Senate Schedules Forums To Discuss Report
THE LANCE
A Weekly Journal of News and Events
At St. Andrews Presbyterian College
LAURE^URG, NORTH CAROLINA, THURSDAY, APRIL 15,1976
Inauguratign Boycott Seen Likely
NUMBER 22
[ VOLUME 15 'THE LANCE, THURSDAY, APRIL 15,1976
Here’s The Text Of The
Report On The Smith Case
March 24, 1976
To the Faculty;
I am releasing this report of
Faculty Personnel
'roblems Subcommittee to
lou because I believe that the
Irocedural issues raised here
of significant concern to
the faculty.
Respectfully,
^ Mark L. Smith
REPORT
of Ihe Subcommittee of the
i Faculty Executive Committee
on Faculty Personnel
^Problems concerning M^k L.
jSmith, Assistant Professor of
JArt at St. Andrews
jPresbyterian College.
February 20, 1976
[I. BACKGROUND
On January 22, 1976, Mark
L. Smith, Assistant Professor
of Art at St. Andrews
Presbyterian College, Laurin-
burg, Nffl-th Carolina, was
notified by Victor C. Arnold,
Dean of the College and Vice
President for Academic Af
fairs that upon action of the
Board of Trustees he would
not receive tenure. In the
tenure review process as
outlined in Faculty Handbook
and in the document entitled,
“The Restructuring of
Faculty Organizations and
Committees,” dated May 7,
1974, his division council, his
division chairman, and the
Faculty Committee on
Leaves, Promotion, and
Tenure all recommended that
Professor Smith be granted
tenure. After the committee
This Week
TONIGHT: WSAP’s Album of the Week is a new release by the
group Kingfish and is called, appropriately enough,
“Kingfish.” You can hear it - uninterrupted by commercial
messages - at 10:30 p.m. on WSAP, 640 AM or 91.1 FM.
FRIDAY, APRIL 16: Poet Basil Bunting opens his visit to St.
Andrews with a conversation with Joiathan Williams and Tom
Meyer in the Liberal Arts auditorium at 7:30 p.m. Free.
SATURDAY, APRIL 18? NBC’S “Saturday Night” show
- * presents presidential press secretary Ron Nessen as gues
host. 11:30 p.m. on WSOC-TV, Channel 9.
Sunday, April 18-The College Union Board movie for this
week will be “Duck Soup” “Duck Soup” was the Marx Broker’s
cliniatic moment at Paramount. They shared the billing with no
one and were assigned director Leo McCarey, one of the top
directors on the lot, and a genuine genius of comedy. As Prime
Minister Firefly of Freedonia, Groucho soon reduces Queen
Margaret Dunomt’s kingdom to a shambles. Harpo and Chico
appear as peanut vendors who become secret agents. Zeppo
rounds out the gang as Firefly’s secretary and straight man.
“The most surprising thing about this film is that I did not go
mad...they were completely crazy,” said director McCarey.
Allen Eyles in The Marx Brothers added, “‘Duck Soup’ is the
most highly regarded of the Marxes’ pictures. Groucho himself
thinks it’s the craziest...it is the most mint-fresh today and wiU
be timelessly funny.” Free.
MONDAY, APRIL 19: A Reading by Basil bunting in GranvQle
Hall’s main lounge. 8:00 p.m.; free.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 21: “Nosferatu”, a 1922 silent horror
film. 7 p.m. in Avinger Auditorium. Free.
recommended tenure. Dean
Arnold and President Alvin P.
Perkinson, Jr. agreed that
President Perkinson would
not recommend Professor
Smith for tenure to the Board
of Trustees,
n. INVESTIGATION
As a result of this action, on
January 27, 1976, Professor
Mark L. Smith submitted the
following letter to this sub
committee:
I am making this formal
request that you as members
of the Faculty Personnel sub
committee of the Faculty
Executive Committee review
the substance and procedures
involved with the recent
denial of my tenure ap
plication.
