predicament outside UB, bad news travels fast. Indeed, besides the numerous telephone calls, I have received letters of support from the presidents of the American Statistical Association and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, two of the largest Statistical Associations in the U.S.A., if not the world, and I have received other letters from various distinguished statisticians. For example, Professor Herman Chernoff, Harvard University, a National Academy of Sciences member; Professor Seymour Geisser, head of the School of Statistics at the University of Minnesota, and as well, Professor T. Louis, chair of the Division of Biostatistics at Minnesota. Inside UB, I have received letters of support from Professor J. Boot, Management Science (and an informed user of statistics and where it comes from), and Professor K.D. Magill, Department of Mathematics, who was chair of the Search Committee that brought me to UB, and who, of course, is knowledgeable about statistics and its mathematical underpinnings. Space requirements do not allow quotes from these letters and phone calls, unfortunately, but these letters and the interesting article mentioned at the outset of this discussion that appeared in the Reporter in 1989, are available at our website. The address of our website is http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~dschmidt/fac.html/‹I urge the readers of this article to consult this website to more fully appreciate the gravity of the situation.

As to these letters and phone calls from outside the university, I must say, that although I welcome them, I worry about them at the same time. For if events do not proceed in such a way as to clear the air, who will encourage young Ph.D.s to join the faculty at Buffalo, where such a narrow-minded attitude to our discipline, as well as other important disciplines, reigns supreme? I take this matter up later in this article.

It is to be borne in mind that the consultative process that led us to this predicament is anti-collegial. A dean proposes and discusses (maybe) amalgamation of Statistics into SPM with the provost‹that is to say, shamefully, there was not to be any faculty input, discussion, or study about this proposal. We are a first example of this. What I mean when I say this has to do with the fact that UB is now preoccupied with the study of a Planning Report made by Provost Headrick. However, this planning report emerged largely without faculty input. For example, on page 120 of the copy that I received, there appears a choice quote (with no explanation before or after)‹the quote is: "Plans to merge Biophysics with Physiology and Statistics with Social and Preventive Medicine should move forward." It is interesting that Provost Headrick would couple a true merger with our case, trying, I suppose, to give our case the facade of a true merger, rather than an amalgamation. Indeed, Biophysics and Physiology have merged, and it is a true merger‹the new department is called "Biophysics and Physiology," and not only the name of one of the two merging departments. Recall that the Naughton-Headrick merger of "Statistics with SPM" calls for an amalgamation of Statistics into SPM, and that the expanded department was to be called SPM. Further, no programs from either Biophysics or Physiology have been lost, unlike the case of our absorption into SPM, should it occur. Neither set of professionals in Biophysics or Physiology have been asked to serve the other, that is, they have not been asked not to practice their profession. In fact, the merger of Biophysics and Physiology has been in the discussion stage, for at least two years that I know of, and possibly more.

And I must remind you that this planning report, because it was written and appeared with practically no faculty input (as distinct from deans and certain vice presidents), has not been well received. Recall the example of Professor William Allen, a distinguished UB historian, when discussing the Planning Report in front of the provost, declaring that in 30 years, other historians will say, "that a good university was destroyed by Tom Headrick." Further, the Faculty Senate has initiated studies, by various committees, of the consequences of certain facets of this Planning Report. The administration has chosen to effectively ignore these reports, for certain decisions. For example, they have announced that the decision about the reorganization of Arts and Sciences is to be taken in July, when nobody will be around, and very little time will have elapsed for proper study of the Faculty Senate's reports, by both faculty and the provost and president. And the danger sketched above as a result of the reaction of the USA's Statistics Community, holds true for various other intellectual communities outside UB, and they are reacting adversely‹bad news travels fast!

And one hears, again, about other ridiculous proposals (with no consultation of the faculty) for mergers. The latest example that I have heard about is that of Pathology with Anatomy.

Yes, indeed, first they came for Statistics, and now they have come for UB.

I do hope that my colleagues of UB will protest the treatment of Statistics, and the treatment of other disciplines in general, by contacting the Provost (Thomas Headrick) and the President (William Greiner). I have touched on some of the dangers, exposed since May 1996‹and they are real. The quality of education afforded by UB is at stake. And the decision as to what programs remain and what programs should cease, is, as the example of Statistics illustrates, not thought through nor adequately studied, and this is only the tip of the iceberg. In my opinion, we should all be contacting the provost and the president and protest in the strongest terms.

For convenience, their addresses and phone numbers are:

Provost Thomas Headrick-Office of the Provost, State University of New York at Buffalo, 562 Capen Hall, Amherst, N.Y. 14260 (716) 645-2992

President William Greiner-Office of the President, State University of New York at Buffalo, 506 Capen Hall, Amherst, N.Y. 14260 (716) 645-2901

Irwin Guttman
Chairman
Department of Statistics

Another view on reorganization plan

Although many innovative reorganization plans have already been discussed, I would like to present another one for your consideration.

Establish the following three board divisions of our core academic faculty, which includes the Arts and Sciences faculty and members of professional faculty who participate in university-wide teaching programs:

­ Division A of Arts, Letters and Social Sciences as outlined in one of the provost's alternative plans. The breadth of this division provides more flexibility for constructive rearrangement of its programs.

­ Division B of Physical, Mathematical and Applied Sciences. Some engineers and information scientists may want to join this division without necessarily relinquishing their present roles in professional schools. Science students with additional engineering knowledge will have more employment opportunities after graduation. Engineering students with deeper knowledge in science will have a greater potential to develop new technology after the state-of-art skills they learned today become obsolete. A closer cooperation between science and engineering faculties will enable both groups to recruit brighter students.

