It's almost always active membership in a church and a vigorous Christian faith. Sometimes church membership is not enough. I'm an elder of a Presbyterian church, I teach Sunday school, I sing in the choir, but I don't know if I would get hired here today because I'm theologically quite liberal. I think evangelism is probably the better term for what they're looking for, and I think they would agree with that
- Baylor University President Robert Sloan, on what he expects from faculty
It can be interesting at times for Susan and I to compare college experience, if only because we went to schools at different ends of the political and moral spectrum.
Susan went to Baylor University in Waco, a Southern Baptist school with a strict moral code and a strong religious foundation. While I would have lasted about three weeks before going crazy, she enjoyed her college experience, just as I enjoyed mine. Of course, there's the tired old joke about why anyone would willingly subject themselves to four years in Waco, but I'll leave that one alone.
I went to Macalester College in St. Paul, MN, a Presbyterian school (though the ties to the Presbyterian Church are in name only), a VERY Liberal liberal arts school. I majored in History and Anthropology while minoring in Recreational Pharmaceuticals and Effective Alcohol Managment. I may have THOUGHT I saw God a few times, but I never would have lasted at a Southern Baptist school. Even so, there is one thing that gives me hope that Baylor is not the undergraduate lockup I used to see it as: Willie Nelson attended Baylor.
It is beginning to appear, however, as if Baylor's current President, Robert Sloan, is embarking on a campaign to turn Baylor into the fundamentalist bastion that many already see Baylor as.
"I think Baylor is in excellent condition -- financially, academically and in every way," he said. "I'm extremely positive about what's happening at the university. The feedback I get is overwhelming."
Some in the Baylor community are unconvinced. They have strong reservations about Sloan's "Baylor 2012" plan, which aims to strengthen the school's religious mission while pursuing the coveted ranking of a "Tier One" university from U.S. News and World Report by the year 2012.
Since Sloan took over the Baylor helm in 1995, his critics have accused the former West Texas minister of:
· Imposing an evangelical form of the Baptist faith that is hurting the university's academic reputation;
· Pursuing an expensive growth agenda despite a weak economy, making the school too expensive for its traditional base of middle-class families;
· Bringing a "publish-or-perish" mentality to the campus by overemphasizing research.
To implement his agenda, critics say, Sloan has handpicked regents who are loyal to him and has quashed dissenters.
Sloan's supporters say change comes hard in any organization, but especially so at a university with passionate faculty and alumni.
In the latest controversy, Sloan two weeks ago asked regent Jaclanel Moore McFarland, a Houston attorney, to resign for allegedly tipping off students about an undercover drug operation by Baylor's police department. Moore claims she did no such thing and is being targeted because she's an ardent Sloan critic.
"I think it is about power, not theology," said Randall Fields of San Antonio, a former regent who was vice chair when Sloan was named president.
The attempt to silence McFarland, based on hearsay that hasn't been fully investigated, is "what fundamentalists do," Fields said, adding that if Sloan does not change his autocratic ways, "there is a real question if he should stay."
Many Sloan critics say it's ironic that just 12 years ago then-President Herbert Reynolds engineered a charter change to limit the number of regents chosen by the Baptist General Convention of Texas to one-fourth of the 36 regents, and allow the regents to choose the rest. Although the convention is moderate, there was fear it would be overrun by fundamentalists.
I may be in the minority in this state, but I've always felt that Fundamentalism and education are for all intents and purposes mutually incompatible. Fundamentalism, in it's pure form, provides a very narrow and Conservative view of the world, one that if often incompatible with the open hearts and minds that are required for an effective learning environment. Fundamentalism is about control- particularly behavior and thought control. Enshrining that sort of control into the philosophy of an institution of higher learning would seem to be counterproductive.
Granted, the Baylor experience would not have been my cup of tea. It is, nonetheless, an excellent institution worthy of it's academic reptutation. It's sad to see it in the process of being hijacked by a Fundamentalist who seems more interest in theocratic purity than diversity of thought and philosophy. Baylor and it's alumni deserve better.
