UI faculty wary of new background-check policy

A policy set to take effect this summer requiring background checks for all new University of Illinois employees has prompted pushback from UI faculty.

 

Some professors argue that the policy is too broad and worry about employee privacy, especially with an outside company doing the checks. The campus senate last week forwarded a letter to UI Provost Ilesanmi Adesida, asking for additional safeguards and a stronger faculty voice in the process.

 

University officials say without the policy, the UI opens itself to risk.

 

The university has required background checks for years for employees who hold "security-sensitive" positions, handle money or work at a hospital, as well as anyone who works with children, a provision added in 2012 after the Penn State child-abuse scandal.

 

But a year ago, the UI announced it would expand the checks to all employees, including faculty members, academic professionals and civil service workers.

 

That would include "specialized," or adjunct, faculty, as well as hourly employees, but not student workers unless they are in sensitive positions.

 

The UI will not conduct a background check on every applicant. It will be done after a job offer has been made and accepted by the employee, said Deborah Stone, director of academic human resources, who briefed the campus senate recently about a draft policy set to take effect in June.

 

The employee's appointment will not be sent to the UI Board of Trustees for approval until after the background check is completed, she said.

 

The UI will use a third-party vendor, General Information Services of Chapin, S.C., which has been under contract to do background checks since early 2014, said Maureen Parks, associate vice president for human resources. The cost of each check will be about $45, she said.

 

The background check will look back seven years, utilizing both the National Sex Offender Registry and state and national criminal data bases. It will only search for convictions, including misdemeanors, Stone said. When something turns up, the university will decide whether it's relevant to the particular job — a DUI conviction for someone who drives a car, for instance.

 

It's not clear if the UI will make the implementation target of June. Officials are still working on an "electronic bridge" between its applicant-tracking system and the company's background-check system, Parks said.

 

$175,000 a year — tops

 

English Professor Kay Emmert and other faculty raised concerns about allowing a third party to have access to the information, and asked how it will be kept secure.

 

Stone said language protecting data security is built into any contract with a human resources vendor.

 

"This is a national company. This is their business," Stone said.

 

None of the information will be passed on to the Board of Trustees, she said.

 

Others asked why the university couldn't do the checks in-house and complained about the potential cost, especially as the state is considering unprecedented budget cuts.

 

Elyne Cole, associate provost for human resources, said the university doesn't have the "resources or the ability" to do a national check for every new hire. The UI hired about 4,800 new workers on its three campuses in 2014, Stone said.

 

With the new policy, Parks estimated the cost at about $175,000 annually "at the most" for all three campuses and university administration combined. Given state budgetary constraints, the UI might not be hiring as many employees in the next few years, she said.

 

Other professors wondered who inside the university would have access to the information.

 

Stone said it will be given to the individual employee and "a very small number" of individuals in human resources. A committee with representatives from human resources, the Division of Campus Safety and UI faculty, advised by the UI legal counsel, will review the information — considering how long ago the conviction was, the nature of the violation and whether it has any bearing on the job.

 

The department hiring the employee will only get information if "there needs to be a conversation about risk," Stone said. "While this is public information, we want to respect an individual's privacy."

 

The preference will be to complete the check before the employee starts working at the university, officials said. That should not delay hiring for most faculty members during the regular recruitment cycle, she said.

 

But — partly to avoid the situation involving Professor Steven Salaita, whose job offer was rescinded just before he was to start teaching — the university is also working on a process for "conditional hires," Parks said. If someone is needed to teach a course on short notice, for example, the professor will be asked to sign a form stating that he understands he is being hired conditionally until a background check is completed, Parks said.

 

UI officials say the change was not prompted by Salaita or the school's employment of James Kilgore, the former Symbionese Liberation Army member who has worked as an academic hourly and taught on the campus in recent years.

 

Parks said background checks are becoming "normal practice" in higher education, noting that most Big Ten institutions already use them or have policies under consideration. And they've been common in private industry for more than a decade, she said.

 

The policy is needed to "ensure the university's reputation and to try to mitigate risk and have a safe campus environment for our students, faculty and staff," she said.

 

Student senator 'shocked'

 

Erik McDuffie, professor of African- American studies, worried that the expanded checks could deter minority applicants from applying for jobs, given disproportionately higher conviction rates.

 

There's a growing movement in Illinois to not "overemphasize" the time people have spent in prison so they aren't unemployable, said George Ordal, professor of medical biochemistry.

 

"I basically think people should have a chance. My personal feeling is to skip this," he said.

 

Stone noted that the UI has already removed a question about convictions from the civil-service application, in response to that movement. Now, background checks will only be conducted once someone has been chosen for a job, and that data will be considered along with all other information, she said.

 

"A conviction history is not a bar to employment," she said.

 

The individual would have a right to challenge the information or provide additional detail to the committee, officials said.

 

Some professors asked for evidence supporting the need for mandatory checks for all employees.

 

"You don't know the answer to that until you miss the one you didn't do," Cole replied. "We do have people who do not disclose convictions."

 

Michael LeRoy, professor of law and labor and employment relations, noted that, in Illinois, employers can be held liable for "negligent hiring" if they don't check out an employee's past.

 

Others said the risk is overblown because of high-profile cases at Penn State and elsewhere, and noted that a background check can't prevent something from happening in the future.

 

"I think there is no solid reason to indiscriminately background check everyone," said Professor Harriet Murav, head of the Department of Slavic Languages and Literature.

 

"A university should embody the best principles of democracy, including freedom of speech and belief in rehabilitation: once you have served your time, you may re-enter society," she said.

 

Professor Roy Campbell, who chairs the Senate Executive Committee, wrote a letter to the provost summarizing faculty concerns and asking for more input on the policy.

 

While many professors recognize the university's liability risk, Campbell said, the process must protect confidentiality and be "fair, representative and in the case of faculty reviews must include significant faculty involvement." The university should also keep an eye on cost and ensure that the policy doesn't hurt recruitment and hiring goals, including for "members of groups who might be discouraged from applying for positions here because of non-relevant criminal convictions in their past," he added.

 

Vice Provost Abbas Benmamoun agreed faculty should have a voice and said the campus won't do anything to jeopardize faculty hiring or recruitment. Officials tried to write a policy that would not be more restrictive than those of the UI's peers so the university would not be at a competitive disadvantage, he said.

 

Student senators expressed surprise at the faculty reaction, noting that many freshmen are still minors when they come to the UI. Senior Kendal Hellman said she was "shocked" the university didn't already do background checks.

 

"Every job I've worked, every event I've volunteered at has had a background check," said Hellman, who is in a health-related field. "It's become an expected thing in a job market."