Recognizing Public Commentary at a Dangerous Time

 Yesterday was a pretty special day.  Carleton's Faculty (equivalent to College of) of Public and Global Affairs held its annual award ceremony.  My school, NPSIA, had two profs recognized: Lama Mourad for teaching excellence and myself for Public Commentary.  I joked that hers was a quality award and mine was a quantity award--she did great and I did a lot.  

Lama is a terrific
teacher

It was great to see Lama get recognized, as she teaches some very tough stuff, especially at this time--refugees, migration, and Mideast stuff--when her own family is very much in harm's way.  Plus it doesn't hurt her slam dunk tenure case as well.  I also assured another winner, someone from the Public Policy program, that her tenure case is bulletproof as well as it is a mighty bad look to give someone an outstanding research excellence award and then deny tenure.   

James simply rocks

A fun bit is that my award followed that of James Milner, who received one for Community Outreach.  I keep following James, as he applied successfully for a partnership grant about eight years ago, so he gave me much help in applying for the grant that created the Canadian Defence and Security Network.  Last year, his second stage project was successful, so I again leaned on him and then followed him in the application process.  So, one again, I follow in his footsteps. 

My application for the award focused on my, um, extensive portfolio of stuff--doing podcasts, heaps of tv/radio/newspaper interviews, blogging here, blueskying (I didn't mention threads as my stuff there is mostly not about politics/IR), and my new reels of Guns and Butter. 

We each had a minute or so to speak.  I first noted that the Associate Dean mispronounced my name, which I noted as being most apt given how often my name or title is messed up by tv/radio folks.  I then thanked the committee.  Most of my minute or two was focused on the moment: that universities are under attack because we generate and disseminate knowledge when actors want to spread mis and disinformation.  I asserted without any evidence that most universities provide awards for staff excellence, research excellence, and teaching excellence but not so much for public engagement.  Indeed, I said that if I had stayed put in west Texas, I would have been fired by now for my public engagement.  

Dean Mary Francoli giving 
me the award

I urged the folks in the room to do what our title suggests--to profess.  To share what we have learned and to fill the information space with our knowledge.  Because there are bad faith actors who are quite willing to fill that space with lies and disinformation.  It was pretty well received, I think.

With so little time and thrown off by the name thing, I didn't think Melissa Jennings, our podcast producer and director of operations, or the rest of the CDSN team which help so much in my efforts to engage the public about what the CDSN has been doing.  So, thanks!

It was an honor and a small, temporary bump in my paycheck that will pay for a post-divorce couch or chesterfield (a word I have never used until now, but a Canadian term for such furniture).  It was my second time,* as I received a similar honor ten years ago.  One of the reasons I have been so happy in this fourth and final job of my career is that they recognize and reward this stuff and also facilitate it.  The other thing that happened yesterday was a meeting staffers from all over campus who were there to help me figure out how I can best rely on them for the new big grant that creates a global and comparative Civil-Military Relations Network.  

Happy to share the spotlight 
with NPSIA hotshot Lama Mourad

I did start with a joke about my being an attention hound, which, of course, is true.  But the urgency of this moment has given me greater focus and purpose for doing stuff that suits me well--talking and writing about this international relations, civil-military relations stuff to any audience that will listen to me, see me, and/or read me.

And, yes, I am incredibly thankful to Carleton for supporting me in all of this, and to Canada for providing an environment where I don't worry much about getting fired.  The move twenty four years ago may have led to a temporary cut in salary, but it has been the best investment of my life and keeps paying dividends.

*  Only now as I write this post and look back at the award I received ten years ago (I do prefer the plastic monolith to the framed certificate) that I wore the same jacket, the same one I wore when I graduated Oberlin nearly forty years ago.  Tis a bit tighter, of course, but I guess it will always be my happy day blazer. 

