Posted on Jan 28, 2004

“We give lip service to college service,” says Prof. Terry Weiner in explaining the title of his recent faculty colloquium: “Lip Service: Rethinking the Role of Citizenship in the Liberal Arts College.”

Prof. Terry S. Weiner

“We've lost the role of college service and citizenship,” Weiner said of liberal arts colleges nationally, adding that service has become a “devalued function” at most colleges.

“There is little effort to evaluate or reward college service in the way we do scholarship and teaching,” says Weiner, professor of political science and chair of the department. “[As a result], faculty members are unwilling to play the service roles that are important in a self-governing community of a liberal arts college.”

Weiner, who last fall was invested as Chauncey H. Winters Professor in Comparative Social Analysis, adds that colleges should also evaluate and reward faculty who serve the outside community in their fields.

Weiner recalls his time in graduate school, when students who considered a career at a liberal arts college, were “frowned upon.” University faculty thought their liberal arts counterparts spent too much time on service – advising, committees, peer review – and not enough on scholarship and research that brings resources to the institution.

Times have changed, Weiner says. The university approach, with its pursuit of resources, has trickled down to liberal arts colleges. “Trying to narrow the role of faculty … has taken us away from what it means to be a liberal arts college and made us more like a large research university.”

Weiner's research is based on the literature of college service – reports by professional societies, articles by scholars, reports by foundations – which he will share at Wednesday's talk.

Weiner has the distinction of chairing two academic departments at Union, the Department of Sociology and Anthropology (1978-1986) and the Department of Political Science (currently). After receiving his undergraduate degree in sociology and history from the University of Illinois at Chicago, he went on to earn his master's degree and Ph.D. in sociology from the University of North Carolina.

He joined the Union faculty in 1974 and has developed courses in such areas as health care politics, the sociology of medicine, political sociology, and issues in American education. He also has published in the major journals of political science and sociology and health, including the Journal of Politics, the American Journal of Sociology, and the American Journal of Public Health.

He was associate dean of the faculty for seven years and acting dean of the faculty for one year; he started the College's M.A.T. program and, as dean and department chair, has increased the presence of women on the faculty. Among his community positions, he has been a member of the Niskayuna School Board since 1990 (currently serving as president), a member of the board of trustees of Wildwood School and Family Corp., chair of the board of the Early Childhood Education Center, and an advisor to Schenectady Association for Retarded Children and DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education).