November 22, 1996


MINUTES OF THE OCTOBER 2, 1996 MEETING OF THE UNIVERSITY ASSEMBLY

APPROVAL OF MINUTES

As he welcomed all to the 1996-1997 school year, President David Frohnmayer called the meeting to order at 3:00 p.m. on October 2, 1996 in room 150 Columbia. There being no objections, the minutes of the June 5, 1996 meeting of the University Assembly were approved as distributed.

ANNOUNCEMENTS

President Frohnmayer encouraged all to extend greetings to the University's new faculty during the new faculty reception, an annual event which would, in the long honored tradition of the Assembly, occur immediately upon the meeting's adjournment.

President Frohnmayer announced that the Annual Report of the 1995-1996 Faculty Personnel Committee would be distributed with the minutes of this meeting.

MEMORIALS

Mr. Louis Osternig, Exercise and Movement Science, read a memorial for Ms. Edna Plock Wooten, Professor Emerita of Physical Education. Ms. Wooten, who retired in 1991 after 26 years of service to the University of Oregon, died on July 16, 1996 in an automobile accident near Dallas, Oregon. The memorial to Ms. Wooten is a part of these minutes.

Also a part of these minutes is a memorial to Ms. Joyce M. Mitchell, Professor of Political Science. Ms. Mitchell, who came to the University of Oregon in 1960 and served this institution for a quarter of a century, died in Eugene, Oregon on May 28, 1996.

INTRODUCTION OF NEW FACULTY

At President Frohnmayer's request, Provost John Moseley recognized the deans who introduced their new colleagues to the University Assembly.

STATE OF THE UNIVERSITY ADDRESS

President Frohnmayer delivered the State of the University Address which is made a permanent part of these minutes.

ADJOURNMENT

Before accepting a motion to adjourn, President Frohnmayer again encouraged members of the Assembly to welcome the University's new faculty at a post-adjournment reception in the Faculty Club. The business of the meeting having concluded, the meeting adjourned at 4:15 P.M.

Nancie Fadeley
Acting Secretary


University of Oregon State of the University Address
President Dave Frohnmayer
October 2, 1996

