A Decade of Progress
Chicago State College
Years of Transition
With its mandate broadened in 1967, Chicago State College became one of 279 similar institutions across the country. According to figures compiled for the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, these four-year state colleges, numbering 2t0 with an additional sixty-nine regional universities, spread across flirty-four states, the District of Columbia, Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands, represented over ten percent of the country's higher educational institutions and enrolled at the time twenty-one percent of all students in higher education. It was expected that this one-in-five enrollment ofcollege students in 1967-68 would shortly become. one-in-four and then one-in-three, for state colleges and universities everywhere were growing rapidly and were being heralded as the wave of the future.
Quite different in temperament and mission from the land-grant institutions spread*across the land, the state colleges and universities, for the most part, were all newly emergent from their relatively sleepy, single-purpose pasts as teacher training institutions. Said the Carnegie Commission, "Having acquired a taste for higher status and strong ambitions, they are at various stages of movement along a spectrum from their single-purpose origins as teachers colleges toward multipurpose university status and prestige." All publicly financed and controlled, the institutions were emerging into the sun, Chicago State College included.
Chicago State College had taken a number of steps to fulfill the charge received in July 1965 when it became part of the State of Illinois System of Higher Education. This mandate called lot the College to become a multipurpose university serving the higher education needs of the metropolitan Chicago area, with a major emphasis on undergraduate education. These first steps had consisted of designing and offering undergraduate degree programs in ten liberal arts areas (art, biology, chemistry, English, geography, history, mathematics, music, physics, and psychology) and graduate degree programs in five liberal arts areas (English, geography, history, mathematics, and natural sciences).
New kinds of professional and vocationally oriented programs were planned in the areas of business and administration, paramedical occupations, including nursing, and social welfare/urban services. Corrections education—the first in the Chicago metropolitan area—was added to the College catalog. So that the College would be prepared to offer such programs at the undergraduate level when it occupied its new campus, a major commitment was made to the employment of planning personnel in the first two of the three areas beginning in the 1970-71 academic year.
It had become clear that there was a national demand for reform in teacher education as well as shifts in emphasis in undergraduate education. Pre-service and in-service education of teachers needed to be modified to produce teachers who were creative and sensitive to the implications of social change. Teachers were needed who were, in particular, capable of bringing about significant improvement in the education of those members of the society for whom the educational enterprise had operated partly as a barrier and a rejection rather than as a door-opener to the myriad opportunities of American society.
While teacher education reform was being recognized on a national and local level, black students were highly concerned with their immediate plight. Born out of the wave of activism that was sweeping the nation's campuses in the late 1960s, black students were demanding that colleges and universities give consideration to the contribution of black people by instituting black studies programs. Black students at Chicago State College, like students across the nation, were in search of a solution to past racial wrongs, cultural identity for both students and the black community, an opportunity to study the black experience in such areas as history, sociology and the arts, and the appointment of more black faculty.
Racial friction mounted, and in March 1969, black student leaders latched Onto a long chain of similar events occuring in Chicago and across the country. Dissatisfied with the administration's progress in honoring ten of their demands, among them a Black Cultural Center, black students rioted in the lunchroom and set several fires in the 6800 Stewart building. To further dramatize their demands, students seized control of the College administration building, holding Dean Theodore Stolarz and Assistant to the President Erik Shari hostage for 5 1/2 hours. Byrd, who was off campus at the time, returned the following day to a confusing situation. With both sides unwilling to concede anything in public, resolution of the crisis was more than a week coming. A hostile atmosphere was the immediate residue, with distrust at a high level between the administration on the one hand and the students and sympathetic faculty on the other.
It must be noted, however, that Chicago State College was the scene of only minor incidents in comparison to other college campuses during that period. Nonetheless, the student unrest, though costly and a bit dangerous, was a catalyst for social and academic change.
As a first step toward establishing instructional programs treating ethnocentricity in American life, the College established a Committee on Black Studies. As a result, a full-time Coordinator of Black Studies and the Black Cultural Center was engaged. A temporary quarters was established for the Black Cultural Center, and approximately thirty courses in black culture and history were made available to the students. Undergraduate students were able to take a concentration of up to fifteen credit-hours in Black Studies. Anticipated future development included courses and programs for Spanish-Americans and other ethnic groups.
