Stanford Creative Writing Determined to Do the Wrong Thing

In a public relations release credited to the “Stanford School of Humanities and Sciences staff,” we are told that  “Stanford Creative Writing revitalizes its vision amid growing demand.” The following text contains a level of spin and obfuscation that would make the most hardened political operative blush.

I have ceased to be surprised by shortsighted, counterproductive things happening in higher education institutions. Over the years, writing in this space, I have exercised much disbelief and outrage over actions that are demonstrably anti-learning and/or that exploit the hard work of the nontenured laboring underclass.

My present attitude is reflected in the lyrics from Elvis Costello’s “The Angels Wanna Wear My Red Shoes,” where he opens the song by singing,

I am trying to be amused in the Costello-ian sense, rather than disgusted here, and it is proving difficult.

As concisely as possible, I’m going to try to summarize what has been happening with creative writing at Stanford in recent weeks.

In advance of the start of the academic year, all currently employed Jones Lecturers, who do the vast majority of the teaching of undergraduate creative writing, were told that they would be fired, some at the end of this academic year, and others at the end of the next academic year.

These lecturers, some of whom have 10, 15 or 20 years of experience at Stanford, will be replaced by new Jones Lecturers on term-limited three-year contracts.

So, in essence, Stanford is “revitalizing” its undergraduate creative writing program by firing all the people who built it. The revitalization is not a question of improving quality, because, as the press release makes clear, the quality of instruction is off-the-charts high.

As one example, the press release cites “unprecedented growth” in student interest in creative writing. It also praises “popular classes” like the Graphic Novel Project and Novel Writing Intensive, classes that were co-created by Tom Keeley, one of the long-standing lecturers who will be out of a job at the end of the academic year.

Patrick Phillips, a Stanford professor who is one of those who voted to terminate the existing lecturers, seems deeply satisfied with the work that has been happening. “When our writing workshops are good, they’re not just undergraduate classes, but extraordinary gatherings in which people can talk and write about what matters most in their lives. I feel lucky every time I walk into a room of undergraduate writers.”

Everyone says things are going swimmingly, so why fire the people who have built this incredible program?

Nicholas Jenkins, the faculty director of the creative writing program, offers one rationale: “It is common for popular classes to change hands. In setting the curriculum, the Program always pays close attention to student views. Nothing that draws enthusiastic undergraduates is likely to go away. The influx of new Jones lecturers into the Program will also produce innovative course offerings that will become must-haves.”

Is Jenkins arguing that a series of three-year temps—who, for their own sakes, should be focused on securing their post-Stanford futures—will be excellent innovators of new courses at a place they will be staying for such a short time? Does he believe that the inexperienced are better innovators than the experienced? Does he think that once created, these innovative courses will be picked up by subsequent lecturers?

None of this makes rational sense.

Another rationale is to bring the program back to the “original vision” of the Stegner Fellowships/Jones Lectureships, which were intended to be temporary.

A. Van Jordan, another professor who voted to terminate the existing lecturers, said, “When the Jones Lectureship operates as it was designed to, ideally, with the imprimatur of Stanford on their CVs and new book publications, they will go on—as many have over the years—and begin their careers as faculty at other institutions.”

Jordan is saying that the original intention was to make these jobs temporary, to mint more people with Stanford on their CV who can go forth and conquer other parts of academia. But is this a superior vision to what happened organically over time as some Jones Lecturers cycled through in the fashion Jordan describes, while others dug in and developed innovative courses that attracted this unprecedented student interest?

Is Stanford not supposed to be the ne plus ultra of innovation? This is retreat, not revitalization.

The rationales for dismantling the existing program are not even internally consistent, let alone externally persuasive.

What are the real reasons that some of the tenured faculty want to purge their colleagues and instead staff these in-demand, innovative programs with a series of temps?

Perhaps it makes sense to look at how Elvis Costello’s lyrics continue:

It looks to me as though the tenured angels of Stanford creative writing, angels who do vanishingly little teaching, particularly when it comes to undergraduates, recognize the rust on their wings and are now coveting the lecturers’ red shoes.

Interestingly, the students who have been taught by the Jones Lecturers are not buying the rationales, having contributed a couple of dozen (and counting) “Dear Stanford” letters sharing the meaningful experiences made possible by being taught by experienced, knowledgeable, invested faculty.

I stopped being surprised by the indifference of higher education to nontenured labor many years ago, long before I opted out of being among those nontenured laborers. But what’s happening at Stanford still surprises, in that they are making an affirmative choice to dismantle a program that everyone agrees has well served the student interest, not for reasons of cost or quality, but simply because a handful of tenured faculty are determined to exercise the privilege of their rank to purge their nontenured colleagues.

It’s rare to see the petty, gross reality of the structural inequalities of the two tiers of faculty labor in such clear relief, but here we are.

I try to be amused, but really, I’m disgusted.