THE OREGON SPIRIT

Thank you.
I have good news to share with you today.
The first good news is that I am going to keep this address relatively short. I, like you, am eager to get on to the chance to meet our new faculty members.
But there is much more.
In my last State of the University speech, I promised this Assembly that the coming year was going to be a great one. My powers of prophecy are severely limited. But that time I think I got it right. This is a university on the move, and people everywhere are taking notice.
During the past year:
* We received the largest single private gift in the history of the Northwest: $25 million from our graduate Philip Knight, a gift that is important not only for its size but its strings-free dedication to supporting faculty positions and building classrooms.
* The Knight gift propelled our Oregon Campaign, the largest fundraising campaign in the history of this state, nearly two years ahead of schedule on its way to its $150 million goal.
There is going to be more good news about the Campaign in a few days, but what pleases me especially is that the Oregon Campaign has been focused on the needs of our people - through raising funds for endowed professorships, providing seed money for innovative teaching methods, and student scholarships - not just bricks and mortar.
* We do have bricks and mortar, too - the pledge for a new law school will free, years sooner than we could have constructed it, 82,000 square feet of much-needed room in the current law school, which faculty and staff in the College of Arts and Sciences can use for classes, lectures, seminars and study space.
* Our educational capabilities have been recognized this year in a variety of rankings: Our business school is ranked among the top 40 in the nation; the School of Law is ranked one of the best in the West; our master's program in special education is fifth in the nation; our research programs in psychology and biology are, in terms of the citation ranking of faculty, among the best in the world; and our overall academic reputation rose to 55th in the nation out of all universities, public and private, according to U.S. News & World Report.
* Through our economies, we have self-funded raises for faculty, and negotiated a successful contract with classified staff.
* Last year's passage of the higher education efficiency act has loosened some of the red tape that was strangling our business operations, and has allowed us to operate more efficiently.
And among many other achievements,
* We saw a student come up with an idea for a conference about the "Ethics After the Holocaust," and the campus worked together to make it a truly outstanding event for our entire state, and in fact the caring world community.
* We created a university-wide alcohol and drug abuse program that was one of four identified as a national model for universities by the U.S. Department of Education.
* We drew 28,000 music lovers to Eugene for the Oregon Bach Festival.
* We went to the Cotton Bowl, the first time in our university's history that we've gone to two New Year's Day bowls back-to-back. The effects this athletic success has on the state's sense of pride and on support of our academic programs is not quantifiable with precision, but obviously tangible in the aggregate.
* We prevented hundreds of tons of waste through more and better recycling efforts.
* Our faculty were featured this year in stories in the New York Times, the Boston Globe, the Washington Post, NPR, CNN, 20/20, Nightline, The Discovery Channel, and many other national outlets.
* And we have attracted a cadre of outstanding new faculty members, many of whom you will meet today.
* We continued to build for the future, completing hundreds of new units of student housing, putting a new roof on Mac Court, and finishing plans to expand classroom capacity by building a new law center.
* Lest I sound too sunny, let me note that there are some troubling clouds on the horizon, as well, which I will address in a moment.
*But for now, let me tell you the final, and perhaps best bit of good news this year: We reached the end of the ratcheting-in of Measure 5, the property-tax limitation that resulted in the loss of millions of dollars in state funding for our enterprise.
We did it. We have survived Measure 5.
The loss of state funding caused by Measure 5 constituted one of the greatest challenges our university has ever faced.
We lost millions of dollars in state funding. To show the magnitude of the cuts we had to make, consider that in 1990 one dollar in three in our overall budget came from state taxes. This year, that number is one dollar in six. No university in the nation has absorbed the magnitude of cuts absorbed over the past several years by the University of Oregon.
Yet we survived.
I cannot pretend that it was easy, or painless. To make ends meet, we cut positions and merged programs. One entire school was eliminated, as were vital parts of others. There was soul-searching on this campus. And there was suffering.
But we survived. And we did more than survive the bludgeon of this ill-considered tax measure - we found ways to thrive in our adversity.
We made tough decisions, and we made some positive changes. We streamlined and made more efficient our central administration, cutting millions of dollars in costs.
We safeguarded the academic core of our university, and found ways to build where we needed it. The Library expansion and renovation is an example.
We became more talented at raising private funds, and better at securing research grants and contracts.
We survived Measure 5, my colleagues, because of you. That is the basis of my trust.
· Your creativity and intelligence have allowed us to weather this storm and emerge in important ways stronger for it.
· Your efficiency helps cut costs. Two examples: Our campus recycling program each year prevents tens of tons of waste. And at the Physical Plant's Utilities Department, employees this year figured out how to join forces with other public institutions to get a bargain price on natural gas, saving us about $200,000 per year.
· Your talent for teaching is a major reason we're getting more students. Not only the quantity of students is going up (enrollment will be up by a couple of hundred again this year). The quality is rising as well. Both average SAT scores and GPAs continue to rise among our freshmen. The increases are greatest at the highest end of the curve, among students with GPAs nearing the 4 point level.
· Your caring keeps students here. Our dropout rate among freshmen is 20 percent below the national average. I credit here not only faculty, but staff as well, for showing students that their concerns are taken seriously.
(I wish you collectively could eavesdrop on the dozens of conversations I have each month when alumni, movingly, tell me how you and your predecessors transformed their lives through the inspirational craft of committed teaching.)
· Your discoveries attract the largest research grants this institution has ever seen: The past twelve months have brought multimillion-dollar grants for education and the sciences, and we expect soon to announce more, including the largest single research grant ever made to the UO.
· Your loyalty to this institution gives us stability, continuity, and a critical mass of talent that attracts the best new professors. Nothing has impressed me more during these sometimes difficult years than the fact that this faculty has stayed with the University, resisting enormously lucrative offers from other institutions.
These are the great strengths that define our character.
