James Tipton’s proposed tenure elimination bill will make WKU worse. It will lower the quality of WKU’s faculty. It will undermine the value of WKU’s degree and the education that students receive.

The reason is that WKU won’t be able to recruit and retain quality faculty if tenure is eliminated. All of WKU’s benchmark schools except for one (in Florida) offer traditional tenure to faculty who earn it. WKU’s faculty salaries are the lowest of any of its benchmark schools. Why would any faculty member on the job market who has a choice take a job at WKU if there’s no possibility to earn tenure? They wouldn’t take one. Why would any faculty member at WKU stay if they could find another job at a school that offers them tenure? They wouldn’t stay.

Florida passed a law eliminating tenure and its universities and students are suffering bad consequences. Faculty are fleeing. Faculty resignations at University of Florida and Florida State increased 20 and 28 percent, respectively, after the tenure elimination law went into effect, according to the “Chronicle of Higher Education.”

In a survey of Florida faculty, half of the respondents said that they’re actively looking for jobs in other states where tenure exists. In their annual updates to the state, Florida universities report that they are having trouble hiring new faculty since tenure was eliminated.

I hope that Gov. Beshear vetoes Tipton’s bill if it reaches his desk. I also hope that our local representatives, especially WKU alums Kevin Jackson, Robert Duvall, Michael Meredith, Shawn McPherson, and David Givens, vote against this bill if they get another chance to consider it. They’ve made a sad mistake and hurt their alma mater by supporting this destructive bill in the first place.

Eric Reed

Bowling Green