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Rutgers president could face no-confidence vote Friday after strike, months of controversy
By
Nancy Solomon
Published Sep 20, 2023
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By
Nancy Solomon
Published Sep 20, 2023
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Members of the Rutgers University Senate are considering a vote of no confidence against school President Jonathan Holloway — a rebuke just three years into his history-making term as the school’s first Black president.
A draft of the Senate’s resolution obtained by Gothamist accuses Holloway of “disdain for the diverse community of students, staff and faculty across all Rutgers campuses.” It says he’s dismissed a tradition of shared governance with the Senate, a mostly advisory body of faculty, staff and students.
The Senate meets Friday and requires a majority vote to place the no-confidence resolution on the agenda. If that initial vote does not pass, the resolution could instead be voted on at the Senate’s October meeting.
The conflict between Holloway and the Senate has been growing since at least the spring, during the runup to the school’s first-ever teachers strike. At the time, Holloway threatened to file an injunction “and potentially have academic workers arrested for exercising their right to withhold their labor,” the draft resolution says.
Holloway had repeatedly described the strike as “unlawful,” a move opposed more than 40 scholars of labor, social justice and African American history who penned a letter in objection.
Paul Boxer, a psychology professor at Rutgers-Newark and Senate executive committee member, confirmed the Senate will decide Friday whether to hold the no-confidence vote that day. There is widespread frustration about a series of decisions Holloway has made without Senate input, he said.
“We have public universities being run like privately held corporations, and that's completely unacceptable,” Boxer said.
At universities, there’s a tradition of what’s called shared governance — the idea that members of the campus community would have a say. But during Holloway’s tenure, critics allege the Rutgers Board of Governors, which holds most formal decision-making authority at the school, is basically a rubber-stamp for the president.
“And the notion that a president can make a unilateral decision in a public university to do things that go against shared governance, against policy, against the best interests of the voting faculty in the context of a large decision — it's just mind boggling,” Boxer said.
Rutgers Board of Governors Chairman William E. Best declined a request for an interview.
Two controversial decisions have come in the months since the faculty strike. The Board of Governors agreed to merge the Rutgers medical schools in New Brunswick and Newark at a meeting where doctors, professors, medical students and Newark community members spoke in opposition to the proposal — and no member of the public spoke in favor of it
A few weeks later, Holloway said he wouldn’t reappoint the popular chancellor of Rutgers-Newark, Nancy Cantor.
“To discard Chancellor Cantor is taking two steps backwards,” Mayor Ras Baraka wrote to Holloway in August. “It flies in the face of the collective work that we have been doing many times with Chancellor Cantor’s insistence, her commitment, and sheer will.”
Members of the University Senate reached by Gothamist say they were particularly upset with the decision on Newark chancellor because it contradicted a year-long assessment by a committee looking at her job performance.
“These important decisions that concern all of us, our entire academic community, should not be made unilaterally by the president,” Heather Pierce, a lecturer in the political science department and member of the Senate, said.
Shared governance has long been a principle recommended by the American Association of University Professors. And when it falls apart, university senates resort to votes of no confidence, Pierce said.
These important decisions that concern all of us, our entire academic community, should not be made unilaterally by the president.
Heather Pierce, a lecturer in the political science department and member of the Senate, said.
A no-confidence vote doesn’t, in itself, trigger any formal action. But Pierce has studied the impact of those votes at other colleges and universities. She said about half of the time, the university president either resigned or was fired in the aftermath.
In July, the Rutgers Senate passed a limited no-confidence vote that only addressed the merger of the medical schools. It also took emergency action to threaten a no-confidence vote during the strike. But whatever action the Senate takes Friday or in the coming weeks, it doesn’t have any direct say in Holloway’s standing as president.
“It would be up to the Board of Governors, who virtually have no oversight, not from the state, not from the university, not from the voters,” Pierce said.
The university’s administration declined a request for an interview, but its press office said in a written response Holloway has worked to strengthen shared governance since coming to Rutgers three years ago. The statement said that doesn't necessarily mean everyone will agree, but that Holloway will be responsive to Senate concerns.
Holloway wrote a letter to the Senate last week that directly addresses the concerns about shared governance. He said part of the problem may lie in holding online video meetings instead of meeting in person.
“I’d like to approach our work together differently as a result, to ensure there are more opportunities to work directly with Senators — the students, staff, faculty members, and alumni that make up this representative body,” he wrote.
Toward that end, he proposed measures including small-group meetings with members of the Senate in his home.
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