In my many years of public service, I have never seen a group of professionals pull together toward a common goal more cheerfully, with less rancor, through tougher times, than I have on this campus.
It has been an extraordinary effort. And I give you my thanks.
Let me now focus not on what we have accomplished, but what we have yet to do.
In two days, we will hold a Convocation ceremony with Stanford President Emeritus Donald Kennedy as keynote speaker, followed by a panel of distinguished faculty and visitors, all discussing the theme of Transformation in Higher Education.
This is a chance for reflection, self-examination, and renewal at the roots of our commitment.
We are witnessing, locally and nationally, changes in higher education unprecedented since the end of World War II. Rising costs, tectonic economic shifts, relentless technological advances and resulting changes in what students and society seek from us are forcing searching and often painful self-examination.
Our enterprise must and shall continue to change in response - to continue the process we have employed so successfully during the past six years.
We shall do so thoughtfully, and only after due consideration and debate, as is the tradition since the charter of our founders. This Convocation will provide a good start for the coming year, and I hope all of you attend.
Among the most important issues we will face this year and in the coming decade cluster around the improvement of the quality of teaching and research, and service to our students.
Our students today are facing very different demands than they did twenty, or even ten years ago.
High tuition is a serious problem for our students, their families, and I believe for the future of our state. High tuition has shut the door on many students just when we should force it open.
These students cannot work their way through college any more. They are taking out loans, and the amount of their loans is staggering. This year, the average debt load of those we can track will exceed $17,500 by the time they're through.
I find this figure appalling. This is the magnitude of debt that can postpone planning for a family, or steal the down payment for a house. It channels our graduates away from public service and public interest jobs.
It is our duty, as faculty and staff, to repay the sacrifice of their investment with superb teaching, responsive support, and an open and accepting campus atmosphere.
The simple fact is that we and our sister universities are increasingly tuition-driven. As a result, we must continue to find ways to teach, do research, and provide service to our university and our community as efficiently as possible.
Our challenge is to find creative, academically responsible ways to handle the constant and necessary pressure to excel in all aspects of our work.
I am sometimes struck by words used to describe the traditional triad of the academic mission: We hear of service "burdens," teaching "loads," and research "interests." Surely those words betray an unthinking imbalance in priorities. For, in truth, each is essential to our privilege of participating in the joy of learning.
There has been a great deal of talk in the past year about another word, productivity, which in some people's minds has become synonymous with assembly-line labor.
But the productivity issue is not going to go away. Make no mistake: The future demands that we become better at what we do. While state cuts have made it impossible to increase the size of our faculty significantly, we are going to face an increase in the number of students here.
We are expecting a flood of potential new students as the sons and daughters of the baby boomers graduate from high school. Oregon is one of the top twelve states in the nation in projected high school enrollment growth over the next decade.
Our long-term plans call for an increase in enrollment at the University of Oregon to 20,000 students - a 12 percent increase over this year.
We will accommodate this influx of new students with new and refurbished classrooms.
We will increasingly make education available to them in new ways through new marvels of communication technologies.
But we must also find ways to teach them effectively without major increases in faculty.
So this year I propose what I hope is more than a semantic change. I propose that we move the discussion from "productivity" to "quality."
Let us strive every day, each one of us, to improve the quality of the work we do. In the best of worlds - and we can make those worlds real - there is no dichotomy.
· We must teach with maximum effectiveness.
· We must undertake research, the enduring quest to discover and advance knowledge, with maximum efficiency.
· We must serve our students, serve the needs of our colleagues, and serve our community with maximum goodwill and energy.
No one in Johnson Hall can tell you how to accomplish these ends. Only you, through your own creativity and that of your colleagues, can find the best ways of improving the quality of your work.
I challenge you to do so, this year and for every year we are together.
We have examples you can emulate in every corner of this campus.
If we do not devote ourselves to continuous improvement, there will always be those ready to force their views of "improvement" upon us.
During the past year, the Oregon business community voiced its suggestions for higher education, stressing, among other things, the need to invest more in engineering and education in the Portland area, and suggesting a hard look at the tenure process.
More reviews of public higher education in Oregon are being done by the Governor and the State System of Higher Education. We are involved in and keeping a close eye on both processes.
I believe the results will be positive. Governor Kitzhaber has voiced very strong support for higher education, and promised to make it a budgetary priority in the legislative session.
We are hearing good things as well from legislators themselves. (If lip service were currency, we'd be billionaires.)
These external processes are important for us. But we cannot allow them to determine our future.
My own long-term vision for the University of Oregon was refined and sharpened in several retreats held this summer with deans, department heads, and top staff.
I have already spoken of the expected increase in enrollment and need to improve the quality of our work.
That quality, by the way, will be assessed in a decennial accreditation review next spring.
Unlike some campuses that may enter this process relatively unprepared, we have done study after study that has laid the groundwork for our success into the next millennium. This visit by the accreditation team will allow us to consolidate our strengths and sharpen our internal focus even more.
Over the next decade:
· We must continue to forecast and respond appropriately to opportunities to deliver education in new ways, using instructional technology - as appropriate, and only where it will extend our reach without appreciable loss of quality - to reach out to new students.
· We must continue to advance research and technology transfer in support of the University's mission.
· We must continue to extend the UO's outreach to other areas of the state and region, especially Portland and Bend.
· We must continue to seek further diversity in faculty, staff and student body, not only to enrich our educational offerings with the insights of different cultures, but because our students need to learn in an environment that reasonably reflects the nation and the world.
· We must in all ways continue to build upon our already considerable success, raising the bar in our academic efforts, continuing to increase our national rankings as we have done for the past three decades.

