Kean University professors plan last stand in tenure fight

By Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger

UNION TOWNSHIP — Some of the Kean University professors slated to be denied tenure say they are staging a last-ditch effort this weekend to save their jobs.

Kean President Dawood Farahi and his administrators sparked a controversy on the Union Township campus last month when they failed to give recommendations to six of the nine professors up for tenure this year.

Farahi argued tenure, which is essentially a lifetime job guarantee, is “not an entitlement” and should not be given out lightly at the public university. But members of Kean’s faculty union said most of the fifth-year professors up for tenure this year have spotless records and the unanimous endorsements of their college and department tenure committees.

Donald Moores, one of the professors up for tenure, said he has already lined up nearly two dozen students and colleagues to speak on his behalf at the Kean Board of Trustees meeting on Saturday.

“This is my last-ditch appeal,” said Moores, an assistant professor of English.

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