Does this seem very outlandish? I can't imagine in a million years that someone at MIT would be denied tenure because of their race. Especially in todays P.C. academic environment. Does anyone in his field know what his qualifications were and whether he probably should have gotten tenure?
A black MIT professor began a hunger strike Monday to protest the university's decision to deny him tenure, which he claims was based on race.
James Sherley, a stem cell scientist, said he tried for two years to persuade administrators at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to reverse the department head's rejection of his tenure bid.
"I'm not actually doing this to get tenured," Sherley said. "I'm doing this for the reason that I wasn't tenured which is racism and I want this institution to admit that that is the problem and make plans to do something about it."
Comments
Some conservative sites are claiming that he was not tenured because he does adult stem cell research and opposes embryonic. He had a letter in Nature in 2003 opposing ESCR.
On the other hand if he was appointed in 1998 and denied tenure in 2004, then it appears he had 6 real papers, 4 as corresponding author, from MIT in the intervening 6 years, mostly in specialty journals. I doubt that gets you tenure at MIT.
More background
http://www-tech.mit.edu/V126/N61/61sherley.html
Posted by: Gerard Harbison | February 5, 2007 10:48 PM
Maybe he wasn't tenured due to a continuous issue with an eating disorder?
jk - I'd hope MIT has reasonable answers for choosing to deny the tenure. It would be terriably sad if race was the deciding factor, but if its true than a pat on the back and a snickers for this guy for speaking out.
-- jolt
Posted by: joltvolta | February 6, 2007 4:05 AM
I'm not sure that it's completely outlandish to think that someone might be denied tenure because of their race. I don't know about racial figures, but the statistics on gender are pretty clear that women get hired less and tenured less, even proportional to the number of female Phds who are graduating. So if gender can be a systematic issue, why not race?
Whether this guy was targeted because of his race more than any other candidate in the country is probably unknowable from a distance, but I wouldn't be suprised if he was caught in a wider trend.
Our assumption that our 'PC society' is beyond bias just isn't held up by the statistics.
Posted by: Hugh | February 6, 2007 10:09 AM
perhaps... but it really doesn't sound like this guy had the record to receive tenure - not does it sound like he really has any reason to suspect that his race was playing an issue.
Posted by: steve | February 6, 2007 10:19 AM
It seems possible that he was denied tenure because he is the type of person who throws a fit when he doesn't get his way with the administration.
I cannot imagine why the people in his department wouldn't want someone who is willing to have a hunger strike in their department.
Posted by: Cheeto | February 6, 2007 1:01 PM
Reasons for not granting tenure are part of a person's private personnel file. MIT can't publicly defend themselves without opening themselves up for a lawsuit from this joker.
If he's honest, he'll release his own file/tenure packet publicly. Otherwise, he's just an attention-mongering coward.
Posted by: michael | February 6, 2007 3:32 PM
Accomplishments
2006 NIH Director's Pioneer Award , Pew Scholar , Ellison Scholar, MIT's Trailblazer and MLK Leadership Awards, NIH Center for Excellence in Genome Science co-Principal Investigator, 62 publications (28 pubmed), 119 invited seminars, 18 patents pending (1 licensed). See also Laboratory page, Stem cell research accomplishments example
Posted by: TC | February 6, 2007 6:06 PM
TC,
How does that compare with another newly tenured professor?
Do you know if there are any good comparisons at MIT?
Posted by: steve | February 6, 2007 6:13 PM
Found this site looking for something else, and had to comment about this entry. There was a lot going on here. The following letter outlines some of the conflicts. Race relations aren't clearcut... a lot of normally perfectly reasonable people are often pretty prejudiced and don't know enough about race relations to know it (though that's beside the point). Go read Noam Chomsky, etc.'s letter...
http://www.boston.com/yourlife/health/blog/2007/02/chomsky_calls_f.html
Posted by: Sarah | February 6, 2007 8:22 PM
This is Norm Chomsky's letter as published in the MIT Tech (school paper):
http://www-tech.mit.edu/V127/N1/1facultyopn.html
Posted by: gp | February 7, 2007 1:57 AM
thanks for the links guys!
Posted by: steve | February 7, 2007 4:27 PM
This is not the first time that someone having heterodox views (i.e. "wrong" as far as Big Biotech is concerned) on cloning and embryo-destructive research has faced occupational reprisals. Sherley has done good work and clearly knows what he is talking about, but these days opposing the destruction of embryonic human beings for medical research will get you branded as "controversial," in many circles. Sad.
Posted by: Brian | February 7, 2007 9:54 PM