Monday, March 25, 2024 I Vol. 120 Iss. 22
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INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER • SERVING THE GW COMMUNITY SINCE 1904
What’s inside Opinions
The editorial board argues cross-field studies aren’t as accessible as they should be. Page 6
Culture
GW fails to meet tenure requirement for fifth-consecutive year as faculty probe officials for transparency FIONA RILEY
ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR
KAROLINA MONTALVO REPORTER
Officials fell short of meeting a Faculty Code clause requiring 75 percent of regular faculty to be tenured or on a tenure track for the fifth-consecutive year. The percentage of regular faculty who were tenured or on a tenure track dropped steadily over the past decade — from 77.8 percent in 2014 to 71.5 percent in 2023 — and has remained below 75 percent since 2018, according to the Univer-
sity’s annual core indicators report presented at a Faculty Senate meeting earlier this month. Faculty senators said officials should be more transparent about University finances and consider if their failure to meet the Faculty Code clause for five years indicates that the 75 percent requirement is no longer feasible. The clause states that no more than 25 percent of regular faculty in any school should be nontenured or not on a tenure track. The code also states that at least half of faculty in all departments should be on a tenure track. Provost Chris Bracey said
personnel headcounts adjust based on “a variety of financial factors,” but the “strategic addition” of tenure-track faculty lines across schools and colleges will remain a “critical consideration” in the University’s fiscal and academic plans and scholarly endeavors. Bracey declined to say whether officials expect to see the percentage of tenure and tenure-track faculty increase in 2024. He also declined to comment on whether officials are considering amending the Faculty Code clause, considering the University’s failure to comply with the requirement for five years.
Fifth-year senior James Bishop IV looks back on his record-breaking career with the Revolutionaries.
“We remain committed to strengthening our scholarly community through attracting and retaining talented tenuretrack faculty who will make significant contributions to, and achieve excellence in, our teaching and research missions,” Bracey said in an email. At the senate meeting earlier this month, Bracey attributed the drop in tenure and tenure-track faculty to the hiring freeze during the COVID-19 pandemic, when officials prioritized contract faculty hires during online learning amid falling student enrollment. See PROVOST Page 5
TOM RATH | STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
James Bishop IV closes curtain on GW career BEN SPITALNY
CONTRIBUTING SPORTS EDITOR
The last four years of men’s basketball have seen a lot of upheaval. Following the conclusion of the 2021-22 season, officials fired Head Coach Jamion Christian, who had failed to reach a .500 in any of his three seasons coaching the team. The team’s second
and third leading scorers, guards Joe Bamisile and Brayon Freeman, each transferred to other schools, leaving the program with a gutted roster that newly hired Head Coach Chris Caputo was tasked with filling. He found a “crutch,” however, in one holdover: guard James Bishop IV. A self-described quiet guy, he transferred to GW in 2020
following a quiet freshman season at LSU. And in a college sports ecosystem where players are quick to transfer and coaches are fast to leave, Bishop, year after year, has stayed. The on-court success was to be expected. He had already led GW in scoring his first two years on the team and had the high school resume to earn him a Power 5 scholarship.
Off the court, however, might have been where Bishop was most important to the basketball program. The soft-spoken, evenkeeled Baltimore, Maryland, native was a veteran presence and a leader to players and coaches alike, a constant in years of losing streaks, coaching changes and transfer portal uncertainty. “For me, he was really a crutch,” Ca-
Sports
Check out the professors who rock out after they clock out. Page 7
puto said following the team’s A-10 Championship loss against La Salle, Bishop’s last game in the Buff and Blue. “As you’re trying to build a program, trying to build new players, you’re trying to do a number of different things. To have a guy you could lean on a little bit in certain situations was certainly just a blessing.” See BISHOP Page 8
Lacrosse fell to Davidson as the team remains winless in Atlantic 10 play. Page 8
Incoming student GPAs reached decade-high in 2023 ELIJAH EDWARDS REPORTER
NATALIE NOTE REPORTER
The share of incoming students with top high school GPAs surged in 2023, according to a report presented at a Faculty Senate meeting earlier this month. The percentage of students who have enrolled at the University with a high school GPA of 3.9 or above reached a decade-high last year, increasing from 18 percent in 2014 to 34 percent in 2023, according to the report. Provost Chris Bracey and experts in higher education administration said grade inflation during the COVID-19 pandemic could have caused the rise in average high school GPA among first-year students. “This is an indication that we’re continuing to improve academically in terms of the quality of students that we matriculate year over year,” Bracey said at the meeting. “That said, I will be fair here, this may also be an indication of grade inflation.” The number of incoming students with a GPA of 3.39 or lower dipped from 33 percent in 2014 to 14 percent in 2023, according to the report. Bracey said incoming students’ rising average high school GPAs serve as a “good indicator” of high-performing students’ interest in attending GW. He said officials track the high school GPAs for admitted students as a measure of academic performance because