* * * *

These are substantial goals, but we can meet them - if we can avoid some short-term threats.
This November, Oregonians will vote on a number of ballot measures with serious implications for our enterprise. The most important concern public employee pensions and various sorts of alleged tax "reform."
Among these, I see Measure 47, which would "cut and cap" property taxes, costing local governments close to a billion unrecovered dollars every biennium in the process, as the most threatening. I have seen 47 called tax "reform," which I believe is a question-begging misnomer, since Webster's defines "reform" as "improvement in quality."
The passage of Measure 47 could have just as serious a fiscal effect on our university as did Measure 5.
Let me reiterate a message I sent you in my Welcome to Campus letter this week. While it would be inappropriate for me to try in any way to influence your political views, I do want to encourage you to educate yourselves about the ballot measures this year.
As someone with electoral experience - and the scar tissue to prove it - I tell you the two same two things about initiatives that I often tell our fellow citizens: Be careful; and stay awake!
As public employees, we are restricted during working hours in our ability to lend support to one side or another of these issues. But we have a right and a responsibility as private citizens, on our own time, to address measures that we believe work against the public interest. I encourage you to do so this fall.

* * * *

We are not without our challenges.
You will meet them, as you have met all our challenges, with grace and selflessness, creativity and intelligence, good humor and great success.
We will meet them because our hard times have shown us how to succeed.
How is it that our University is able to attempt the largest fundraising campaign in the history of the state, and not only succeed at it, but succeed two years ahead of schedule?
How is it that our University, given the tough budgetary times, has been able to attract and keep the quality of faculty and students that we have?
How is it our University, as relatively small and underfunded as it is ranked by our peers among the best in the nation?
I believe that the answer cannot be found in a ledger book.
I believe it is in our hearts.
· We are not here simply because we love teaching. We could teach anywhere; you're all good enough to get a job at almost any university.
· We are not here only because we have the chance to work with outstanding colleagues across many disciplines. True, the quality of our researchers is world-renowned. And true, we have a well-earned reputation for collaboration across disciplinary lines. But we could find that, too, at other places.
· We are not here only because of the attractiveness of this good and green campus - although it is important that we enjoy the extraordinary mix of a high-powered research university packaged in the beauty of a mid-sized liberal arts college in a matchless environment.

