Scholars Decry Discrimination in Tenure Review Process

Dr. Patricia A. Matthew, an associate professor of English at Montclair State University, has become a sought-a­fter expert on diversity in academic tenure, although most of her scholarly writing and teaching are in British literature and romanticism.

Matthew’s road from researching the Brits to tackling the tenure process in American academia was paved with revelatory stories of Black women striving to achieve the elusive prize of tenure, and o­ften falling short. At the center was Matthew’s own unusual saga.

Her personal experience in 2011 — during which a university president overruled her provost’s denial — and the writings of other women resulted in her 2016 book, Written/Unwritten: Diversity and the Hidden Truths of Tenure, which was praised by the New York Journal of Books as “a timely and courageous contribution to the exploration and critique of the operation of power as it refracts against diverse, non-dominant identities in American higher education.”

Matthew explained in the book’s preface that “the catalyst for this project — for my decision to add a focus on diversity in higher education to my work on nineteenth-century British fiction—was hearing about four women of color at the University of Michigan [who were] all denied tenure in the same year.” Matthew said she became aware of their situation in the midst of her own tenure battle as she was “planning for a meeting with my university’s provost to ask him to reconsider his decision to recommend against tenure.”

So, Matthew embarked on an examination of the plight of Black women who were denied tenure in subjective, sometimes inexplicable circumstances, inspired by her own ultimately successful journey. “I put my own experiences in the preface of the book because I didn’t want people to think I was hiding anything, so I just told my story.” She invited other scholars to write chapters in the book describing the challenges they faced. “I wondered if there was a pattern and I wanted to find out if there were things that faculty who were successful wanted to discuss about their paths,” Matthew told Diverse.

She cites practices in the University of California system and at Wheaton College as examples of institutional advances in the area of faculty diversity. Matthew’s key advice to tenure track faculty, culled from her journey and those of others, centers around learning the culture and expectations of your institution. “I think you can actually tell what the university wants if you look at the CVs of the recently tenured faculty,” Matthew advises, noting that vitae are usually available online. “I think your first job is to understand the culture of your department in real terms, not what they say in orientation and not what you happen to hear.”

And this is one thing on Matthew’s list of what not to do: “Don’t get caught up in service.” The additional burden often placed on faculty of color to serve on numerous committees can be a distraction. “Just say no,” she advises. “Your job when you get hired is not to fix your university’s diversity problems; your job is to get tenured.”