Biting the Silber Bullet

Wherever John R. Silber goes in academe, controversy seems to follow. In 1970, Silber, then 43, was fired as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Texas when he opposed the board of regents' plan to split his college into smaller schools. A year later, after a nine-month search by a 21-man committee, he was named president of Boston University. Since taking office, he has led an ambitious program to raise the school's admission standards, cut its sizable deficit ($2.2 million), and improve the quality of the faculty. Laudable goals, but the manner in which Silber pursued them has angered many of the deans, professors and students on the Charles River campus. He was told by the board of regents' chairman when ousted from Texas: "You are the most intelligent, articulate and persistent man around. You scare the hell out of the incompetents above you." Now Silber's arrogant, autocratic leadership--one Boston professor has called him an "intellectual bully"--has worried those beneath him. Incompetents and stars alike, they are trying to get the university's trustees to dismiss him.

Budget Cut. Ten of the 15 academic deans have demanded his ouster, and in a 377-to-117 vote, the faculty senate also asked for his resignation. Besides his overpowering style in office, a number of substantive issues have fueled the conflict. Boston is meagerly endowed ($25 million), and the administration has been forced to modify its $128 million budget to meet the demands of declining enrollments and rising costs. In December, 90 untenured professors were told they would lose their jobs when their contracts expired. Announcing the need for a 20% budget cut in the next two years, Silber suggested that some tenured professors might also be released. But according to a number of faculty members, the issue was not the possible cutting but the administration's competence to budget fairly. As Mathematics Chairman Robin Esch puts it, "The issue is mismanagement."

Silber, a Yale philosophy Ph.D. and an Immanuel Kant scholar, has admitted to his "warts, defects and idiosyncrasies." He has also tried to allay fears that a mass layoff of faculty is planned. After defending himself at the faculty meeting during which the no-confidence vote was taken, he asserted, "We have to have a tight ship, but we certainly don't intend to make any cuts at the expense of academic quality." Next week the trustees must decide whether Silber will stay at the helm or whether yet another long search must begin.

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