Remember 2020? It was the height of the pandemic. It was a time when we as an institute had to make weighty decisions quickly. It was also a time when we were physically separated from one another, making it logistically challenging to converse and to participate in decision-making processes.
At that time, Mike Short reached out to me and articulated a concern about faculty input on important Institute-wide decisions. He noted (and I agreed) that we were hearing a lot from the loud extremes and very little from the (often quiet) middle of the community. We were very keen to hear from this middle group, but all of the existing communication channels that we could think of – faculty meetings, the FNL, directly reaching out to leadership, etc. – tended to damp out moderate voices and amplify the passionate extremes. The lack of a channel for this largely unheard part of the community inspired us to search for another vehicle that could work in concert with the existing communication channels. We called our pet project “The Pulse of the Faculty.”
To give this busy, mostly silent cohort a chance to engage, we needed a tool with the following properties:
- It had to be quick and easy to use.
- There should be mechanisms that allow faculty to pick the topic of conversation. (The FNL is another great example of a medium with this property).
- In order for busy people to prioritize participation in Pulse, it should either be fun and/or interesting and/or impactful.
- Users should be able to change their mind. In an ideal world, Pulse questions would stimulate conversations which may change peoples’ perspectives; if that happens, users should be able to update their Pulse response.
Note that none of these properties are necessarily characteristics of a high-quality survey. For example, a high-quality survey would typically not share the results until the survey is closed. On Pulse, in contrast, many people have expressed that they enjoy seeing what other people are saying throughout the week. This feature is interesting and many users have shared that it makes them feel connected to the community – even if their response is an outlier. When Mike and I launched Pulse, we chose to prioritize the properties above, which means that Pulse is closer to a community game than a survey. It is not a definitive conclusion; it is the beginning of a conversation.
What do the faculty want to talk about?
If Pulse is the beginning of a conversation, high-engagement questions suggest topics that we may want to discuss as a community. I have picked a few of those questions from Spring 2024 to highlight below.[1]
Are you concerned about retaliation from any of the people listed below when you speak your mind?
This question had the most engagement of any Pulse question with 320 people responding, and touches on a number of important issues. First, many people have shared their concern that the speed and prevalence of social media has changed the landscape of retaliation. Doxxing, defamation, and the spread of misinformation are now common occurrences; a meaningful ability to retaliate is not necessarily aligned with institutional power. Our policies may not be equipped to handle this new retaliation environment and we as a community need to decide what is culturally acceptable in this space. This issue was foreshadowed in recommendation 9 in the Freedom of Expression Working Group Report which states: “Because the technological landscape is continually changing with a concomitant proliferation of digital platforms on campus, we recommend periodic review of relevant Institute policies to ensure consistency with the MIT Statement on Freedom of Expression.” The ad hoc Committee on Academic Freedom and Campus Expression (CAFCE) will sunset in December 2024 and we have been asked by the President and the Chair of the Faculty to provide recommendations regarding the free expression landscape on campus; social media will certainly be one of the many topics on our mind. If you have suggestions that you would like to share on this topic, as always, you may reach out to any of the members of CAFCE.
Second, some of the responses to the retaliation question may reflect concerns about complaint resolution processes at MIT. Vice Provost for Faculty Paula Hammond has assembled a Faculty Advisory Committee which is mindful of faculty concerns in this space. They have been collecting input, reflecting on next steps, and plan to issue a report with recommendations when their work is complete. We look forward to hearing from them in the coming months.
Finally, a significant number of faculty report feeling concerned about retaliation from senior administrators and deans. Whether or not this is likely, the fact that people feel this way is troubling. One strategy to help identify where this feeling is coming from is suggested in the next Pulse question …
Should the faculty have opportunities to rate senior administrators?
265 people responded to this question and needless to say, the overwhelming answer was YES. Our community is no stranger to evaluation. Students are rated through grades; faculty are rated through course evaluations and performance reviews; department and unit heads are rated through visiting committees. We tell our students: “Feedback given in good faith is a gift.” Given the abundance of evaluation and assessment on college campuses, this question made me appreciate how odd it is that we do not rate our senior administrators.
Rating administrators is not uncharted territory. The University of Michigan not only allows faculty to rate their administrators, but also posts the results online. This seems like a golden opportunity. If the administration were to ask the faculty “How are we doing?” and share the responses – as is done at UMich and as we do for all faculty course evaluations – my guess is that it would go a long way towards building trust with the faculty and, as a bonus, the faculty might even provide some useful advice.
The topic of feedback and advice brings me to the next question:
The Schwarzman College of Computing: Your opinion now?
This question received 290 responses; 53 people feel that things are going well, but 197 people had concerns (the remainder were neutral or abstained). Given that we are coming up on the five-year anniversary of the founding of the College, this seems like a terrific opportunity to assess how things are going. Many faculty have suggested that, when there are major initiatives which involve a significant amount of MIT resources and a large number of faculty (such as the College of Computing or the upcoming Climate Initiative), best practices dictate that serious assessments should be performed, including gathering input from stakeholders. Engaging faculty in meaningful assessment processes for major initiatives in general seems like another excellent opportunity to build goodwill and perhaps get a bit of useful information to boot.
