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Show B10 Castle Valley Review, March 2009 CEU NEWS Reverend Speaks During Forum at CEU Discussing the positive achievements of African Americans was the main focal point of a forum featuring the Reverend France A. Davis when he described Black History Month at the College of Eastern Utah, Feb. 26, in the Jennifer Leavitt Student Center. He told the faculty, staff and students that originally Black History Month was celebrated the second week of February. “This week was important because Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass were born the second week, plus the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was organized that week.” He asked those in attendance if they knew who laid out Washington DC streets, made the first allwooden clock, was the first doctor to perform open heart surgery, invented street lights and the gas mask? All were African Americans. The U.S. Constitution defines African American males as three-fifths of a person, Native Americans as not being a person, and white men as whole persons, he said. Many think that black slaves were given their freedom with Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. There were not given their freedom until the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution were ratified. Then 7 million people had their freedom but no education or means to support themselves. To help educate this new class of people, black colleges and universities were created to educate the African American people. These colleges represent three percent of the 4,084 institutions of higher education. Davis said when the Klu Klux Klan was organized, it was to keep African Americans in their place. “We had to sit in the front of the trains, back of the busses, balcony of the theatres and bottom of the boats.” A black trapper named James Beckworth was in the Utah Territory 25 years before the first Mormon pioneers arrived in the Salt Lake Valley, he said. Three black servants were with the pioneers when they first arrived in the valley. About 28,000 African Americans live in Utah and work primarily in the hospitality, mining and train industries. Most live within 40 miles of Salt Lake City, he said. In addition to living on the Wasatch Front, there are many black families who had made Carbon County their home for years. Walking alongside Martin Luther King Jr. and knowing Malcom X, he explained that he had a lot of history to tell. King had three goals needed for African Americans to be equal. First, we needed to deal with the issue of poverty, limit our military and enter the political arena. “With Barrack Obama as president, we have achieved one of King’s goals.” Davis resides in Salt Lake City, and was born and reared on a Georgia farm to John H. and Julia Davis. After high school he attended Tuskegee Institute and later became an Air Force jet mechanic. He later The Reverend France A. Davis speaks on the positive achievements of African Americans during a forum at the Jennifer Leavitt Student Center. earned degrees in Afro-American studies from Merritt College; arts and humanities from Laney College; rhetoric from University of California at Berkeley; religion and philosophy from Westminster College; master’s of mass communication from the University of Utah; and master’s of ministry from Northwest Nazarene College. He came to Salt Lake City in 1972 as a teaching fellow and graduate student. He was appointed instructor in communication and ethnic studies courses, earning a distinguished teacher award, and continues to teach in the University of Utah’s Honors and Ethnic Studies Program as adjunct associate professor. He was licensed in 1966 and ordained in 1971 for ministry. Presently, the Reverend Davis is, and has been since 1974, the full-time pastor of the historic Calvary Missionary Baptist Church of Salt Lake City, Utah. He lectures widely on cultural and religious topics. He also serves on community and national boards, including the Salt Lake Housing Authority, Career Service Council and the Salt Lake Convention and Visitors Bureau. He has received numerous awards, including an honorary doctor of humane letters degree from the University of Utah in 1993, Salt Lake Community College in 1997, Dixie State College in 2002, the T. K. McCarthey Silver Hope Award from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, 2006, an official citation from the Utah House of Representatives in recognition of outstanding service to his community, state and nation in 2006 and appointed as a member to the Salt Lake Community College Board of Trustees by Governor Huntsman in 2007. Reverend Davis published his second book, “ France Davis: An American Story Told,” in 2006. Reverenc Davis is a member of The Utah Board of Regents. Majority of CEU Classes Taught by Full Time Instructors The majority of classes at the College of Eastern Utah are taught by fulltime tenure and tenure-track instructors; a feat many colleges in the United States cannot claim because it is more economical to hire adjuncts in place of fulltime instructors. Almost 72 percent of its instructors are full time, compared to 28 percent of full-time instructors at Salt Lake Community College. Weber State University follows CEU with 69 percent of its faculty being fulltime and Southern Utah University bolstering 55 percent of its faculty as fulltime. On the bottom side of the spectrum, five Utah colleges use fulltime instructors to teach at least 40 percent of their classes. Those schools include Utah Valley University 41 percent, Utah State University 43 percent, Dixie State College 44 percent, and Snow College 45 percent, according to the Utah System of Higher Educa- tion Data Book. The University of Utah has 1,172 fulltime instructors and 510 adjuncts, followed by USU with 622 full-time instructors, 205 adjuncts; WSU has 486 full-time instructors, 117 adjuncts; UVU has 402 full-time instructors, 387 adjuncts; SLCC has 325 full-time instructors, 481 adjuncts; SUU has 218 full-time instructors, 77 adjuncts; Snow has 126 full-time instructors, 93 adjuncts; DSC has 94 full-time instructors, 108 adjuncts. CEU has 91 full-time instructors and 16 adjuncts. The faculty taught 2,920 contact hours, a total of 2,030 instructional credit hours offered with students taking 21,853 credit hours. Sixteen CEU faculty members teach overload classes (more than 15 hours of class instruction) with 91 part-time instructors teaching classes fall semester. Part time instructors generate 22 percent of CEU’s total FTE (full-time equivalent) with instructors teaching overload classes, generating three percent of the total FTE. Michelle Fleck, academic vice president and provost, adds, “It’s difficult for CEU to find qualified adjuncts, due to our rural location. Ideally, adjuncts who teach general education courses should hold a masters in the discipline. This matter is on our curriculum and instruction committee agenda for this semester (minimum qualifications for adjunct faculty).” In the Chronicle of Higher Education, Peter Schmidt wrote, “At a time when colleges are under increasing financial pressure to rely more on part-time instructors, three new studies suggest that doing so erodes the quality of education many students receive. “Part-timers’ inability or unwillingness to devote more time to students outside the classroom, the research suggests, results in the denial of important support services to many students - including, often, those who need the most help. “And in a finding that breaks new ground, one of the studies concludes that heavy reliance on part-timers can actually hurt the performance of full-time, tenure-track faculty members. One possible explanation: Full-timers feel less secure at institutions that might replace them with part-time instructors and lecturers, said that study’s author, Paul D. Umbach, an associate professor of adult and higher education at North Carolina State University.” Part-timers are not the ones to blame, Umbach said, “We are not treating these faculties in a way that they are feeling valued.” In a Dec. 4, 2008 article in The Continued on Next Page. |