No, there is something more.
We are here, I believe, because we share a certain spirit.
I will be very parochial now, and call it an Oregon spirit.
By birth or choice, we are Oregonians all. I have spent a lifetime studying that odd breed, and this is what I think makes us unique:
· We believe in the land, in a clean and high-quality environment.
· We laud a record of public-mindedness, debate and controversy.
· We enjoy a maverick individuality.
· We try to balance a commitment to our individual academic careers and reputations, with a commitment to our students, our university, and the community around us.
· We stubbornly refuse to accept traditional boundaries.
· We insist on openness and honesty in our dealings.
· And there is one more thing: For us, "good" is never good enough.
Individually, collectively, each day, we have a profound ethical dedication to improving what we do - because that is the right thing to do.
People like you, people rich in spirit, make our campus what it is, distinguish the University of Oregon, and will continue help us build success, from achievement to continued achievement.
Thank you.


MEMORIAL FOR PROFESSOR EMERITA EDNA PLOCK WOOTEN


Dr. Edna Plock Wooten, former professor in the Department of Physical Education and Human Movement Studies, died at 72 years of age on July 16, 1996 in an automobile accident near Dallas, Oregon.

She was born on September 12, 1923 in Columbus, Ohio and completed Bachelor of Science, Master of Arts, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees at Ohio State University in 1945, 1946 and 1961 respectively. Her majors included physical education, health education, recreation, biological science, and anatomy.

Prior to beginning her academic tenure at the University of Oregon in 1965, Dr. Wooten was an associate professor in the departments of Physical Education at Arizona State University and Ohio State University. She also held the position of Assistant Professor, Department of Anatomy, in the College of Medicine at Ohio State University.

Professor Wooten's career at the University of Oregon spanned 26 years, from 1965 until retiring in 1991. Because of her medical background, Dr. Wooten focused on the biologically based components of the department curriculum including physical growth and development, the disabled child, sports medicine, and human anatomy.

Her impact as a professor was profound. She was a brilliant teacher, combining humor and command of subject that inspired students and faculty alike. During her tenure at Oregon, Dr. Wooten chaired more than 70 master's theses and doctoral dissertations. Edna accepted students from the far corners of the world and treated all with compassion and respect.

In Dr. Wooten's courses, you not only learned the subject, you also learned about Edna. She had no hesitation teaching her students about life, using herself as an example, and, thus, revealing herself to others. Students were drawn to this humanness and, in turn, revealed themselves to her as she became their mentor, confidant and lifelong friend.

Edna often had more confidence in her students then they did in themselves. She believed her graduates were prepared to take on virtually any position, and her faith in them many times provided the necessary push to reach goals they often thought unattainable.

Throughout her life, she kept in touch with her students, and, when needed, was always there to counsel and educate.

As a faculty colleague, Edna would take on any assignment, teach any course, assume any responsibility requested of her, and was the first to help an associate in need or in a difficult situation. She was an early advocate for women in higher education, and in the early 1970s was appointed by President Clark to investigate possible discrimination in women faculty salaries at the University of Oregon.

After retiring, Dr. Wooten continued to serve her community. She gave much of her time in cancer support groups, in 12-step programs, and in building homes through Habitat for Humanity in Central America.

Dr. Wooten is survived by two daughters, Peggy Holstedt of Salem, Oregon, and Barbara Chamberlain of Newark, Delaware; a sister Evelyn Grashel of Phoenix, Arizona; and four grandchildren.

Edna will be remembered not only as an brilliant university professor, but as a true and dear friend to her many students and colleagues.

Mr. President, I request that his memorial be made part of the official and permanent minutes of this meeting and that copies of the memorial be sent to the immediate family by the Secretary of the Faculty.