­ Division C of Life Sciences. More faculty members in the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, School of Dental Medicine, and School of Pharmacy may want to join this division to participate in university-wide teaching programs without necessarily giving up completely their responsibilities in the professional schools. Biology majors with additional health-related knowledge will have a wider range of employment opportunities. The designation life sciences includes the study of both living beings and their environment. It also conveys an implicit moral incentive that could help to attract superior students into this division without duplicating the names of health-related professional schools at UB. In view of the great potential for future development in neuroscience, it would be nice if the Department of Psychology could join this division.

Each division will have a director or associate provost who reports directly to the provost. This will shorten the line of communication between faculty and the president, and remove some of the communication barriers. The appointment of a new all-embracing dean of Arts and Sciences will create an even higher barrier, because then each proposal will have to be pre-examined by one of his new associate deans with proper competence in that field before it reaches the new dean, since he does not know everything. His associate deans will then be actually doing the work of the present deans but without the authority to decide on academic matters or direct access to the Provost's Office on fiscal matters. Without the incentive of making important decisions, we cannot expect these new associate deans to be as motivated as the present deans in meeting challenges with enthusiasm and dedication. Consequently, the appointment of an all-embracing dean of arts and sciences will delay communication between the faculty and the provost or president.

Each division is responsible for both graduate and undergraduate education programs in their field, and hence the undesirable separation of research and teaching is avoided. All the brilliant undergraduates I talked with expressed the desire to have some experience in research before graduation, and that is why many of them prefer universities to four-year colleges.

While the breadth of each division will encourage interdisciplinary collaboration, each designated academic program should have a reasonable degree of autonomy so that its endeavor can be steered by a much smaller group of the best informed people to move forward rapidly and harmoniously.

The core academic faculty with three broad divisions is wider in scope than a College of Arts and Sciences, although both will be more flexible than the present organizational structure with three deans. The removal of present decanal barriers will allow possible merging or transfer of departments across traditional boundaries, and encourage jointly taught courses. The resulting elimination of instructional and administrative redundancy will lead to savings in both university budget and student time.

The savings in budget could be used as seed money for development of interdisciplinary centers or programs in areas of the greatest promise. The savings in student time due to elimination of redundant content in required courses will leave more credit hours in curricula for elective courses, and will make UB more attractive. As a result we could raise the number and quality of applicants for admission as well as the retention rate of registered students after the first or second year.

In the proposed academic core, the closer interaction between arts and sciences faculty and professional faculty will enhance the vitality of each and improve the university as a whole. By contrast, establishing a College of Arts and Sciences under a single dean will further insulate the Arts and Sciences core, we must not forget about its interdependent relationship with the rest of the university apple.

Many universities have the position of dean of Arts and Sciences with different job description. For example, Harvard University does not have a provost, but has a dean of Arts and Sciences in charge of the entire academic core budget, which is equal in amount to the total budget of Princeton University, and reports directly to the president. For the present situation at UB, the appointment of a new vice provost for each of the above three divisions could shorten the response time in dealing with difficult problems and their collective wisdom will enable the provost to take a breath once in a while. The replacement of three deans by the new associate provosts will also reduce the total administration budget if the latter already function as deans in other capacities that complement their new responsibilities. For example, if the SEAS dean also serves as vice provost of Division B, he could effectively promote the collaboration between scientists and engineers without making the NSM faculty worry about their autonomy or EAS faculty worry about their professional standing. If the Graduate School dean also serves as vice provost of Division C, he could effectively encourage the cooperation between HS faculty and NSM faculty via the established guidelines of Graduate School and the tuition waiver program.

Jui H. Wang
Einstein Professor of Science

Goal of hiring own best applicants is wrong

Editor:

In the May 15 issue of the Reporter, Professor Bernice Noble is reported to have noted that MIT has increased the representation of women on its chemistry faculty because the department is hiring "the most outstanding of its own chemistry graduates" in tenure-track positions. This reference to MIT chemistry is a mis-statement of a letter to the Reporter written by UB Department of Chemistry Professor Joseph Gardella, who referred to the MIT Department of Chemical Engineering. Gardella would be among the first to admit that his views are his own and do not reflect those of the majority of the faculty of the Department of Chemistry. In my humble opinion, the assertion that UB departments should make a goal of hiring their own best graduates is wrong. In academics as in biology, in-breeding leads to reduction of viability. If one wishes to improve the quality of one's department, one should hire the best graduates from BETTER departments. Of 32 faculty (2 female) in the MIT Department of Chemistry, 10 male faculty had B.S. (2), Ph.D. (6) or post-doctoral affiliations (2) with MIT; none of the female faculty had prior affiliations with MIT. Of 34 faculty (4 female) in the MIT Department of Chemical Engineering 11 male faculty (1, 9, 1) and three female faculty (1, 1, 1) had B.S., Ph.D. or post-doctoral affiliations with MIT. The MIT departments of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering each are probably in the top five (many would say #1) in the world in terms of graduate research. MIT has little choice; as one of the best, they must hire some of their own if they are to maintain their reputation. Such is not the case at UB. If MIT were hiring UB graduates, I could support Noble's/Gardella's argument. Sadly, this is not so (although one of our distinguished B.S. alumni is on the MIT Chemistry faculty). If we are to aspire to this goal, we must hire the best applicants, regardless of their academic parentage/gender/race/etc. I believe that it is possible to increase the representation of women and under-represented minorities in our faculty, while continuing to hire the best candidates, UB alumni included but not targeted.

Sincerely,
Jerome B. Keister
Professor and Chair, Department of Chemistry