Byrd felt that the faculty as a whole possessed basic academic strength, capable of providing the basic foundation for the future urban university. While he found the students "an attractive lot," he felt that they must be made more aware of the great problems and challenges of their age. The faculty's responsibility, he felt, was to stimulate the students to become more concerned and involved and to encourage them to express their ideas so they could truly feel part of the College community.
This faculty-student relations position articulated by Byrd left its mark on several members of the faculty who were on the staff before Byrd's tenure. Byrd's reference to hiring qualified people and the future recruitment of faculty from beyond the Chicago area in order to develop a more diversified faculty, disappointed many. 'The expressed hope," said Byrd, "is to attract and bring to the campus qualified men and women, who are knowledgeable, able, liberally educated, and professionally trained." As concerted efforts escalated during 1966-70 to recruit faculty members on a nation-wide basis, the faculty included 146 members who had received their academic training at institutions outside of Illinois and 135 at Illinois institutions. The annual rate of faculty turnover was eleven percent, which compared favorably to the national average.
The rapid change contributed to a situation making unionism more attractive to faculty. It was a situation in which Chicago State had rapidly experienced a fundamental change in character and purpose, accompanied by a sharp increase in the size of the faculty, the creation of new academic programs and departments, and the appointment of a new president. It was indicative, also, of the shock of educational unrest produced by a demand for real faculty participation in College affairs which was running through American institutions of higher learning. These tensions were intensified by the College's urban setting. Socially, a college tends to reflect the atmosphere of its milieu and, in any age, the city will tend to be in the vanguard of change.
Coincidental with its "victory" in the Staughton Lynd case, the American Federation of Teachers, Local 1600, of which Chicago State was a chapter member, demanded in a proposal to the Board of Governors the right to have a collective bargaining election to decide whether the faculty members wanted collective bargaining and who their agent would be. A strike vote called for work stoppage if the Board did not act upon the collective bargaining request by March 1. The Cook County Teachers Union was still riding on the crest of its success following the new contract negotiated for the City Colleges. CCTU, as the exclusive representative of the teaching faculty on the seven junior college campuses, had negotiated a course load reduction limited to no more than 13 contact hours a week in the City Colleges. Salaries were increased an average of $500, a three year tenure policy was accepted, and $300 in fringe benefits were added. The successfully negotiated contract "demonstrated to Chicago State faculty how tough a faculty union could be."
Poll results released to the media by the AAUP Chapter indicated that sixty-one Chicago State faculty members wanted College Senate representation while fifty-nine preferred the Cook County Teachers Union. In third place with forty votes was the American Association of University Professors. The actual official vote did not take place, however, because the Board denied the request, which also contained a program to serve as the basis for contract negotiations.
Prior to the Board meeting in November 1967, the union program was presented to the faculties of Chicago State and Northeastern, asking them to vote on the proposal. The proposal presented by Local 1600 carried 16 items, among which were a 36-week calendar, a salary schedule ranging from $10,000 to $31,000, a class load of nine hours for undergraduate-and six hours for graduate teaching, and an equitable grievance procedure providing for binding arbitration of all disputes. The faculties of the two state colleges voted and overwhelmingly endorsed the union's proposals by a margin of six to one. The vote results were: Chicago State, with sixty-nine percent of the total faculty of 218 voting, 157 in favor; at Northeastern, with sixty-three percent of the total faculty of 222 voting, 118 affirmative.
Again the Board of Governors rejected the vote results. The principal reasons for the rejection of the request, according to comments made by the Board's report, was that Local 1600 was primarily a Junior College union, with a minority membership from the two state colleges. The Board's resolution pointed out that "perhaps half" of the two colleges' faculty would not have a voice in such a collective bargaining arrangement and that half of the institutions governed by the Board would also have no voice in a contract agreement which applied just to Chicago State and Northeastern and not to the other BOG schools.
The resolution as adopted committed the Board to continue faculty representation and governance in accordance with the American Association of Univeristy Professors (AAUP), American Council on Education (ACE), and Association of Governing Boards (AGB) statement of 1966. Norman Swenson, the union president, called the resolution a "backward step" and a "paternalistic point of view."
