TEN-YEAR ACCREDITATION PLEASES UNIVERSITY

An accreditation review of Southeast Missouri State University lauded the institution for the "loyalty" of faculty, staff and students, and its "remarkable support" by alumni and the Cape Girardeau community.

But the evaluation team for the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools also pointed out some concerns, including: the need for higher salaries for faculty and other university personnel, a gender and racial imbalance in the upper administrative levels at Southeast, and evidence of racial unrest on the campus.

However, university officials overall are pleased by the evaluation team's report, which recommends that Southeast be reaccredited for 10 years, the maximum period for which North Central grants accreditation.

Referring to the concerns outlined in the report, Art Wallhausen, assistant to the president at Southeast, said: "It is not a surprise those were in there, because they were in the (university's) self-study report in some form."

He said the university itself had looked at those specific issues prior to last year's on-site evaluation by a North Central accreditation team.

Wallhausen said the university will attempt to address the concerns. "Any of the nine or 10 items they list as concerns are certainly things we will be working on."

A six-member North Central evaluation team visited the Southeast campus last October. In making its evaluation, the team relied partly on a self-study done by the university as part of the accreditation process.

North Central's Commission on Institutions of Higher Education is expected to approve the evaluation team's report and formally reaccredit Southeast at the commission's August meeting.

A draft of the evaluation team report was discussed at last week's meeting of the university's Board of Regents.

"Ten years is exceptionally good," Dorothy Allen, assistant provost, told the regents.

University officials have said that reaccreditation is significant. It involved a comprehensive review of the entire campus, from student services to academics to athletics.

Accreditation is a requirement in securing federal and state funding for student grants and other educational programs.

Provost Leslie Cochran has said that accreditation reflects that the institution has been reviewed by outside professionals and is following "nationally accepted practices."

The evaluation team report said that "faculty salaries in general are too low."

In addition, the report said that "there is not a real understanding of the need to pay competitive market salaries to attract qualified faculty in disciplines where there is short supply such as most fields in business."

As to a gender and racial imbalance, the report said, there has been "some improvement" in moving women into administrative positions, but "there remains a gender imbalance among faculty at all ranks."

The evaluation team pointed out that at the professor rank, only 12.2 percent are women. At the associate professor rank, only 18.7 percent are women.

"Even at the assistant professor rank, where one would expect that correction of imbalances would be most evident, only 37.5 percent are women. At the lowest rank of instructor, 64.4 percent are women. Only 28.3 percent of the total complement of full-time faculty are women and 69.3 percent of those women are clustered at the lowest two ranks," the evaluation team said.

"There appears to have been insufficient effort over the past 10 years to bring women into full participation, especially at the upper and tenured ranks. More than half of the student body, on the other hand, are women," the report noted.

Wallhausen acknowledged that there are few women in the upper administrative levels at Southeast. "It's obvious that at least until the advent of Dr. Kala Stroup (university president), there were very few women in essentially the president's cabinet."

In addition, he said, Ed Spicer, associate to the president, is the only black official in the top administrative level at the university.

As to a gender imbalance within the faculty, Wallhausen said an effort is being made to hire more women to improve the situation.

Of 33 new faculty members hired for the 1991-92 academic year, 25 are women, university officials pointed out in a report to the Board of Regents last week. "This represents a net gain of 14 women added to the faculty," the university report said.

As to racial unrest, the evaluation team said that "there is the potential for serious disruption of the institution if corrective measures are not taken to open up lines of communication, namely in the relationships between minority, primarily African-American, and non-minority students."

The report said that two university studies on the issue provided "ample evidence of disharmony and harmful tensions between minority and non-minority students."

The report advised that "developing healthy attitudes toward ethnic diversity among the white majority is as significant an institutional goal as are taking remedial measures to address specific needs of minority groups."

Wallhausen said the racial situation at Southeast mirrors that at other colleges and universities.

"Nationwide at most institutions, including many that have never had a history of racial disagreement, there have been some very unpleasant incidents.

"Any time you have ethnic diversity issues that you have not dealt with, there is the potential for the kind of disruption that they (the evaluation team members) are talking about," said Wallhausen.

The evaluation team also said business classes are held in "woefully inadequate facilities," something university officials hope to address with the eventual construction of a new business school.

The evaluation report praised the university in a number of areas in addition to loyalty of faculty, staff and students, and support of alumni and the community.

The evaluation team said the campus is "very receptive to the new administrative leadership" and the university has a "well thought-out internal planning process."

It also praised Southeast's academic support services, and its university studies and international studies programs.