LINCOLN — Faculty groups and administrators at the University of Nebraska lined up Tuesday to oppose a legislative proposal to end faculty tenure, with many saying it could handicap NU.

State Sen. Loren Lippincott of Central City, who introduced Legislative Bill 1064, said he feels the “pendulum” has swung too far toward protecting professors instead of students and away from merit and performance. His bill would eliminate tenure as an option for faculty in NU and the Nebraska State College System, as well as community colleges that don’t currently offer it.

Lippincott said his goal is not to stifle academic freedom but to put benchmarks in place and allow for more transparency. He offered a comparison between higher education and a farm.

“A lot of these horses plowed the field very straight when they were young and they were earning their tenure,” Lippincott told the Legislature’s Education Committee. “But then those horses ended up staying in the barn and just simply eating hay.”

‘A club of one’

Interim NU President Chris Kabourek, the first person to testify in opposition at the hearing, framed tenure as something NU needed in its “toolbox.” He said that while he is a strong supporter of academic freedom and tenure, he does not support lifetime job guarantees; yet, tenure is not an easy feat.

“It takes years of work and a proven record and scholarly performance and productivity, and that’s good news for Nebraska,” Kabourek said.

Should LB 1064 pass, Kabourek added, it would put NU at a “great competitive disadvantage” to peer institutions as he predicted that faculty would look elsewhere for positions.

“Eliminating tenure would tie both hands behind our back at the very time our university is setting high aspirations to go compete with the best of the best throughout the country,” he said.

Luke McDermott, on behalf of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s student government, said it takes the most talented researchers five to six years to obtain tenure and that, without the protections it offers, no professor seeking long-term work would choose Nebraska.

“We’ll be the last choice for the academic job market,” McDermott said.

McDermott said the bill could also worsen brain drain and drive away prospective students.

Lawmakers in other states have unsuccessfully tried to ban tenure through similar measures, Lippincott said, noting that efforts have stalled in South Carolina and Iowa but advanced in at least one chamber of the legislatures in Texas, North Carolina, Florida and Ohio. No states have passed such legislation.

“We can’t afford to become a club of one,” Kabourek said.

Times have changed

Colby Woodson, a UNL graduate student, said the institution of tenure plays into a form of academic caste system and said it’s not necessarily what it used to be.

“It’s not the ‘60s — there’s not necessarily the same level of political tumult there once was,” Woodson said.

Woodson said there’s a question of whether tenure rewards the “best and the brightest” or those well-connected. He also asked whether it can, informally, shield bad actors who may have a reputation for penalizing students, which he said he’s seen at UNL.

“Is it more trouble than it’s worth to call them out?” Woodson asked.

‘Pinnacle professional achievement’

Under LB 1064, the governing boards of affected institutions would create, in lieu of tenure:

Employee agreements.Acceptable grounds for termination, including just cause, program discontinuance and financial exigency.Annual performance evaluations of all faculty.Minimum standards of good practice for faculty.Standards for review and discipline of faculty and procedures for termination on acceptable grounds.

“They should have the keys to let loose the weight of those not helping to carry the load,” Lippincott said.

Chancellor Paul Turman of the Nebraska State College System, Kabourek and NU faculty said such measures already exist. An NU spokesperson affirmed that faculty can be eliminated for each reason Lippincott listed.

For example, the Board of Regents voted to eliminate two tenured faculty in just a little over a year last year.

Chris Exstrom, Faculty Senate president at the University of Nebraska at Kearney, testified in opposition to the bill on behalf of his UNK group and similar governing bodies at NU’s other campuses.

Exstrom said that when he applied for tenure, he did so with a six-inch binder that included years of documentation — teaching materials, evaluations, research grants, publications and notes of how he impacted students.

“When I was awarded tenure, I considered that my pinnacle professional achievement,” Exstrom said. “What I would soon learn is that tenure provides incredible ongoing motivation.”

John Bender of the Academic Freedom Coalition of Nebraska said he sat in on multiple annual performance evaluations during his two years as an associate dean of UNL’s College of Journalism and Mass Communications.

“There is accountability in the system already,” he said.

In his 32 years as a professor, Bender added, he saw some tenured professors get fired and others denied tenure. He explained that tenure is not a guarantee that someone can collect a check without working. He said he worried the legislation could lead to policing speech based on content.

‘Raise the bar’

State Sen. Joni Albrecht of Thurston, Education Committee vice chair, said she appreciated Bender’s insight and his explanation of how tenure works and to learn that faculty members have checks and balances.

“I think that the public needs to know that,” Albrecht said. “This is not for naught, it might take a while. … But just know that we are hearing what you’re saying and we are also understanding where Senator Lippincott may very well be coming from.”

State Sen. Danielle Conrad of Lincoln, whose district includes UNL, questioned during the hearing whether a 1977 court case — NU Board of Regents v. former Nebraska Gov. James Exon — would supersede Lippincott’s bill. That case determined the Legislature can’t dictate NU policy, as that remains vested in the NU Board of Regents.

Kabourek testified that the senator had opened an important dialogue about rigor and accountability.