Teaching in the Age of Corona, the Continuing Saga

The semester is over for most academics, summer teaching has started for some (sorry, Phil), and now the focus is on what is next.  I have posted before about teaching during the pandemic and ruling out a variety of options.  Shortly after that second post, Carleton put out a report that, well, largely coinciding with my post.  The focus was on uncertainty and concern for the health of students/staff/faculty with the conclusion that almost the entire campus should be online. 

Other universities disagree and have put out a variety of plans.  One of my sister's is on a private college's governing board, so she has been sending a variety of plans from a number of places to me. Many of these are ones considered by Carleton's team.  I guess the one that might have been omitted (because US Thanksgiving is later) is starting early and ending in-person early--around Thanksgiving (US).  The idea, I guess is that the travel back from Thanksgiving might expose the campuses to what had been kept off?  The problems with that are, of course, that the students might be the vectors taking the disease from being on campus to being all over the place; and the second wave may hit universities before Thanksgiving, and then what? 

My criticisms and concerns has not been focused on getting the classroom stuff but the dorms/dining halls/fraternities/etc.  That is, even if we do everything we can to keep students from transmitting the disease to each other and to profs and staff in the classroom, it will still spread because 18-22 year olds are not going to socially distance rigorously and wear masks all of the time.

I get it that universities and colleges are facing tremendous budgetary challenges, so I am guessing that those most eager to treat things as normal are those that are most exposed.  I think the combo of depending more on provinces and a greater likelihood of the federal government bailing out the provinces makes things a smidge less problematic in Canada than the US.  In the US, tuition is a better component, as far as I can recall, of revenues even at state universities.  States are far more willing to cut and gut universities although a closer look shows that Colorado is not as screwed as I thought. 

There is also the question of students getting their money's worth if things go online.  There are lots of ways to look at that.  It depends on how one looks at tuition.  As payment for this semester's courses and nothing else?  As part of one's payment for the four (or more) year experience, which includes courses but not exclusively so?  As an investment in all of that plus the value of the degree, which can rise or fall depending on the long-term situation for the university?  I am motivated, of course, by my own self-interest, but I have thought (such as when McGill was raising tuition just a little bit) that folks should be thinking not just about the price tag today but the value of the degree to them in the long term.  So, a semester or two online may not be quite as good as normal, but, if they are part of the larger process of getting the degree and what comes with it, then one is still investing. 

Of course, that probably will not play well to those spending tens of thousands of dollars (another difference between Canada and the US).  So, the priority, I think, must be getting the online experience to be as good as possible, as close to the quality of in-class as possible.

On that, I have good local news.  That Carleton is working really hard to make this work.  By recognizing the reality and shifting resources and driving expectations, Carleton will have a better online experience in the fall than they did this past winter.  The waves of announcements about tools, training, resources, help have been one thing.  This week, NPSIA, my program, had a meeting, online of course, with some of the teaching and learning staff.  I hate meetings, but this one was most productive.  They presented the basic realities of the situation, what tends to work, what tends not to work relative to various class sizes, and they answered questions.  They discussed what help there will be for us.  And, yes, starting to prep early makes a great deal of sense. 

What was also very encouraging was not only the turnout among my colleagues, but their deep interest, concern, and curiosity.  Folks were most engaged, asked good questions (well, mostly), and showed a deep interest in getting this right.  The focus was not on fighting the changes, but making the best of it.  I was not only very proud of the university for trying to get this right but also of my colleagues for their dedication and flexibility.

I am lucky in that one of my classes next fall is a PhD seminar that will no more than five students in it and probably less (students can stop taking it if they successfully defend their dissertation proposal).  My other class is a third year undergraduate class of about 90.  That will be quite a challenge, but I happen to be co-teaching it with David Hornsby, who is not only much sharper on flipping classrooms and doing innovative stuff, but he happens to be the Associate Vice President of Teaching at Carleton.  So, he is very much on top of what the various systems can do, has great ideas for how to do stuff well online, and is pretty passionate about this.  So, will I be free-riding on David's efforts?  Well, if I want to teach the students how international relations works, um, sure.  But I have been thinking since this thing hit of strategies and tactics to make teaching work better and hopefully make learning work better.