Louis Osternig
Professor
Exercise & Movement Science


MEMORIAL FOR JOYCE M. MITCHELL


Joyce M. Mitchell died May 28th, 1996, after a long struggle with an often debilitating illness. Her friends remember her as a gifted person, one who was an intellectual catalyst for students and colleagues and, simultaneously, a political catalyst for women at the University of Oregon and in the discipline of Political Science during the difficult and defining early days of the Women's Movement in academia. Her formal academic accomplishments were substantial: B.A. Magna Cum Laude from Pomona (1952); M.A. from Berkeley (1954); a Congressional Fellowship (1957- 58); Ph.D. from Berkeley (1964); numerous papers and reports dealing with aspects of America political life and with the status of women in academia; and a major text (co-authored with William C. Mitchell) introducing a generation of scholars to the power of a political economy perspective on American political processes.

As with many gifted scholars, however, Mitchell's life was multi-dimensional, characterized by not only a formidable scholarly commitment, but also by a deep involvement with current political and social issues. She was a witty, energetic and always informed critic of scholarly ideas that have little grounding in real political and social life, and political activism uninformed by the best of scholarly thought. We are among her friends, all of us influenced in important but somewhat different ways by her life, who feel that the best way to convey the richness, complexity and impact of that life is to recount, however briefly, some memories of our own.

Joan Acker. Joyce Mitchell was a vibrant, funny, highly intelligent, dedicated, and courageous person. She and I became friends in the 1960s in the anti-Vietnam War movement and a little later as co-conspirators in the beginning of the women's movement. We were among the very few women faculty at the University of Oregon, which provided neither institutional support nor approval of our feminist activities at that time. Joyce was the primary mover of a study on the status of women at the university that we did in 1969. In addition to devising an unassailable research methodology for the study, she cleverly commandeered office space for the study from the Political Science Department. Soon after that, led by Joyce, we few feminists began a campaign for an Affirmative Action office at the University. This was before such offices were required by HEW. We were strenuously opposed by the university; I remember Joyce as a tremendously articulate fighter who would not be intimidated by the University's top lawyer. And she did not have tenure yet. When our first Affirmative Action Director resigned because the University administration gave her no support, Joyce was the first one to support the director, identify the real problem and make it public. In all of these actions, she was superbly informed and politically skilled.

Joyce was also, for me, a model in her relationships with students. She was both demanding and supportive. Such support was tremendously important in the 1960s and early 1970s when there were so few women faculty, so few women graduate students, and the academic climate was frigid for women.

In the long years of her illness, Joyce's commitment to the women's movement and to other things in which she believed never weakened. Often she was too sick to take part, but she was always a supporter. And Joyce never lost her irreverent, quirky sense of humor. She faced her illness with great courage. She was a remarkable person.

Lois Bronfman and Rachel Starr. Joyce Mitchell was a mentor, friend, nurturer, nudge, warrior chief, a woman and a scholar, a Renaissance person of taste whose contribution to the profession of Political Science (which she loved) is probably not well understood. To us, she gave respect, encouraged our individual voices (not all women sounded alike to her), and demanded that we strive to be all that we could be at a time in which such support was reluctantly given. We love her. The memory of her strength and of her combative, lucid, erudite analyses of every aspect of her life from baby monitors to public opinion to ballet sustains and challenges us daily. We miss the possibility of her unexpected calls.

Dan Goldrich. In Eugene for a job interview in 1963, I met Joyce. I encountered her friendly interest in a visitor's ideas, one working very differently from her but for whom she had a warm, encouraging interest in the days long before I understood what "support" meant. I came to see her as my best educated colleague. But that important quality recedes in the presence of another. Among so many others, I came to be one touched by her characteristic animation. Over the years, I saw her give that gift in the form of a hard-working, masterfully crafted intelligence, exquisitely sensitive to the ways power was used and abused, working through her unlimited capacity to care, bracing and encouraging her fellow strugglers for fairness, for a decent life, regarding Vietnam, wealth, race and gender.

Joyce had a gift for life in the garden, in the kitchen, for the basset at the end of her leash, in the canvas on her walls or the clay on her table, or the quality of sociability suffusing her and Bill's home.

