Temple Recommend required to work at BYU
 

Is this a good idea?

Doesn't it encourage people to fudge, and by placing external incentives on it, also demean the recommend itself?

One more reason I would never work for BYU.

I can understand both sides of the argument. I tend to believe it is a bad idea, for the reasons you mentioned.

I guess it depends on what the intent is.
I don't think it's a good idea and is at odds with the purpose of a university.
You also tend to get a homogeneous faculty, again, at odds with the purpose of a university. My sister in law just started a graduate program at the zoo and out of curiosity, i checked out the department faculty pages. Every single faculty member did their undergraduate work there, and it was about 50/50 on going away to do graduate work before returning as faculty. Amusing.

One more reason I never went and would never encourage my daughter to go.

It depends on what your goals are. You may send your daughter to a small liberal arts school with very good academics. She may be the only member at the school, and the only college student in her ward (if she attends).

That would be the extreme example of complete absence of Mormonism. There are of course plenty of schools with a strong Mormon contingent. But as a parent, I would be aware of the issue and try to guide my child to a school with a certain minimum, or when schools are otherwise equal, to the school with a stronger Mormon infrastructure.

One other quick point. You don't go to BYU because of the faculty. You go because of the students.

BYU gets good students, better than its faculty.

A temple recommend is only required if you are LDS. I believe the non-LDS faculty/staff requires an ecclesiastical endorsement from their pastor or priest.

I'm don't think this is a good idea when universally applied. But I have no problem with having a temple recommend requirement for administration. They are de facto employees of the church and are engaged in non-academic activity.

I may be wrong, but I believe that hiring of non LDS faculty has been severely curtailed.

this is a formula for disaster.
Can't you get the same results from match.com, for a lot less?

How can you curtail 0?

This is very rare. What's the program? Maybe they have a lot of old faculty on tenure about to retire. The faculty quality level is improving quickly significantly over the last 20 years. Today you wouldn't have a chance to get hired as a professor at BYU with a PhD from BYU. It's become extremely competitive to get hired at BYU, and you'd need a degree at a top school and some success in research to get a sniff.

This differs from my understanding, which is that BYU is following a slow trend to hire more non-LDS faculty than before. I think they'd like to even more than they are, but LDS prof's view BYU as a more attractive job than non-LDS, so when a position is open, you get more qualified LDS prof's than non-LDS applying.

If so, that's too bad. I'm very glad to see that this policy is not practiced by the Head Football coach.

Yeah, we'd hate for you to have fudge.

What I am saying is that when you are surrounded by smart kids, that is good.

I spent most of my time at BYU interacting with other students. Not interacting with professors.

I agree that considering the numbers of LDS youth at a university is important, and that's why I will encourage my kids to look at BYU. It's not for the professors, though there are some very qualified professors there, but it's for the quality of students.

What is the genesis for the belief that you will go inactive if you don't go to a church school? Are the youth of today so feeble that they are unable withstand anything other than being hand fed bits of toast dipped in milk?

That's not what I was saying. I am saying there is a difference between going to a place with no one, and a place with some.

Check out these documents:

http://www.lds-mormon.com/aaupbill.shtml

Bateman was a master of cloaking administrative decisions with the priesthood.

Another reason why I could never work at BYU.

Where do you gather that?

Students need some who share similar belief systems to survive or thrive. Church school or not, would you encourage your child to attend far away from places where nobody knows LDS beliefs and where the chances of dating somebody of similar faith are non-existent?

For me, it's more social. Kids need kids to date. If you send the kids to places where it's difficult to find LDS kids to date, they will struggle. It's just practical.

Amen. How Evenson managed to stay civil with his reply after Bateman's letter and the George Q. Cannon apostasy quotes is impressive. I doubt I would have had such tact or diplomacy.

I wonder how Evenson feels about the Honor Code. Essentially this seems like an Honor Code for the faculty.

Wow. Attaching the George Q. Cannon quotes to that memo was a real cheap shot. Another example of why the faculty were elated when Bateman was replaced.

In defense of the University and it's policies I will say that it is a unique environment and that employment there is akin to studying there. You know what you're getting into, so if you don't want to deal with that, there are other schools available. Now while I would probably be sitting in Evenson's boat on this issue, realistically would you expect anything less from BYU?

If the University reworked the honor code in a mullah-like fashion, would you say "well that's the way it's supposed to be at BYU"?

You might be saying, instead, "why don't we just leave it as it was before."

And that's what Evenson was saying. "Let's keep the old BYU, and not go to this new BYU."

Ummm...OK?

This reads alot like a defense of the policy because "that's how BYU is."

It's ironic that in church meetings we ask if there is anyone opposed.

Yet at BYU this notion is totally foreign. And being opposed is tantamount to apostacy.

I really can't imagine Joseph Smith setting up BYU as it is now. Brigham Young, yes, I can imagine it. And I suppose that is why it is called BYU. And not JSU. JSU might be a more intellectually open place.