the University’s test-optional admissions policy made it impossible to compare all applicants using SAT and ACT scores. GW has been a test-optional university since 2015. A 2022 ACT study reported a rise in high school GPAs and a drop in standardized test scores that suggested grade inflation was present. The average American high school GPA rose from 3.17 in 2010 to 3.36 in 2021, while the average ACT score, graded on a scale from 1 to 36, dropped from 21.4 to 20.17, according to the study. Bracey said grade inflation may contribute to the rise in average high school GPAs among first-year students, but the growth in retention rate for first-year students suggests they are prepared for college-level work. The University retained 91.9 percent of the class of 2026’s first-year students, a 3.9 percent increase from 88 percent of students who enrolled in 2019. “If it were due to just grade inflation, you would expect that retention rate to be lower,” Bracey said at the meeting. Experts in higher education administration said flexible grading policies and a shift to a pass/fail system in some high schools during the pandemic may have inflated applicants’ GPAs because the metric may not factor in all their coursework. Dan Goldhaber, the director of the Center for Education Data & Research at the University of Washington and the CALDER Research Center, said the center’s researchers collected evidence showing an uptick in grades during COVID-19. He said the average GPA for high school students has grown slightly over the last decade because of factors like “grade compression,” meaning little variation in the grades students receive despite disparities in quality of work. “There is evidence, not just our evidence, but evidence from other sources that suggests grades have been creeping up over at least the last decade,” Goldhaber said.
Muslim Students Association expands programming for Ramadan BROOKE FORGETTE STAFF WRITER
JENNIFER IGBONOBA
CONTRIBUTING NEWS EDITOR
The Muslim Students Association will expand its programming this month in observance of Ramadan with a charity gala, iftars and a temporary student prayer room. The MSA will host iftars, the meals Muslim people eat each evening to break their fast during Ramadan, and a charity gala to raise money for various issues affecting the global Muslim community. Senior Raheel Abubakar, the president of the MSA, said the organization wanted to focus on more religious-based programming for this year’s Ramadan compared to past years’ focus on the month’s overall significance. “One of the most important parts of Ramadan outside of fasting is also becoming more close to your faith,” Abubakar said. Officials have been renovating the musalla, or place of prayer, on the fourth floor of the University Student Center prior to the start of the semester, which students say will modern-
ize the space after years of use wore down the room’s carpet. Abubakar said continuous order delays for items like prayer mats and decorations prompted him to reach out to Cassandra Lammers, the director of the student center, about possible meeting space accommodations for Taraweeh prayers — which occur during Ramadan after Isha, the evening prayer — because of the musalla’s small space and ongoing renovations. Abubakar said Lammers helped organize a meeting with himself and officials in the Multicultural Student Services Center, the Division for Student Affairs, the student center, and the Student Government Association earlier this month. They designated room 433 as a temporary musalla for students to pray during Ramadan because of its large space. Abubakar said MSA board members have added mats and furniture and dimmed the lighting to soften the atmosphere. “I have heard very positive feedback from the community, which is very nice,” Abubakar said. “I think a lot of people like that we fi nally have more room. They like the ambiance in the
room, they think it’s comfortable, and I think that it’s been generally well-received.” Abubakar said the organization will host a charity gala April 4 in the City View Room inside the Elliott School of International Affairs to fundraise for issues like the civil conflict in Sudan; earthquakes in Afghanistan; the humanitarian crisis in Gaza; and the repression of Uyghurs in China and Rohingya people in Myanmar. “There’s a lot of places where we want to help the community around the world,” Abubakar said. “One of the pillars of Islam is something called Zakat, which is charity, giving back. I think it’s important for us to try and encourage that during this month.” Abubakar said the MSA will continue co-sponsoring iftars with other student organizations throughout Ramadan with different regional themes, including “A Night in the Middle East” with the Arab Students Association and Students for Justice in Palestine on Thursday and “A Night in Africa” with the African Student Association and Ethiopian-Eritrean Students Association on Sunday.
JENNIFER IGBONOBA | STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Date seeds and a miniature Eid lantern rest on a paper plate during iftar in the University Student Center.
“Islam is such a wonderful faith that there is so much information about it that there’s always more to learn,” Abubakar said. “Learning it and constantly learning more about it is part of the faith. Always expanding and trying to incorporate more of the faith in your life is a part of being a Muslim, and we want to make sure that if our organization is about making being a Muslim easier on campus, that
involves education.” African Student Association President Deseree Chacha said the group is partnering with the MSA for an iftar on March 31, which will have food from multiple African countries. She said her organization suggested African restaurants like Koite Grill and Wow Chops as catering options for the event, and the MSA is in the process of confirming the selections are halal.