Her animation had the dimension of challenge. She left us with the challenge of her long years of personal struggle, the challenge of how to understand and respond to the struggle of a person beset by demons of the mind, of body, demons that we in our late-twentieth century lives don't yet know how to respond to. We don't yet know, but having known Joyce, we must try to learn.

Jerry Medler. Joyce Mitchell was my friend and, although I never took a course from her, she was also my teacher. Good friends and good teachers are rare; Joyce was doubly rare. What I cherish most in my memories of Joyce was the seamless, integrated way in which she addressed life. This was her most simple but most challenging lesson for me.

Joyce could move from field to field with intellectual grace and, when she wished, she could leave the academy (and our sometimes arcane concerns) to embrace other loves. Yet she never changed her style: always vigorous, always exciting and usually surprising. Joyce enjoyed a theoretical discussion but at heart she was an unflinching realist. Joyce truly liked politics and politicians (not all, of course) yet she had a deep concern for art, music, dance, literature, history and athletics. She was a modern women in every sense of the word yet she had a strong connection to tradition and community. For Joyce, these myriad interests were not really separate parts of her life. For me, everything she touched with her intellect became connected, clear and understandable. I miss that.

Mary Beth Medler. Joyce was the first person I met in Eugene. I was 21 years old, without a college degree and terribly insecure. Professor Joyce Mitchell, Ph.D. was an academic and an intellectual. She and Bill welcomed me and my husband, a new political science graduate student, to their home and served us a dinner of hot dogs and beans in honor of Independence Day. Just as that simple menu became a gourmet meal remembered in detail 33 years later, the vibrant, intelligence of Joyce's spirit remains and sustains me today. After that first evening with Joyce, Political Science was no longer an abstract discipline. It was alive and exciting, something to argue about and defend and hold to standards so that the world was not only more knowable, but more interesting and better too.

Joyce, never patronizing but by forceful example, made a way for me in this world. That first night I found myself giving opinions barely formed and never articulated but awakened by her excitement and playful discourse. Because of Joyce I too could give voice...and it was fun.

It was also the seeds of feminism. The empowerment of a feminist voice, a feminist perspective. The Joyce that planted these seeds is the one I will always remember and honor. I hope I can be forgiven for my apparent insensitivity to another Joyce, one that I now know must have been much more vulnerable than I would/could allow. I continued to argue and debate with her and to be challenged by her insights and ideas. A vibrant, generous, wonderfully alive being, Joyce remains a true inspiration, a personal hero.

John Orbell. Joyce was an intellectual "older sister" for me. As such, she was a guaranteed source of good humored and informed, but unrelenting, criticism of my own efforts to make scholarly sense out of the world. There was no way I could escape. Her wit and intelligence, and, with her husband Bill, the effervescent social context she provided for me as for many in the University community (the closest to a salon I have ever known) were magnetic. Still more compelling was the compliment she paid me of taking my ideas seriously. I did not fully realize, in my first few years at the University, that Joyce was a rarity in the academic world who took everyone's ideas seriously; but no matter. I could not brush her theoretical, methodological and substantive criticisms off as, somehow, the product of a too-competitive academic context; it was impossible for me not to change my own thinking in response.

Beyond that, through her activist involvement with the profession of Political Science, she reinforced and elaborated my own appreciation that how academic pursuits are organized and conducted matters because power relationships within a profession influence both the careers and the ideas that survive. I came to appreciate that Joyce's intellectual courage in adopting non-conformist and often unpopular (but, in retrospect, prescient) intellectual perspectives was the flip side of her courage as an activist on behalf of women and minorities in the discipline (no less prescient, as it turns out). The complementarity between these two parts of her life was not always straightforward: The intellectual perspective she adopted was occasionally unpopular among her political allies, just as her political perspective was occasionally sometimes more than occasionally unpopular among her intellectual allies.

The demands of her struggle with her own health, eventually and tragically, diverted her own extraordinary intellectual and political energies. The impact she had on her friends, on the University of Oregon, and on Political Science as a scholarly discipline and as a political organization will, nevertheless, remain.

John M. Orbell
Professor
Political Science