This spring and summer of zooming with friends, relatives, colleagues, and more is providing some good experience for the fall.  However, since much of what we will do will be asynchronous (recorded, not live), that experience may only go so far. 

The key is to have the right attitude, which is:

We live in a world of lousy choices, more so than ever.  I am sad about what is likely to happen to a large number of colleges and universities.  The situation for institutions of higher education is dire.  But we can try to make the next semester or two or three (how long? who knows?) as productive and as safe as possible for our students. 

Team CDSN Progress Report

Over the past several years, a team of Canadian defence and security scholars, scientists, officials, officers and interested parties from civil society have been working on building the Canadian Defence and Security Network.  This past year, we have been working on a grant application to fund activities and events that would generate a heap of research, training and sharing of knowledge.  Since I returned from Chile in July, this has been my highest priority, eclipsing pretty much every other work obligation (I am far behind in writing up the case studies for the Dave, Phil and Steve project).

We just submitted it.  It has 26 or so pieces including six forms, fifteen documents we had write ranging from one to eight pages long each, and four items that required ten, thirty-two, thirty-two, and one hundred people to address, including one that involved lawyers (gasp!).

We have about a 50-50 chance at this point, and we won't know until spring.  While I have whined much about it, the process itself has been great. It has helped to build and connect a community of interesting people. It made events like the NATO summit more rewarding as I used them to help bring in new partners.  This partnership effort caused me to go to three different conferences/workshops taking place over the last 10 days in Ottawa, and I learned a great deal from each, even though all were outside my area of research/focus.

I have gotten much assistance and inspiration from the leadership team.  The whole idea is to create structures that harness the energy and interests of the community, so it is not a one-man show by any stretch of the imagination.  The proposal we submitted yesterday is so much better for all of the suggestions/comments/revisions that the partners and the leadership team made along the way.

The joy of this is that the effort to get funding for a network/partnership has built such a thing even before we have received funding.  Of course, the money would be more than handy because we would be far more productive (research, training, dissemination, etc) doing stuff than planning to do stuff, but still it is important to note that the exercise, if it goes unfunded, will not have been a waste of time.  Incredibly frustrating, sure, but it was time well spent.  I made new friendships and deepened old ones, and I learned a lot.  These are things I value the most.

And the timing is fitting as today is the seventh anniversary of my announcing my move to Carleton and to Ottawa.   None of this would have been possible without the support of Carleton.  From the VP for Research to my Dean to my Director to my colleagues to the director of our research centre to my research assistant to our grants facilitator and others in the funding chain of advice/command at Carleton, I have received so much support, assistance, advice, and more.

So, I owe much gratitude to Stef, Steph, JC, David, Alex, Andrea, Phil, Anessa, Irina, Al, and Srdjan; to the folks on our advisory board; to the many partners; and to Rafik, Andre, Teddy, Karen, Melissa, Tabbatha, and Patrica, and especially to Jeff, Alvine, Kate, Kyla, Kyla and Kyla (nope, not three different ones, just one doing the work of at least three different people).

Five Years of Paterson Chairing

Today, I was notified that I have been renewed* as the Paterson Chair in International Affairs!  This may sound strange to Americans, where most endowed chairs are lifetime appointments.  It has been my experience in Canada that these things tend to be fixed terms with renewals, as my Canada Research Chair was back at McGill (only one renewal allowed for that federally funded chair).  To be clear, the Chair means essentially that I have a fancy title and a yearly fund to spend on research, which is mighty handy, especially for those projects that are not related to my SSHRC-funded one.  Also, there are expectations of research productivity and outreach that come with the chair.  Regarding the renewal, I am not surprised nor troubled, although I am enchanted and humbled.  Huh?  Yes, I am bring back the very oldest Spew meme.