I do not feel that a
judicious or appropriate
evaluation of my competence
has been made or that the
proscribed sequence of
decisions has been adhered
to.
(Continued On Page 4)
Craft Center
Show Set
Craft Center director June
Williams has announced that
persons who participated in
the Winter Term glassblowing
course can pick up their pieces
in the office of Dr . David Wet-
more in the Science Building.
Williams told “The Lance”
that a showing of products of
the crafts center is planned for
the period between April 26
and May 7. The exhibit case
(CwitinuedOnPagell)
St. Andrews cyclists
take a short break on
their 105 mile ride to
sunset beach last
Saturday. See story
page 11. (Photo
courtesy of Rooney
Coffman).
An open break with the
college administration by the
student association seems
likely in the wake of the
Senate’s meeting Monday
night, at which the report of
the Personnel Subcommittee
of th Faculty Executive Com
mittee on the denial of tenure
to art professor Mark Smith
was made public by student
association {X’esident Keith
Gribble and Senate President
Steve Elkins.
The report, which appears
■in this iooue of The Laiiet in its
entirety was received with
disgust, to use the most
frequently voiced adjective
used to describe it at ttie
meeting.
Gribble and Senate prsident
Steve Elkins said the reason
they were making the report
public was the failure of the
faculty to discuss it in any way
at its Mffliday meeting. The.
pair told the senators that the
report had been released by
Smith to the faculty on March
24 and that there had surely
been enough time since then to
come to a discussion. They
went on to say that inquiries
made of various faculty mem
bers as to why the report was
not on the agenda were not
particularly infonnative. The
majority of the explanations
they received, Gribble and
Elkins said, were that the time
was not right and that to press
the matter too hard in a public
forum might back the
president into a comer and
cause him to “dig in his
heels,” eliminating the
possibility of a review and/or
reveral of the January 22
decision of the Board of
Trustees to deny tenure to
anith on the basis of recom
mendations by President
Perkinson and Dean of the
College Victor C. Arnold.
“They’ve been saying that
kind of thing all along,” Grib
ble sakl. “There are only five
weeks left in the school year
and if (Perkinson) can ju:^
draw it out that long it’ll be a
dead issue.”
Senate response to the
report took two principal for
ms. The first was the dorm
forums to discuss the situation
with the student associatio
and devise various ways of
registering discontent with the
Smith situation more ef
fectively than has been the
case with the number of
Senate-initiated letters and
petitions that have been sent
to the president and the Dean
since the affair began in
January. The firm forum will
be held in Orange Hall tonight
at 7 pm; the second will be
held in Granville Hall at 9 pm.
The other response took the
form of a unanimous Senate
resolution asking that THE
LANCE print the report in its
entirety. Editor Lin Thomp
son, a senator from GranviUe,
agreed to comply with the
request.
An expected avenue of
protest will be the boycotting
of the events surrounding the
inauguration of President
Perkinson April 22. Exactly
how to maximize the effect of
such protests is expected to be
one of the principal topics of
discussion at the dorm forums
tonight.
Elections Underway
Student Association elec
tions get underway today as
five o’clock marks the end of
the period in which candidates
file for office.
Up for grabs are all cabinet
posts, the presidencies of the
college Union Board and the
College Christian Council, and
a number of seats on the
Judicial Board and Aj^ellate
Boards. Dorm forums in
which the candidates meet the
voters, will be held on the 19th
and 20th; on the 19th they will
be held for the residents of
Wilmington and Geranville
together and for the residents
of Meek and Winston-Salem.
On the 20th the forums will be
for the residents of Caicord
and Albemarle and for Orange
by itself.
Elections wiU be held April
22 and any runoffs made
necessary by the voters will be
held on April 23.
Dorm elections, which in
volve the selection of
presidents and vice presidents
who wiU serve in the senate,
will begin with the self
nominating process on April
29. Dorm forums will be held
on May 3, with elections on
May 4 and runoffs on May 6.