“I think we can find ways to raise the bar while still preserving a valuable tool offered by every other university whose company we want to keep,” Kabourek said.

The committee took no immediate action on LB 1064.

Nebraska Examiner is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Nebraska Examiner maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Cate Folsom for questions: info@nebraskaexaminer.com. Follow Nebraska Examiner on Facebook and Twitter.

Editor’s note: This has been updated with comments from Matt Wynn with the Nebraska Journalism Trust.

LINCOLN — Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen on Friday addressed for the first time national criticism he has faced after dismissing a Chinese reporter’s work because of her nationality.

Pillen told reporters following an event in Lincoln that he is “100% focused on being the governor of all Nebraskans” and would not get involved in a “political sideshow.” He did not address calls for him to apologize and declined to speak more specificity.

“I’m not going to talk about any reporter. I’m not going to talk about any sideshows,” Pillen said. “I’m focused on my job.”

The national criticism came after Pillen, during an appearance with 1110 KFAB radio in September, responded to a question about Flatwater Free Press investigative reporter Yanqi Xu. Xu reported that 16 hog farms within Pillen Family Farms — owned by the governor’s family — recorded nitrate levels more than five times higher than what is considered safe to drink.

“Number one, I didn’t read it. And I won’t,” Pillen told KFAB’s Gary Sadlemyer. “Number two, all you got to do is look at the author. The author is from communist China. What more do you need to know?”

‘The proof’s in the pudding’

Matt Wynn, executive director of the Nebraska Journalism Trust, which launched and funds Flatwater, fired back at Pillen on Tuesday, describing his comments as infuriating and dead wrong.

“Had Governor Pillen spoken to the facts Yanqi found, I wouldn’t be writing this now,” Wynn wrote. “Elected officials deserve the chance to respond to findings. We offered every opportunity for him to do so before we ran the story. He declined them all.”

Wynn told the Nebraska Examiner on Friday, after listening to a recording of the exchange between reporters and Pillen, that he is heartened the governor mentions immigrants and glad that he takes pride in that chapter of Nebraska’s history.

“The opportunity is still there for an apology,” Wynn added. “I think it is the right and decent thing to do.”

Pillen said that across the state immigrants have been involved in agriculture, and he pointed to Japanese immigrants coming to build railroads 120 years ago in Nebraska. Over a century ago, more than 1,000 Japanese immigrants worked on the railroads and in sugar beet fields.

Research indicates Chinese immigrants made up most of the workforce in building railroads nationwide.

“The proof’s in the pudding,” Pillen said. “People on the sideshows can make any kind of comments they want.”

Comments blasted as xenophobic, racist

During his appearance with KFAB, Pillen said Nebraska is the “most welcoming” state in the nation. National and local groups have since said that notion is undermined by Pillen’s remarks.

Rep. Judy Chu, D-Calif., and chair of the Congressional Pacific American Caucus, told NBC News that Pillen should apologize for a “baseless xenophobic attack.” Norman Chen, CEO of The Asian American Foundation in San Francisco, described the comments as “not only appalling but also outright racist.”

Chen noted Asian Americans are the fastest-growing minority group in Nebraska, at about 3.5%, and said Pillen should apologize and work with local AAPI leaders to understand the implications of his remarks and rebuild trust within the community.

“Anti-Chinese rhetoric skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic and continues to have dangerous consequences for the safety of the whole Asian American community,” Chen said. “For the Governor, the highest leader in the state, to publicly degrade a journalist based on her ethnicity fosters an environment where AAPIs cannot feel safe and do not feel like they belong.”

Xu grew up in Guangzhou, China, and left for Beijing to study English and international journalism. She came to the United States in 2017 for a master’s degree, and she has reported in four states and Washington, D.C. This includes North Carolina Policy Watch (now NC Newsline), part of the States Newsroom network of nonprofit news outlets, which include the Nebraska Examiner.

Xu has received support from numerous journalists and organizations nationwide, including the Asian American Journalists Association. She has described the support as emotional and told NBC News this week that it’s important to speak up, though it can be hard at first as it makes someone the center of the story.

“Especially as a woman of color, if the other person who made such a comment about you is the most powerful person in the state, how do you respond?” Xu told NBC. “But I think for me, I found myself coming back to this point of: If I don’t do it, who would?”

‘My comments were my comments’

When asked Friday by the Nebraska Examiner what policies he would support to curb nitrate levels and promote safe water, Pillen said he is working to develop policy and plans to have a master plan for improvement. Education on how nitrates get into Nebraska water will also be involved.

“Water is a gift, just like God’s grace is a gift,” Pillen said.

Pillen said he is focused on kids, taxes, agriculture and values. He declined to comment further on whether Nebraskans deserved to hear more about the controversy with Flatwater, whether he stood by his initial comments or what his comments mean for other minorities in the state.

“My comments were my comments,” Pillen said. “That’s what I have to say about it.”

Nebraska Examiner is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Nebraska Examiner maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Cate Folsom for questions: info@nebraskaexaminer.com. Follow Nebraska Examiner on Facebook and Twitter.