H/t to Ben Forrest

• As Paterson Chair, the most surprising aspect has been (although not really anymore) is when media types introduce me on live TV or radio as the Chair of the Paterson School of International Affairs.  This gives me far more responsibility than I have, and, no, I am not the new director of NPSIA.  It does lead to friends having the opportunity to screen capture my reactions:
• In my five years at Carleton, I have been little troubled and certainly not by having the Paterson Chair.  Nor have I been troubled by anything at Carleton except for one thing: that the way the internal market works here provides disincentives to do the stuff that they want us to do.  Specifically, our building, the Richcraft (formerly the River) Building, was designed to do public outreach stuff, but to use it for such purposes--public talks, workshops, conferences--we have to use our own research monies to pay for the space/tech support/etc.  This is not just a Carleton thing, but it is a strange economy where only some entities within the school can make money off of other departments--the space folks, the a/v folks who set up stuff for
  
  conferences, the printing folks, and the like.  My first inquiries into podcasting got stymied when I found that the Journalism school wanted $ for using their tech, but, of course, didn't expect us to charge them for being practice dummies for their students who are working on their interviewing skills.  NPSIA has no products to sell to this internal market, so I was pondering the making and distribution of meth, but that seemed to be more trouble than it is worth.
• After five years, I am still quite enchanted with Carleton, the Faculty of Public Affairs, and NPSIA.  It has been a very supportive environment for the stuff that I do, and they have
  
  consistently recognized my contributions.  This goes a long way to making me feel accepted and appreciated.  I am also still quite a fan of Ottawa, as it has not only made my ultimate commutes short (the summer fields are 12 minutes away with little traffic between my house and the sweet fields), but it has provided ample opportunities for me to meet all kinds of interesting people.  Just in the past two weeks, I have been able to chat with Ambassadors, Defence Attaches, politicians, defence contractors, military officers, journalists, bureaucrats, and more.  Living in a national capital is great for someone who is intensely curious about International Relations.  
• I am humbled, as NPSIA has hired great people both before I arrived and since.  The people I work with are not only sharp and very experienced in Canadian international affairs, but also incredibly nice folks who make the place a fun place to work.  We are about to go through regime change as our Director, Dane Rowlands, is stepping down after five years (each term is five years, and that is plenty) and Teddy Samy is stepping up.  I am sure Teddy will do great, so I am not worried about losing one of the two best department chairs (that is what our director is, essentially) I have ever had. Of course, I am not that humble, but these folks do make me realize that I am not that special (I just hope the next renewal committee does not read this post).  

While I have not quite hit the exact date that would make it five years in Ottawa or at NPSIA, this day is pretty special.  I am glad that things have worked out better than I could have imagined, and am looking forward to the next five years.  I will use the Paterson funds to continue to ask questions that come up along the way, to fund research assistance, and to disseminate the findings (i.e., pay for book talks in cool cities preferably near ski slopes).**   Now,  I must return to the less pleasant research task of transcribing notes.


* I am a tenured Professor, so I am going to be employed at Carleton until I decide I am not.... pretty much.
** I would mention the students at NPSIA--how wonderful they are and how much I have enjoyed teaching here--but as the accounting folks here remind me, the Paterson Chair money is for research, not teaching.  A minor gripe.

First Time For Everything: Cover Boy

I am on the front page of FPA Voices, a publication the Faculty of Public Affairs puts out on a quarterly basis.  I was asked a couple of months ago about what would a Trump Presidency would mean for Canada and the world.  My argument was not very nuanced--and ironically, I used Trump speak--it would be awful, awful, awful.  I didn't think then that Trump really had much of a chance because of the fundamentals I have been harping about.

The short photoshoot in my office led to the cover, with not enough photoshopping.  It is nice that the Dean and the folks under him recognize my contributions, including engaging the public.  I think I could have done a better job with the interview, but, well, the subject of it does not inspire much complicated thoughts about  the future--just holy @$*&*&#%%!!

Anyhow, probably the last time I will be a coverboy.

