Two journalism professors have filed complaints against Ohio University, stating officials demonstrated age discrimination in the distribution of its November merit pool and then lied about doing so.
Joe Bernt and Pat Washburn filed separate complaints with the Ohio Civil Rights Commission and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, respectively, this month. Their complaints are based on what they said are claims from Bob Stewart, director of the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism, that he chose to award higher merit raises to younger faculty.
The decision was not made in response to faculty members’ ages but rather by a combination of factors, one of which was their likelihood to accept positions at other universities, Stewart said.
“I wanted to make sure we did not lose certain people,” Stewart said. “In the interest of the school, especially during a hiring freeze, if you lose a hotshot, a very productive faculty member, you’re not going to be able to replace them, which is bad for the school.
“It so happens the people I thought we were going to possibly lose… just happened to be of a certain age,” Stewart added. “I think it would be wrong to say (they received higher raises) because they were young.”
However, Bernt and Washburn said Stewart told them in separate meetings that he chose to award higher raises to younger faculty to try to keep them at OU.
“He said he felt (younger faculty members) were more likely to take offers from other universities because other schools can get them cheap,” Bernt said. “I couldn’t believe he’d told me that.
“They want to keep younger faculty from jumping ship because this place is so screwed up.”
Both Bernt and Washburn said Stewart’s claim, as stated in the Office of Institutional Equity investigation report, that age was not a driving factor in the merit raise decisions is false.
“Bob Stewart is lying,” Washburn said. “He’s just trying to save himself.”
Stewart has since begun recording or transcribing conversations taking place in his office that he feels could be later misunderstood or misconstrued.
‘They were misinformed’
Bernt and Washburn, ages 63 and 69 respectively, received positive evaluations from their peers for the past six years. The evaluations rate faculty members on the basis of teaching and advising, research or creative activity and service.
Bernt’s and Washburn’s merit raises were both $2,500, added onto their respective salaries of $103,424 and $109,596.
Journalism professor Ellen Gerl, who makes $58,448, also received a $2,500 raise.
The additional five journalism professors received higher raises:
•Hong Cheng, salary $82,539, received $4,100
•Bernhard Debatin, 53, salary $83,778, received $4,100
•Yusuf Kalyango, salary $60,600, received $4,100
•Aimee Edmondson, 42, salary $60,600, received $3,500
•Craig Davis, 47, salary $57,772, received $3,000
Of those professors, Gerl, Cheng, Debatin, and Davis received the highest possible ratings through their peer evaluations for at least the past two years.
Since the merit raises were announced, Gerl received tenure and was promoted to associate professor, and Cheng and Debatin were promoted to full professor. Stewart did not comment on whether they had received additional raises because of these promotions.
Ages for Gerl, Cheng and Kalyango could not be confirmed; OU’s Office of Legal Affairs said there was no public record with employees’ dates of birth.
“If they had that idea (that merit raises were based solely on peer evaluations), they were misinformed,” Stewart said. “If they had that belief, it wasn’t more than wishful thinking or hopes.”
Bernt and Washburn asked both Stewart and Greg Shepherd, dean of the Scripps College of Communication, for additional $1,600 raises each to put them at the same level of the highest raises offered to journalism professors. Stewart and Shepherd denied these requests.
A University Investigation
The two took their concerns to OU Executive Vice President and Provost Pam Benoit in February.
Benoit, whose office provided the funds, approved the merit pool recommendations; however, she mainly looked to make sure each college distributed money to the correct number of people, rather than approving specific raises, said Ann Fidler, Benoit’s chief of staff.
“If (Benoit) thought people were being discriminated against, she would have intervened,” Fidler said.
Benoit passed on the journalism professors’ complaint to OU’s Office of Institutional Equity. Laura Myers, the office’s executive director, released a report last month stating there was “insufficient evidence” to support the professors’ claim of age discrimination.
Myers declined to comment further on the investigation, saying the records spoke for themselves.
University policy requires any complaints regarding university action, such as the distribution of the merit pool, to be filed within 180 days of the action. The last day the professors can act in regards to their age discrimination charge is May 21, Washburn said.
Washburn, whose complaint was signed May 4, is meeting with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to discuss his complaint today.
Bernt mailed his complaint to the Ohio Civil Rights Commission Monday.
Stewart said he had no comment to the news that they had filed these complaints.
‘You get angry about the things that happen around here’
While conducting her investigation, Myers received an email from Bernt sent in response to a request asking him to continue his work with preparing for the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication.
“… rather than spending time on the professional service as normal, (my) time will be devoted to preparing a case against Ohio University for purposeful age discrimination,” Bernt said.
Soon after the merit raises were announced in November, Washburn also sent an email to Stewart and Shepherd detailing his achievements in journalism and asking why his merit raise had been lower than that of other journalism professors.“Could it be that the raises were based on a hidden agenda which was something other than merit?” Washburn asked in the email. “For example, if I had had a sex change operation, would that have gotten me more money?”
Washburn later said that although Myers had asked him about that comment during her investigation, he did not remember sending the email. However, he said he did not regret the remark.
“You get angry about the things that happen around here,” he said.
‘Avarice or gluttony or selfishness’
On January 20, Bernt and Washburn distributed records regarding the merit raises to Group I journalism faculty members and asked them to draw their own conclusions.
Six days later, Professor Bill Reader sent a lengthy email to journalism faculty in response to Bernt’s and Washburn’s distribution of the records. In it, he denounced the two professors’ failure to mention their salaries or the salaries of the other professors in their memo.
“I think it is possible that (Bernt and Washburn) were not, as some might think, expressing any avarice or gluttony or selfishness or any other unseemly and repugnant trait. Let’s all assume they were being generous of spirit and magnanimous of intent in distributing those memos,” Reader wrote. “Maybe they were just trying to improve the morale of our School and help everybody stop laughing at the idea of peace, love, and understanding.”
Reader declined to comment further on the email, saying no one at the university can now comment since complaints had been filed.
The aim in filing the complaints is not greed but rather fair treatment, Washburn said.
In a recent interview, Debatin also said he did not agree with Bernt and Washburn’s age discrimination claim.
“I have a hard time following their discrimination argument,” Debatin said. “Their disrespect to faculty members who got (higher) raises — that is something I would never do.”
rm279109@ohiou.edu
@ThePostCampus
