[Sehefac] PPFP program under threat: contact UCOP

[dana.simmons at ucr.edu]

Hello SEHE friends,
A pillar of UC's unique faculty strength is under direct threat. This is a
clear example of preemptive cooperation under threat from the federal
administration. Please write if you are motivated to do so (information
below).
Thank you and happy weekend,
Dana

*****

Dear colleagues,


The UC President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program (PPFP) has, for the last
forty years, supported the recruitment and career advancement of faculty
whose scholarship, teaching, and service advance the research excellence
and public service missions of the UC. This includes more than 400 current
UC faculty who are leaders in all fields and on all ten campuses. Despite
the rigor and success of this highly selective program, the systemwide
Provost has notified campus leadership that they are defunding the PPFP
hiring incentive, eliminating it for future hires – but President Milliken
has not yet signed. This would be an unacceptable concession to the Trump
administration’s demand letter and is taking place without transparency or
consultation with faculty, deans, or other campus leaders. This decision
can not be justified by budgetary concern given that it is a fraction of a
percent of the UC budget. The hiring incentive is crucial to the program’s
competitiveness and success, and campuses rely on it to recruit
postdoctoral fellows as tenure-track professors, sustaining a pipeline of
exceptional faculty. We refuse this federal interference and violation of
our university autonomy and our mission as a public institution. We demand
that the UC President keep the PPFP hiring incentive!


Here’s what you can do:


Share this information widely and write to President Milliken (
president at ucop.edu) about why you think he needs to keep this program.
Please cc: standup4PPFP at gmail.com and consider cc-ing your Dean, EVC and
Chancellor. Below is some template language, but feel free to adapt or
write your own personal message:


Dear President Milliken,


I write to insist on the continued funding of the hiring incentive
associated with the President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program (PPFP).


This program has demonstrated its efficacy for hiring exceptional scholars
over the past 40 years. It is a primary engine for the transformation of
the professoriate and knowledge in the UC system. The PPFP is one of the
most competitive postdoctoral and hiring incentive programs in North
America. It is an open competition that is in alignment with state law and
does not use race, gender, national origin, gender or other protected
classifications in its review and selection.


The hiring incentive linked to the PPFP is a faculty-driven hiring process,
open to all fields. More than 400 current faculty members were hired
through this program. Nearly 100% have been tenured.


Given the demonstrated impact of the hiring incentive on the scholarly
reputation of UC, and given that the cost of the incentive represents a
tiny fraction of the UC budget, budgetary prerogatives do not seem like a
defensible argument for this decision. Cutting the hiring incentive would
be an unacceptable concession to the Trump administration’s demand letter
and is taking place without transparency or consultation with faculty,
deans, or other campus leaders.


I ask you to halt this action and to consult with faculty and
administrators with a long history of not only supporting but also
benefiting from this program.




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Dana Simmons
Chair and Associate Professor, Department of Society, Environment and
Health Equity
Cooperating Faculty, Department of History
University of California, Riverside

On Hunger: Violence and Craving in America from Starvation to Ozempic
<https://www.ucpress.edu/books/on-hunger/paper> available May 13 from UC
Press (Open Access)
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