Some politicians may have their hearts in the right place. Others may be reaching for issues to bring them greater publicity. State Sen. Richard Alarcon's recent indictment of the California State University System regarding diversity of its faculty may be somewhere in between.

Results of a study initiated by Alarcon and reported in the June 26 Tribune showed that the CSU continues to struggle in hiring professors to reflect the state's population. He then demanded that the CSU "have more aggressive policy statements that are strongly and clearly focused on diversity.'

As one who has chaired faculty search and personnel committees in one of the nation's largest departments, I can assure the senator that universities do not take the task lightly. Departments spend approximately a year and a half planning and implementing these national searches. Search committees do their very best in making sure the pool and selection of candidates called for an interview are as diverse as possible. Stringent procedures are followed.

Though diversity is weighed very heavily, the bottom line is to hire a faculty member who will be an outstanding teacher and researcher, and a faculty member who can contribute to university, college and departmental governance and, thus, be able to achieve tenure within six years. That means the candidate must possess the highest degree (usually a doctorate) from one of the nation's prestigious research universities.

The senator and his colleagues should spend more time on solving the budget crisis and making the state a vibrant one in which its state universities could compete and attract minorities. The senator may be surprised to learn that minority and non-minority applicants have not considered California an attractive state in which to teach the past several years.

Applicants are nixing California's invitation to teach four courses and conduct research for beginning salaries that are not on par with other states, which have a two-class load per semester. Minorities with doctorates are heavily wooed by these states and by private industry.

Tony Fellow
Cal State Fullerton