The national rankings of Ohio State’s College of Medicine and Public Health may rise in the next few years, but some university faculty fear it may come with a cost.

In January, the Senate voted to allow no limit to the hiring of clinical, non-tenured faculty at COMPH. The limit only allows a maximum of 40 percent of the faculty to be non-tenured, or not hired for research. Non-tenured faculty can only teach.

However, the limit must still be voted on by the University Board of Trustees.

Even though the Senate voted to get rid of the limit, the vote was not unanimous. Some faculty worry outnumbering the tenured faculty can undermine the research, as well as the collaborative cores of the university.

“When you’ve got a (predominantly) clinical faculty, is that likely to lead the medical school to focus more on clinical missions and less on pure research?” asked Robert Levine, associate professor in linguistics and member of the senate steering committee.

Levine said the top medical schools are often generators of cutting-edge research. He fears with a less research-based faculty in the clinical departments of COMPH, quality research will be edged out by the focus on a higher faculty-student ratio and more doctors for Ohio State University Medical Center.

Douglas Macbeth, associate professor in the School of Educational Policy and Leadership and a senate member, said since the clinical faculty serve on committees in the presence of supervisors who hired them, they may not be able to participate in decisions of policy or curriculum with bias-free opinions.

Macbeth said the positions of tenured faculty, who are able to serve on the Senate, cannot be terminated and are not under renewable/non-renewable contracts. Therefore, they are not affected by the same bias as the clinical faculty, because they have freedom of expression.

He is concerned the clinical faculty may not vote on University Senate, he said. Then the collaborative efforts of administration, faculty and students seen in the Senate would not be enforced.

“My sense is that we are very close to re-structuring the composition and role of faculty and the structure of departments in the College of Medicine,” Macbeth said.

He said hiring more clinical faculty will contribute to the shift in this category.

The shift will increase the number of clinical faculty by the hundreds, said Macbeth, attributing the numbers to COMPH’s own projections.

Dr. Fred Sanfilippo, dean of COMPH, said based on responses to a study assessing the time physicians spent on various responsibilities, including clinical care and research, the OSU Medical Center will need almost 500 physicians by 2006.

However, the total includes the number of physicians already on staff at the Medical Center. Therefore, they would only need to add 140 more doctors in 2006, he said in a letter to the Senate steering committee.

However, he also said the amount of hiring would depend on business growth. The greater the business growth of the college and medical center, the more clinical faculty would be hired, he said.

The emphasis on clinical faculty is not only occurring in COMPH.

Macbeth said other schools were expressing need for a stronger clinical faculty as well, including the Fisher College of Business, the Moritz College of Law and the College of Engineering. Clinical faculty in these schools would teach students not only the textbook material but also lend their professional experience.

Steve Mangum, associate dean of the business college, confirmed the request for additional clinical faculty tracks.

“We would very much like to have an opportunity to create clinical faculty positions in our college as well,” he said.

Mangum said like the medical school, the business college is striving to be among the best in the nation, and other schools have a possible advantage on OSU.

“In our case, most top-ranked business schools have access to a clinical faculty title. We do not,” Mangum said. “Since we seek to be competitive with them, we seek permission to use similar tools and tactics.”

Dr. Andrew Thomas, associate dean for COMPH, admitted last week there were concerns for a domino effect of requests for more non-tenured faculty.

Levine said passing the proposal was a difficult decision for his committee.

“There are certain compromises that you have to make in your pure academic ideals, but you’re going down a slippery slope,” Levine said. “You’re setting a precedent and changing the nature of the institution, where academic values, standards and practices are being relaxed.”