Broken Internal Economies

I am a big fan of Carleton, and have been quite happy here as my fourth year nears its end.  But of course there is a but. 

But its internal economy is broken.  There are some departments/units/whatever that charge for their services and their space, and the rest of the university has to find money to pay.  The most annoying example of this: that my building was built to be a platform for outreach, but we have to find money within our budgets to pay for using that space most of the time.  Not only that, but we have to pay fairly high fees for audio-visual services, for set-up and all the rest.  If we want to provide some parking for our guests, we have to pay for that and the rates are comparable to downtown Ottawa and we are not in downtown Ottawa.  This means, of course, that it often makes more sense to hold events at downtown hotels.  Or not hold them at all.

In some cases, this makes sense.  It makes sense to charge for printing services since there is a real cost to each thing printed, and it creates disincentives for printing too much stuff (seeing the printing services folks advertise across campus is annoying since they have a monopoly, so why waste our money on that?).  In other cases, it does not and is quite frustrating.  When I thought about podcasting with a pal, we went to the journalism school to see if they could help out.  They told us that they have to pay hourly wages for their technician, which was understandable, and also pay for the space.  Ooops.  So, that stopped our inquiry right there since we didn't expect to make any money from podcasting, and if we did, didn't want it to go to someone else's space income.

Those with resources that others need can charge a price for them.  Those without such desired resources have to use, in most cases, externally generated funds to cover this stuff--grant money.  Instead of it going to graduate and undergraduate students for their research assistance (the major category in which much grant money is directed), it goes to those who have something to sell.

I whine, of course, because I ain't got nothing to sell in this internal market.  I was tempted to make meth, but that didn't work out so well for Walter White.  After the conversation with the J school that proved to be unproductive, I thought I might charge their students who seek to interview me for their assignments.  But taking out my grumpiness on the students would be wrong.

Of course, universities have to allocate space and other scarce resources, but charging units for that stuff is problematic.  I'd like to see fake money allocated to all the units (Carleton Bucks!) and then folks could use the resources until they max out or can apply for more bucks if the projects are for the Greater Good.  This would be complicated at first, but the new system would not serve as a deterrent to doing the stuff that the university wants us to do, such as outreach. 

Carleton is not alone in this, as university administrators across North America (the world?) have learned that one way to deal with budgetary pressures is to try to extract grant money to pay for stuff.  In the US, there is a more obvious way this is done--universities set a rate for "indirect" costs, which means that when you apply for a grant, you get x plus y, with y being the money going to the university for the indirect costs of the research--electricity, sewage, heating, whatever else.  Canadian schools get something like this as well, but it is not so explicit.  In the US, some of the indirect flows back down to the units, but most is kept at higher levels to pay for stuff. 

The key with any financial system is to figure out how to design it so that it incentivizes the things that are desirable and disincentivizes things that are less desirable.  The problem with the current system at Carleton is it creates disincentives for doing some of the stuff the university wants us to do.  Oh well, I probably should have asked my favorite Carleton economist/former Associate Dean how this works, but I am afraid she might have charged me for her services.

A Grateful Prof

Yesterday was a pretty amazing day.  First, the local CBC morning radio program talked to me about my book.  The interview was really good as the host, Hallie, did a nice job of building on the pre-interview but in a very natural way.  I was able to talk about the book and link it to recent events.



Then I did the @FPAtakeover tweetup. The second event in the Steve promota-palooza involved getting access to the @FPACarleton twitter account--their idea, not mine--and respond to questions.  I storified it (see the link).  The topics ranged from the book to Iraq/Syria/ISIS to how many Tim Horton's are on Carleton's campus (5).  It seemed to go well and the FPA folks seemed to be delighted.

