It's been a whirlwind past few days for UBC's Board of Governors. In an already turbulent climate thanks to the sudden and unexplained resignation of former president Arvind Gupta, the chair of the Board, John Montalbano, is accused of breaching academic freedoms.
After Jennifer Berdahl, Professor of Leadership Studies in Gender and Diversity at the Sauder School of Business, released a blog post speculating that Gupta resigned due to losing a masculinity contest, she received a phone call from Montalbano. While Montalbano denies that he infringed Berdahl's academic freedom, he does admit that he "expressed [his] concern that the blog had the potential to damage UBC based on its assertions."
According to a media release from the university, presented after the board held an in-camera and unscheduled meeting, the allegations that this constitutes a breach of academic freedom are being investigated.
Today, the Canadian Association of University Teachers is calling for Montalbano to step down while the investigation continues.
"The Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) is calling on the Chair of the Board of Governors of the University of British Columbia to step aside while an investigation is underway into allegations he interfered with the academic freedom of a faculty member," read the release.
"The very fact that he is in a very significant position power both as chair of the board and on the faculty advisory body of the Sauder School of Business and as the funder for the professorship that Jennifer Berdahl holds, it was completely inappropriate for him – and he should have realized that – for him to call her," said CAUT executive director David Robinson in an interview with The Ubyssey.
According to Montalbano, he prefaced his telephone call with Berdahl by asking her to halt the conversation if she saw this as an infringement on academic freedom.
“At the start of her conversation … [I said] ‘before I go any further, are you comfortable discussing the blog? Because I have concerns that you may see it as an infringement on academic freedom.’ And her response was, ‘no, I don’t have concerns,’ and I said ‘look, if at any point in the conversation you feel that this getting close to an infringement will you stop me?’ And she said that she would,” said Montalbano.
However, Robinson considers this a moot point.
"He does admit that there was a call, he does admit that he raised the issue of academic freedom, he does admit that he talked about funding, he does admit that he had some concerns so he admits a lot of what professor Berdahl is alleging," said Robinson. "But what he essentially says is because she didn’t raise any concerns I therefore didn’t affect or didn’t infringe upon her academic freedom."
After the most recent Board meeting, acting president Angela Redish said she continues to have full confidence in Montalbano as chair.
Despite Redish's confidence, pressure for Montalbano's resignation is also being applied by groups within the University. According to a letter by the Faculty Association, they have officially lost confidence in the chair.
"The concerns leading to this conclusion focus on the fact that the University itself has sidestepped standard protocols for handling grievances. More specifically, the Chair of the Board of Governors, the Board’s chief spokesperson, gave public, personal testimony related to the case in a University media release. We were shocked that this happened in a formal University media release," read the release signed by Mark Mac Lean, president of the Faculty Association.
"He is talking about and leading the university communications on a situation in which he is implicated,” said Mac Lean in an interview with The Ubyssey. "The Board of Governors is not like a corporate board in the sense of managing affairs of the university…. So there’s been various pieces here where it’s apparent that Mr. Montalbano may not respect the organizational structure of the university well enough."
In other words, the main issue noted by the Faculty Association is that Montalbano is speaking personally to an issue in which he is the focus, and in which he ought not to give testimony in his position as chair. According to Mac Lean, this "thwarts the natural processes that we have."
“His actions here demonstrate very strongly that the top lead in the governance of the institution is struggling to manage some serious conflicts of interest and not, in my mind, doing a particularly good job of it,” said Mac Lean. "And the institution around him isn't also managing well those conflicts of interest."
When asked whether this latest controversy is damaging to UBC's image, Robinson said "academic freedom is the core value of all great universities and I think by raising questions, the lack of respect for that core value does potentially harm the reputation of UBC."
This article was updated at 12:20 p.m. on August 19 to include comments from interviews with Robinson and Mac Lean.