Many of the annoyances experienced under the Board of Education had been more or less alleviated under State control, according to the Board of Governors, which was quick to point out the dramatic changes for the betterment of the institution which had taken place under its-guidance. Therefore, the Board, based on its record of accomplishment, believed that by "bringing in an outside agency to bargain for the faculty, such gain would be lost." The union contended that the Board's refusal to accept collective bargaining had nothing to do with education: rather it was concerned with management techniques.
In a Policy statement issued in January 1968 by the Board of Governors of State Colleges and Universities with regard to Faculty Representation, the Board indicated that its "central concern" grew out of the essential character of the academic endeavor.
Any lessening of the still growing faculty role in the institution under the Board of Governors would be a heavy if not disastrous price to pay for the uncertain advantages that may or may not accrue from "collective bargaining". The academician is committed to the rational and dispassionate examination of facts, evidence, and ideas, to their careful and logical analysis, to the application of judgment, and to a resulting synthesis and conclusion. It is this process and its spirit of patient and careful work which faculty members attempt to impress upon students. How can the faculty member create the environment to bring about the intellectual development of students if at the same time he engages in processes which are inimical to the academic spirit?
But the faculty continued to press for collective bargaining. Meetings and demonstrations were held, and the Board was presented with an overwhelming number of signed cards showing that a majority of faculty members wanted collective bargaining.
In March 1968, the faculty at Chicago State College and Northeastern Illinois State College went out on strike. Scheduled for two weeks between April 3 and April 18, college professors began picketing the college campls and eloquently recited their demands. The Chicago Tribune (April 4), reported that seventy percent of the Chicago State faculty and fifty percent of the Northeastern faculty were striking or honoring picket lines. The two presidents offered different data, with President Byrd insisting that no more than a quarter of the faculty was out, and Northeastern President Sachs reporting that two-thirds of Northeastern's classes were meeting manned by regular faculty.
Then on April 4, one day after the strike began, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assasi.sinated. The following day the West and South sides of Chicago erupted in flames and violence, as hundreds of people gave vent to rage too strong for silence. Like many other institutions, Chicago State cancelled classes both the following Monday and Tuesday (April 8-9). The local newspapers and public were asking, "Why are college professors striking at a time like this?" Two weeks was too long. Wearily, the professors packed away their signs and headed back to their classrooms, and union leaders returned to their strategy boards. No action was taken against striking teachers, but Richard Nelson, the Board Chairman, was quoted in the Chicago Tribune as having told faculty members they were returning "with full understanding that all grades will be given and no compensation will be paid for time on strike or overtime for completing their work."
The AFT's first attempt in April 1968 to bargain for the two schools had failed.
As of January 1970, Chicago State College's full-time faculty numbered 281, of whom 239 were teaching members and the remainder administrative appointees. The faculty had grown in number from 165 in 1965 to 274 in 1968. There were ninety-five women and 186 men. Eighty-seven percent were white, nine percent black, and four percent Oriental and other. The median age was forty-two.
Sixty-five percent of the faculty had fewer than four years of service at the College, 185 having come to the institution since it converted to State control. Sixteen percent had served on the faculty from four to nine years, sixteen percent from ten to nineteen years, and three percent had more than twenty years of service. In 1969 faculty members commuted from as far as Highland Park to the north, Murphysboro to the south, Portage to the east, and Geneva to the west.
In the fall of 1969 Chicago State College enrolled 5,943 students. The student body included three major groups: undergraduates who entered the College as freshmen; undergraduates who transferred to the College after completing some work at junior college; and students who were admitted to the graduate school or who were taking primarily graduate courses.
Altering the institution's mission also led to the inauguration of many alternative programs, such as degree offerings in the Individualized Curriculum, the Board of Governors degree program, a legislative internship, and the national University Without Walls program. Chicago State was the first institution in the United States to graduate University Without Walls students. Its mission as an urban institution was now being implemented with results.
Campus Sites, 1870-Present
- 1870-1972: 6800 South Stewart Campus
- 1962-1972: West Center Campus
- 1972-Present: 9501 South King Drive Campus
