Editor’s note. In his responses to Springfield College general counsel Christopher Neronha, Professor Gouws refers to a number of documentary records that substantiate his claims. These records—emails, letters, the documents surrounding Professor Gouws’ unsuccessful application for a sabbatical, and the faculty handbook—are available in a Google drive folder here.
April 19, 2016
Peter Wood
President
National Association of Scholars
8 W. 38th Street, Suite 503
New York, NY 10018
RE: Professor Dennis Gouws
Dear Mr. Wood,
Your correspondence addressed to President Cooper dated April 4, 2016 regarding Springfield College Professor Deninis Gouws has been forwarded to me for handling. In the future, please direct any further communication regarding this matter to the undersigned. In addition, I am returning material addressed for Mr. John Krieger at The Achelis Foundation that was apparently inadvertently send by your office to President Cooper.
As an initial observation, while the College certainly appreciates your interest in this matter, I would encourage you to ask Professor Gouws to share with you all of the material and other information that been communicated to him by the College regarding the content of the “Men in Literature” course as well as the other matters—such as his sabbatical request—which you reference in your letter.
Gouws: I am pleased he made this gesture. Dr. Wyld originally stipulated that she would share the assessments of my sabbatical application on condition I did not share them. See Wyld's email 7.
My sense in reading your correspondence suggests that you do not have a complete history of what has transpired nor have you had the benefit of reviewing the College’s curriculum and other policies and procedures which govern these matters—policies and procedures that have been reviewed by the College faculty.
Gouws: I have uploaded a copy of the 2015-2016 Faculty Handbook to my Google Drive and refer to its contents in my critique of Drs. Herzog and Szewczynski's assessment of my sabbatical proposal discussed below.
In addition, as noted bellow, Professor Gouws has repeatedly been encouraged to meet with the College’s academic leadership to discuss concerns involved—something that at this time he has elected not to pursue.
Gouws: I have repeatedly asked for written responses from Mr. Neronha (see Neronha's emails 1 and 2 ); however, he has chosen not to answer them, preferring rather to invite me to meet with him–circumstances under which there will be no objective record of what is said.
In any event, to briefly summarize the matter at hand, Professor Gouws was hired by the College as a Professor of English and tasked with, among other required activities, teaching literature courses to fulfill the College’s general education requirements.
Gouws: I was originally hired, in September, 1999, to teach American Nature Writing, Shakespeare, Survey of British Literature 2 (from the Romantics through the C21), and College Writing. I was subsequently invited by the then Dept. Chair, Margaret Lloyd to design courses in Post-colonial Literature and Men in Literature (the latter was suggested to complement the Department's existing Women and Literature course). Of the courses I was originally hired to teach, I now only teach College Writing and British Literature 2 Survey courses–the Humanities Department curriculum has changed so that British Literature 2 now consists of short one-period survey courses. These changes exemplify the dynamic nature of the department's course offerings and the changing personnel teaching them.
The course that is the subject of your correspondence was, as required by the College’s adopted curricular policies and procedures, originally approved to meet those requirements. However, Professor Gouws at some point, and without officially receiving approval as required, chose to modify the content of the course.
Gouws: The Springfield College Faculty Handbook does require approval for any significant modification made to the course content (see pages 147-148); however, the changes I made to the syllabus, including the inclusion of different texts, did not–and has not–violated the Humanities Department guidelines governing what is taught in various-level courses (See Dr. Szewczynski's email 9 and the materials at the link.) Both prose fiction and nonfiction are allowed. In her email 3, Dr. Herzog asserts that "Department policies/expectations […] may be more important than the generic Faculty Handbook statement." Consequently, the stipulations in Dr. Szewczynski's email 9 should prevail.
The modification came to the attention of the Department Chair and Dean following inquires and expressed concerns from students regarding the content of the course.
Gouws: In violation of the Faculty Handbook protocol for dealing with student complaints (given on page 99), Dr. Herzog refused to name the student–or students (some of her emails claim there was a student, others that there were more than one). (See Herzog's email 4).
Upon subsequent review of the course syllabus, it was apparent that Professor Gouws had shifted the focus of the course from “literature” …
Gouws: The administrators directly involved have refused to provide me with the College's definition of "literature" (See Herzog's email 1) or have not defined "literature" in their correspondence (as in Wyld's letter of March 15, 2016–see Letters #6)
… to “gender studies,” …
Gouws: Dr. Wyld (in her March 15, 2015 letter), Dr. Szewcynski, and Dr. Herzog (in their assessments of my sabbatical application [given in Appendix 4 of the My Formal Grievance Submission]) seem neither to have read nor understood how my male-studies work, described in my sabbatical proposal (See My Formal Grievance Submission Appendix 1) differs from "gender studies"–which they fail to define in their writing.
… thereby creating a concern that the course was not fulfilling the literature requirement for which it was approved. Despite your suggestion that the expressed concern of the Department Chair and Dean (and now the Provost) is an ideological attack, it is, in fact, a curricular matter.
