When we saw the headline - "Man charged with stalking Crow" - on azcentral.com Wednesday, it seemed too good to be true. Somebody stalking ASU President Michael Crow? Wow, what a story! Let's get a reporter on that!
Then we clicked on the link and discovered that it was a man charged with stalking singer Sheryl Crow, not our Crow.
Even so, Michael Crow has become enough of a celebrity around these parts that an academic stalker wouldn't be that far out ... we here at The State Press can't even count how many times we've run his mug shot.
Crow is Changing our Directions. He's bringing in big private donations to ASU programs and colleges, spreading our One University to Many Places.
Another item on his agenda is tweaking the tenure process for ASU faculty.
Tenure is, in brief, a lifetime appointment to a professorship at a university.
It originated in 1940, when the American Association of University Professors defined tenure as: "(1) freedom of teaching and research and or extramural activities, and (2) a sufficient degree of economic security to make the profession attractive to men and women of ability. Freedom and economic security, hence, tenure, are indispensable to the success of an institution in fulfilling its obligations to its students and society" (The Chronicle of Higher Education 2000).
Tenure, which has been upheld by the Supreme Court, allows professors to say controversial or unpopular things without concern of losing their job - kind of an extension of freedom of speech. (Now if only we student journalists could get the 'economic security' part going for us, too!)
Professors can earn this through a tenure review process, which happens several years after they begin teaching and researching at the University.
Crow decided to become more involved in the tenure review process at ASU - now all the final decisions pass across his personal desk. He may also implement ad hoc committees that will study each candidate individually and make recommendations.
Crow says these changes only amount to implementation of the tenure system already in place.
People usually get worried when things are changing - and the changes Crow is pushing for will prove to be no exception.
But we think the changes in the tenure process are a good thing; they promise that the profs in front of our classes will be under more thorough scrutiny and be held to higher standards, thus delivering to us more valuable diplomas.
California has a new celebrity governor. And we've got a pseudo-celebrity president of our own.
While we've got no plans to stalk either of them, we'll be watching closely for the changes that inevitably will accompany their tenures in office.
