Via C&EN (article by Sam Lemonick), an update to the Kristie Koski saga:
The University of California, Davis, has granted tenure to physical chemist Kristie Koski. The decision ends one chapter of a 4-year saga of punishments, lawsuits, and recriminations that Koski has said is exacting a toll professionally and emotionally.
Koski, who joined the faculty at UC Davis in 2013, submitted her original tenure application in 2019. Her review process included a number of irregularities. The chair of her department, with whom Koski had had prior disagreements, produced a letter of censure against Koski during the chemistry faculty’s vote on her candidacy. It accused her of bullying or intimidating two trainees.
One trainee had not followed all the check-out steps when he left her lab for another job. Koski had voiced concerns to her chair that the other may have sexually harassed undergraduates he worked with. Koski was later cleared of any wrongdoing in the latter case...
I dunno what to say, other than that "academia is sometimes very weird." Glad it seems to have finally worked out for Professor Koski.
I have no understanding of academia as a workplace (I very specifically fled from there after I graduated). I just have to wonder why you'd want to continue fighting for tenure at an institution where there are clearly toxic people that see a bullseye on your back. Can she just leave and get a new tenure position at a different university? That might be the only reason I could see for fighting this fiercely (aside from personal principles).
ReplyDeleteIt was my understanding that someone with tenure at one institution was eligible to apply for a job as a full professor at a new institution but leaving without tenure the clock starts back at zero.
DeleteMy recollection of the academic chemistry world was that professors denied tenure would often be hired with full tenure at a lower-ranking department.
DeleteAgreed on academia as a workplace. Makes no sense to me. Glad I have been outside of it for 20 years.
ReplyDeleteI don't understand why they even bother having university HR departments. They look the other way at stuff that absolutely would not fly in the real world.
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