The Language and Literature department at Baker University has undergone some big changes in the past three months.
Professor of English Tracy Floreani announced on May 25 that she would not be returning to Baker in the fall, instead taking a position at Oklahoma City University.
In an e-mail sent to the Baker community upon the announcement that she would not be returning to Baker, Floreani expressed her gratefulness to the BU community.
“I’m quite aware that Baker has helped to make me the instructor that I am, and I will always be grateful for that,” Floreani said in her e-mail this summer.
Floreani and her husband both lived in Oklahoma and she traveled to Baldwin City, commuting 600 over miles each week for 10 years.
While Floreani’s departure was sudden for the Baker community, Professor of English Lucy Price has returned to teach a class on the Baldwin City campus after she formally retired in the spring.
“She really did retire, but she’s doing a single class, as what we call an adjunct,” Professor of English Preston Fambrough said. “Just sort of a part-time appointment. A number of faculty members have done that after retirement.”
While Price has taken on the role of an adjunct professor, her new title is Professor of English Emeritus.
“Her status is rather different from someone who has never been a full-time, tenured faculty member here,” Fambrough said.
Senior Carly Young had Price for Introduction to Fiction and really enjoyed the course.
“My favorite thing about that class was just the discussions we had in class about the stories that we read,” Young said. “It was just a very laid-back setting. Very informal.”
With the departure of Floreani and the formal retirement of Price, the department had to bring in additional adjunct professors, Rob Howard and Stephanie Scurto, to cover some of the courses offered to students this fall.
“The English department lost almost the equivalent of three faculty positions going from last year to this year,” Fambrough said. “We lost a lot of person-power.”
While some changes to faculty schedules are different than planned, Fambrough and the rest of the department has returned to everyday work.
“It was a little nerve-wracking,” he said. “It was kind of a scramble. We’ve pretty much returned to normal and classes are being taught and the department’s work is getting done. After maybe some additional panic … I think we’re in good shape now.”
Fambrough is very thankful for Cynthia Appl, department chair and professor of German, for the work she did to help realign the department and securing the adjunct professors for the fall courses.
“I think Dr. Appl did a splendid job of getting things under control and realigning the schedule and finding the people to teach courses, and finding the adjuncts that we needed,” Fambrough said. “I think she’s done a super job coping with a pretty complicated situation.”