Gouws: Refer to Dr. Herzog's email 6 and Dr. Szewcynski's email 12; see also my critique of their assessments on pages three through six of my Grievance Document in My Formal Grievance Submission. The fact that neither Dr. Herzog nor Dr. Szewczynski would answer my questions about the documents informing their assessments of my sabbatical proposal suggests they used their own ideological positions to assess my work. Dr. Wyld's letter dated June 12 2015 inadvertently concedes the college's reliance on personal opinion rather than assessment-criteria documents. See the final paragraph of Appendix 10 in My Formal Grievance Submission.) Also, see my comments about Dr. Herzog and her beliefs in my letters #2 (January 23 2014) and #4 (February 11 2014).
Moreover, both the Department Chair and Dean, despite being authorized to remove the course from the schedule immediately, permitted Professor Gouws to teach the course for one additional semester to afford him the opportunity to return the content of the course to the required literature-based focus. Despite that opportunity, Professor Gouws chose to wait nearly ten months before resubmitting the course for review.
Gouws: This sentence misrepresents Dr. Herzog’s assertion in the last paragraph of her email, dated June 2 2015–see the last page of Herzog's email 4. During my meeting with Drs. Herzog and Szewczynski, on September 28 2015, we agreed on the changes I needed to make before I taught the course again. Dr. Herzog never specified exactly when these changes needed to be made, only that they be made before I teach the course again. See Dr. Szewcynski's email 2 for more information on our agreement. Dr. Szewczynski's response does not contest my description of that agreement.
It is his delay—not that of the College—that has resulted in this unfortunate timing of the course not being able to be placed on the fall 2016 semester schedule. I would note that you seem to overlook the Provost’s own assessment that the other literature courses taught by Professor Gouws (“Victorian Manhood” and “English Romantic Literature”) do contain the appropriate and necessary literature focus.
Gouws: In the ante-penultimate paragraph of her March 15 2015 letter Dr. Wyld merely states these courses "do seem to appropriately focus [sic] on literature"; Dr. Wyld offers no rationale in support of this statement.
Professor Gouws appears quite capable of developing and, as necessary, reformatting, courses to meet the College’s expected literature requirements.
Gouws: The important omission from this letter is the discussion of my College Writing assignment involving writing about the treatment of males. I think that this part of Dr. Wyld's March 15 2015 letter was a serious blunder, and I think they know that.
Of course, Springfield College prides itself on its open and productive relationship and dialogue between its faculty and academic administrators.
Gouws: Springfield College administrators end the dialogue when doing so on the record does not suit them. In addition to Neronha's already mentioned emails 1 and 2; see Human Resource Administrator, Rosanne Captain's refusal to respond to my emails in Captain 3, 6, and 8 as well as in her letters 3 and 5; see also Dr. Herzog's emails 1, 4, and 6; see Dr. Szewczynsk's emails 1, 2, and 13; see Lorie Pieterse's emails in Office [of the President] 4.
In that regard, Professor Gouws has been repeatedly invited to meet with Provost Wyld and me to further discuss this matter and to address any of his questions or concerns. He had also been encouraged to seek guidance from members of his department if he requires any assistance or support reestablishing the necessary literature focus of the course in question.
Gouws: This statement refers to Dr. Herzog's email 1: she suggests I consult the Humanities Department's "Literature Committee"; however, this group had been charged with seeing if English syllabi fulfilled requirements stipulated by the Massachusetts Department of Education; this group, consequently, had no mandate to do what Dr. Herzog suggested. Besides, my syllabus accords with the criteria concerning English courses given in Szewczynski's email 9.
He has chosen to not take advantage of either of those opportunities. You appear to raise a concern that Professor Gouws is reluctant to meet with me based upon my role as the College’s General Counsel. That comes as a surprise as I have met with Professor Gouws on a number of occasions (including two sessions where it was at his request and just the two of us) and he expressed no apprehension or concern.
Gouws: Because Rosanne Captain, the former Human Resources Administrator, stopped responding to my emails; I approached President Cooper to discuss my situation; Dr. Cooper's staff insisted that I meet with Mr. Neronha; I had no choice in the matter. I stopped meeting with him, and once again sought a meeting with Dr. Cooper, when I felt that Mr. Neronha was not helping me at all (see Office [of the President's] email 2).
With that said, and to be clear, there is no requirement that he meet with me and he is welcome to arrange a meeting with the Provost without my presence—he merely needs to request such. He is also invited and encouraged to bring a colleague from the faculty to participate in any such meeting
I hope this letter clarifies the information that you have been provided on this matter and that in your role and in your organization’s stated mission of open, rationale discourse that you would encourage Professor Gouws to take advantage of the opportunities provided to him in an effort to resolve this matter to the satisfaction of all involved.
Sincerely,
Christopher M. Neronha