Your preferred grad admissions site: Slate or Gradapply?
272 people responded to this question with overwhelming support for Gradapply. I included this question because we received thanks from a number of faculty for precipitating a conversation on this topic that many felt needed to happen. It is certainly possible that the conversation would have occurred anyway. But the sense at the time was that faculty felt frustrated and unheard; this Pulse question made it clear that they were not alone in their frustration. There is power in the faculty when we are united, but we do not always know whether our views are aligned with our colleagues. A good Pulse question can provide transparency and reveal when we are all pointed in the same direction.
Finally, there are many Pulse questions which essentially boil down to suggestions for spending money. In general, these questions are not framed as trade-offs, so the answers are not terribly informative. Despite that, there are two that I highlight here because both have come up sufficiently frequently in other venues (e.g., in the Random Dinners) that I feel they deserve special attention:
Should we restore the faculty dining area on the 4th floor of the Stata Center? (319 responses) and Bring back the food trucks?[2] (241 responses)
Campus dining is clearly on the minds of many people. The Committee on Student Life, chaired by Raul Radovitzky, recently issued a report on campus dining. The report is a short two pages and includes useful estimates and context; I encourage everyone to read it. Campus dining is an issue that is growing more acute and, in upcoming discussions, it may be helpful if we all shared a common understanding of the scale, the opportunities, and the constraints.
Should MIT focus on lowering the cost of graduate students? (250 responses) and Should MIT reduce tuition cost for graduate students after the second year? (247 responses)
The high cost of graduate students is an enormous pain point for the faculty. This is not a new challenge. Rick Danheiser made addressing this a priority when he was chair of the faculty and some of the recent history around this issue is highlighted in his last FNL piece as chair (see page 8); it also appears as RIC 15 in the Report of Task Force 2021 and Beyond. Progress has certainly been made on this front – covering the shortfall of NSF Fellowship funding is a huge help! But these historical documents suggest that covering the shortfall was intended as a first step, and that there is more work that needs to be done.
Tips on how to engage with The Pulse
If you would like to take part in future Pulse conversations, all MIT faculty have access at: https://pripyat.mit.edu/Pulse/Home.php . Typically two new questions are posted every Wednesday and remain live for one week. The preponderance of questions are submitted by the faculty.
Tips for responding to questions. “Be curious, not judgemental.”[3] Your colleagues may not write things the way you would. Their questions and responses may be unclear. They may come from a place that has different norms, perspectives, and vocabulary than yours. Try to hear what they are asking without being judgemental; be interested in why they are asking the question.
Tips for question-writers. I love the questions that come in from the community and I often find the questions more interesting than the answers. The submitted questions are a reflection of the ideas, frustrations, creativity and feelings of the faculty. The topics are almost always interesting.
The challenge typically comes, not in picking a topic, but in writing a set of multiple choice responses that capture the views of most participants. To write a good set of responses we recommend:
- Put yourself in someone else’s shoes. What would a reasonable person who has a different perspective from yours like to convey? Make sure those perspectives are captured in the response options.
- Don’t assume the responders’ reasoning is the same as yours. We have heard many times that people are frustrated by answers of the form: “Yes, because …” ßResponders may want to answer “yes” but they may disagree with the “because” part of the answer. One of the easiest ways to avoid this problem is to …
- . . . just use a Likert scale i.e., use a scale of 1 to N with 1 being “strongly disagree” and N being “strongly agree,”
- Leading or judgy questions and answers annoy everyone.
- Some people like funny answers (I’m one of those people); some people do not. Each to their own.
For Question Keepers. The Question Keepers (QK) are a pair of faculty who select the weekly Pulse questions. Mike Short and I served as the first pair of Question Keepers, but we did not want the conversation dominated by our biases. To avoid this, we stipulated that the QKs should change every 6-12 months, and the new pair would be selected by the community via a Pulse question.
The most important tip for QKs is to maintain a predictable schedule: release submitted questions quickly for prioritization, and send out reminders at roughly the same time and day every week. We are all very busy and predictability in small things like Pulse can be helpful in navigating our chaotic schedules. I personally prefer that the QKs maintain a light touch to give the faculty more ownership over the tool. But this is a suggestion not a requirement; all QKs have the authority to decide how heavy-handed they would like to be. If you are willing to serve as a QK, please respond when the current Keepers reach out for volunteers in the Spring.
Final thoughts
There is a lot of wisdom in the faculty. Yes, we are annoying; yes, we are often ill-informed; and yes, we let our emotions run away with us. But when we focus and pull together, there is no better group of problem-solvers on the planet than the MIT faculty. And if Pulse can unlock even a tiny fraction of that problem-solving potential – by identifying common challenges, highlighting alignment, or just allowing us to pick a surprising topic of conversation – I consider that a win.
As always, thank you for sharing your opinion!
[1] Note that all MIT faculty have access to all of the previous Pulse questions and responses under “Home” ➔ “Results” on the Pulse website.
[2] To the anonymous person who wrote the food truck question: I laughed out loud when I read the responses. Thank you for making my day!
[3] https://www.charlotteobserver.com/charlottefive/c5-people/article275467806.html