 And then I had the Author Meets Readers book launch at Irene's pub.  This was very well attended. Karen Schwartz, the Associate Dean of FPA, mc'ed.  The participants were myself, Phil Lagassé of the U of Ottawa, retired LTG Stu Beare, and Ambassador Elissa Golberg.  Stu asked the audience about their ties to the mission, and more than half knew someone who lost "life or limb."  That created a very moving context for the conversation.  Phil took me to task for expecting too much from our politicians, who are only responding to the incentives--that we the public are to blame ultimately.  Elissa criticized the book for repeating some myths about the civilian side of things.  I was quite grateful to all three for taking the book seriously and coming to the event armed with their perspectives.  

I am grateful to the FPA folks for setting up the latter two events and the media relations Carleton for setting up the first event as well as some other stuff.  I said during my intro that FPA at Carleton has given me far more support, encouragement, recognition and assistance than any other Dean's office in my career, and it is not even close.

It was a stimulating day, and it was great to get folks engaged in discussions about the stuff that I have been studying and writing about for years.  Indeed, while I do not intend on writing another book on Afghanistan (two is enough), I may end up doing some more research to fill in some holes.

Thanks to one and all for a great day!

Carleton Plays Dodgeball

There has been some controversy at Carleton University about how the Board of Governors operates, as there are two profs on the board and one has been most critical and has blogged about it.  The storm arose when there was an attempt to get a lifetime confidentiality agreement imposed upon this prof and the rest.  The new stance was sent out today:

To all Members of the Carleton Community,

 Please see the statement released by the Board today below.

CARLETON BOARD OF GOVERNORS ADOPTS CLEARER TRANSPARENCY RULES

 Ottawa, January 26, 2016 - Anthony Tattersfield, chair of the Board of Governors of Carleton University, issued the following statement today:

The Board of Governors has ratified a Code of Conduct for Governors that reaffirms the importance of open Board Meetings, brings greater transparency to how the Board operates and clarifies what is expected of Governors in Board communications.

The Code of Conduct – which had been proposed by the Governance Committee under the chairmanship of Michael Wernick, and adopted by the Executive - makes it clear that:

•             Most Board business is conducted transparently in open session and an obligation of confidentiality is not relevant to open session. Confidentiality is relevant to information provided for discussions at closed sessions. Closed sessions are the exception and typically involve potential tendering of contracts, personnel cases, performance reviews, legal advice and labour relations. 

•             All Governors are required to act in the best interest of the university. While perspectives may differ, debate and discussion are encouraged at the Board as the manner to resolve them and it is inconsistent with this role of a Governor to reopen and criticize Board decisions after they have been taken or to criticize, question the integrity of, or intimidate fellow Governors and university officials.

•             While individual Governors are free to discuss matters from the open session, in the end the chair, or his or her designate, is the spokesperson for the Board, and the minutes which are adopted are the record of discussion and decision.

This does not seem too bad at first glance, but the clause in red bothers me.  What does it mean that it is inconsistent to reopen/criticize board decisions?  Does that mean no blogging?  Because that ain't gonna fly.  Then it gets worse: was there really an attempt to intimidate?  It would seem to me that being on the board means one has to be responsible, but part of that responsibility might be to be transparent--to criticize decisions.

If they just want the profs to be on the board as silent partners, then, well, they don't understand profs.  I don't think this decision is going to play well even if they do away with excessively restrictive confidentiality agreements.

Universally Annoyed

My university has made the news and not in a good way.  The Board of Governors are aiming to be as opaque as possible.  Closed meetings are a really bad idea.  Telling the professors who are appointed to the Board to represent the faculty that the BoG is now like fight club--that one cannot talk about it--seems to run against the purpose of having profs on the board.

While going into closed session when discussing personnel issues, to operate entirely closed seems problematic in the extreme.

Of course, the Canadian prof union is overreacting, possibly telling aspiring profs not to take jobs at Carleton (in this job market) and not to go to conferences.  Seems like quickly pushing the "nuke all" button.

Not a great way to start the last week or two of the term as our focus should be elsewhere.

Could be worse, our universities could be under attack by the ill-informed.  Ooops.

Update:  I just got this email from Carleton.

