It all seemed so perfect; what could possibly be wrong? What was missing from the picture, literally and figuratively, was any reference to the University of Windsor's employment equity positive action plan and to those who have worked for the past six years to make moments like the appointment of Dr. EIMaraghy a reality. The person who served for eight months as equity assessor to the search committee (and without whose presence a meeting could not be held) was not invited to the press conference. There was no mention of the university's successful employment equity plan in the news release and, not surprisingly, not a single media story made any connection between the historic moment and the thousands of hours a small group of women and men have devoted to moving the university from being one of the most inequitable post-secondary institutions to being an equity leader.

Those who
probably
cannot even
define equity
were front and
centre for the
television
cameras,
microphones
and
photographers.

On the surface, it seems a small thing to expect a little nod to the equity workers. After all, they volunteer to do this work in addition to all their regular committee and university responsibilities. They do it out of dedication to a vision of equity and inclusivity for women and for men from groups traditionally excluded from the higher educational system. They do it on their own research time and on the time they might spend with their families. And they do it for no official credit of any kind.

Not only will their equity work not help them win tenure or promotion, but every hour they spend doing it is an impediment to their progress through the academic ranks. And the work often produces stress and tension, at times even open anti-equity, anti-woman, anti-feminist, racist hostility towards them. It is never easy. But it has produced much benefit for the University of Windsor, not just in reducing the deliberate and systemic bias and discrimination in hiring, promotion and tenure processes, or in meeting the requirements of the Federal Contractors Program, but in generating more accountable procedures that have significantly improved the overall academic quality of the hiring, promotion and tenure decisions made.

Equity workers might reasonably have expected their institution to include them in the moment of national recognition. It would have been a sign of a gracious administration to give some credit to those in the trenches, so to speak. And it might have happened if we had a gracious administration. Instead, we have a petty and greedy administration engaged in well-practiced administrative pimping. Those who, on their own initiative, have done little or nothing to make the institution more equitable, those who probably cannot even define equity, were front and centre for the television cameras, microphones and photographers. They basked in the glory as they siphoned off the wages of the real equity workers. They will go down in Canadian history while those who toil so long and hard are overlooked.

And next year, as the budget cuts get deeper, those same people will be asking for more teaching hours, more research, more service and more equity assessing hours from the same few workers, the fruits of whose labour they continue to steal for their own profit.

Part 2
It is now a year since I wrote the above article. After writing it, I gave copies to those senior administrators I felt were directly responsible for the exploitation. Subsequently, I discussed my concerns with them directly. I asked that some concrete and public form of recognition be given to the equity process and to the equity workers for Windsor's improved record as an equitable employer.

Had there been any such gesture, my reflections on administrative pimping would have remained my own. But there was not. I began, therefore, to make my concerns public, first by reading the piece to the students in my classes and explaining to them the issues involved. Next, I sent copies to feminist colleagues on my own and other campuses. The responses I got were markedly different from the responses of the senior administrators about whom the piece was written. My colleagues identified immediately with the pimping analogy. They, in turn, sent copies of the article to others. Some put it on e-mail lists. Within days it came to the attention of the Status of Women Committee of the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT), who invited me to submit it for publication in Women and CAUT News (vol.vii, no.2, Spring 1994). In the published version, I prefaced my reflection with a description of the University of Windsor's employment equity action plan so that readers could understand the extent to which it depends on the voluntary labour of (mostly) women faculty.



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