Monday, Nov. 30, 2015

Carleton faculty and staff are advised that the Ottawa Citizen published an online article on Saturday, Nov. 28, 2015 and in their print edition on Monday, Nov. 30, 2015 that contained a number of inaccuracies about the Board of Governors.

At the request of the Citizen, the university provided a statement about their story. Only a portion of that statement was included in their story. Another communiqué was subsequently forwarded by the university to the paper outlining the errors contained in their story. The Citizen updated its story, but used only a portion of the second communiqué and failed to correct the errors. Contrary to what is stated in the article, the communiques did address the allegations made by the Carleton Association of University Teachers (CAUT) and the Carleton University Academic Staff Association (CUASA).

It is important to keep the Carleton community informed about this issue and to share accurate information and context. For full transparency, a copy of the letter to the CAUT can be found here: http://newsroom.carleton.ca/2015/11/30/presidents-letter-to-the-caut/.

The Citizen article incorrectly states that the Board adopted a new policy about discussing Board business publicly. The Statement of General Duties, Fiduciary Responsibilities and Conflict of Interest (“the Statement”) is a code of conduct adopted by the Board of Governors that has been in place at Carleton since 2008. The Statement outlines not only the fiduciary duties of the Governors but their responsibilities as Governors and their obligation to avoid conflicts of interest. The Statement also includes the obligation of members to appropriately maintain confidentiality. As with all governance documents, the Statement is reviewed periodically. The Statement was amended and again approved by the Board in 2015. The obligation to maintain in confidence matters or documents discussed in closed session is neither new nor controversial. All universities and institutions require their Board members to comply with similar confidentiality obligations.

The Board has not banned faculty or student union representatives, although the matter of removing union and association executives from eligibility was considered in the past. There was never any discussion to change the composition of the Board, which consists of community members, alumni, faculty, staff and students.

The Statement has been signed by every Governor since 2008 including, for the two prior years, by the Board member referenced in the Citizen article. In fact, 32 out of the 33 current members, including the faculty, staff, alumni, students and community-at-large members have signed the Statement. The Statement does not interfere with any academic freedom issues or collegial governance, which are enshrined at Carleton through bicameral governance.

Every Board meeting consists of an open session accessible by the public and a closed session in which confidential matters are discussed. Every Board in the country handles sensitive matters dealing with issues such as personnel, legal and contracts through closed sessions. No Board of Governors allows members to speak publicly about in-camera closed sessions. This has been the university’s consistent policy and was recently reaffirmed by board members.

The open session of Board meetings are publicly streamed and accessible by all members of the public at a location on the campus. In addition, a limited number of individuals from the public who have sought permission are able to attend the open session of the meeting in person. For example, the November meeting was attended by journalists from the Charlatan. The September meeting was attended by journalists and student association and union representatives.

As for the issue of commentary, once the Board has made a decision, the minutes become the record of the meeting. Proper governance requires fulsome, candid discussion and debate by Board members at meetings, without fear of being misquoted or maligned following the meeting. Blog posts by the member referenced in the article making inaccurate statements about members, meetings, discussions and decisions of the Board are neither appropriate nor legal, according to advice obtained by the Board. Indeed, such posts stifle the freedom of speech of all other members of the Board. While faculty members are free to express themselves, once a faculty member becomes a governor, he or she is required to adhere to the same duties and responsibilities as all governors with respect to board business. Carleton regrets that this sole governor does not want to abide by the Statement that has been previously respected by all other faculty members.

Currently, all the bylaws in the university, including conflict-of-interest issues, are being studied by the Governance Committee of the Board to ensure their conformity with the Ontario Not for Profit legislation. The bylaws will be discussed by the full Board in the future.

Carleton addressed the issues raised by the CAUT by letter to Mr. Robinson on Monday, Nov. 23, 2015. Carleton confirmed its commitment to transparency and that the confidentiality obligations were for closed sessions, which is the same as all universities.