I am not sure how old your daughter is, but this issue is one of very real and immediate importance to my wife and I, as my 18 yo son will leave this fall for a college far away and with a limited LDS population. He did apply to BYU and was admitted, but chose to go in another direction for several reasons. We support him in his choice, but I am concerned, as a father, about this coming year. This has nothing to do with thinking he is prepared for only bits of milk-sopped bread, which is a rather demeaning way to cast this issue. Instead, like many issues in life, it is a question of probabilities. If he is at a school with lots of LDS kids, he is more likely to be with kids sharing his standards and so is less likely to succumb to temptations to violate those standards. If he is hanging around a high percentage of young Mormon women, he is more likely to date and fall in love with a Mormon woman.

Your attitude as articulated seems to be based on your board persona infused with anti-BYU feelings as opposed to true perspective of an active LDS parent. BYU is a great school, very affordable and places someone in an environment that is always supportive of LDS standards. As a parent, what's not to like? I am glad my son is following his own path, but I would always be pleased if any of my children chose to attend BYU.

BTW, when he was applying to colleges BYU was always on the list. I asked him if he wanted to consider UofU and he winced and said something like "you've got to be kidding." He was clearly trained well.

Not for graduate school.
 

Not for graduate school, at least in my department. My wagon, for better or for worse, is firmly hitched to my adviser.

Creekster, the first fork in the road will be mission or not.

If he goes on a mission, you may find that he decides to transfer. Maybe yes, maybe no.

This is true. He is planning on a mission and I expect that he will go. But the probability would certainly be higher if he was attending BYU.

I was the only LDS student at Marist. I didn't struggle with it, as I got involved with a good ward. I lived off campus with a member family and they took me in as their own, so that definitely helped.

Of course, I wasn't the typical college kid. I was more focused on baseball than dating and it wasn't until I finally accepted that I wasn't good enough to advance in baseball that I started to date a bit and by then, I had developed a close relationship with a girl from SLC who lived in Poughkeepsie as a nanny.

I think an LDS kid can do fine at a school with little or no LDS atmosphere. It depends on the kid and how committed he/she is to the Church and it's teachings. I know a few kids who went to BYU and are now some of the most anti-religion of any kind people around.

Odds are better at BYU that your kids will hang out with active members of the Church, but it's no guarantee that they'll always make good decisions.

This is also true and a valid perspective. I went to a Jesuit school with relatively few LDS students and I tended to avoid them (I'm sort of anti-social). My point is not that you MUST go to a church school, but that doing so certainly changes the probabiilities of certain other events taking place, such as a mission and marrying a member.

LDS only . . .
 

It may vary by department and college, but it's my understanding that the Sociology, Classics, and Math Ed. departments are currently restricted by LDS-only hiring policies. These policies might be flexible, but the BYU faculty that I, my wife, and friends have talked to have indicated they need LDS.

Furthermore, word around the campfire is that a temple recommend isn't all you need. The bishop has to submit a ranking of your church activity in your ward (top 10%, top 25%, etc. of the ward) in order to maintain an ecclesiastical endorsement.

I don't have documentation, but I've heard this from plenty of people who have taught at BYU and are in school here in the real Happy Valley.

But, after all is said and done, it's a private school and they can do whatever they want.

I would add that BYU is sometimes the wrong choice if you want your kid to be stay in the church. It depends on the kid, and it's hard to know when the school decision is made.

Zulu, for example, started at BYU, and for various reasons (not church related), ended at Texas A&M. And doesn't regret it one bit.

I already believe the Honor Code to be in full-mullah fashion.

My poor defense isn't something I agree with. But as was noted a significant number of faculty do their undergrad work there. Most are LDS and are keenly aware of the atmosphere and mullah culture there already, so why would any of this be surprising to anyone? I am not saying that's how it's supposed to be and that this policy is agreeable, but to paint with a wide brush, it is what it is. That's BYU. That doesn't make it right, but that's an underlying assumption one must consider before applying to study at or work for BYU.

I learned from my own experience that fighting the HC is like kicking against the pricks. And there are a ton of pricks in the HC department.

This is very true. I've known people who thrived, survived, and drowned. And graduate school is a whole different animal at the Y (at least it was for me).

My question is what is the good side? They can claim that their faculty is righteous?

The current policy is that non-LDS faculty can only be hired if there are no reasonably-qualified LDS candidates.

I call B.S. on this one.

What would be considered a "reasonably-qualified candidate"?

Is there a possibility for sacrificing academic quality to get the "right" person in there?

I think we should not put grad school in the same boat as UG. By the time you are in grad school, the whole church thing has probably either taken or not.

It's very difficult to say that someone thrived or drowned at BYU becasue of BYU. There is no way to know whether the person would have done better or not for having gone there. I went there my Freshman year and didn't really like it. I still went on a mission, however, and I think that being at BYU helped me reach that decision. Even so, after my mission I did not go back to BYU. BYU certainly isn't the best choice for everyone, but it is a good and reasonable choice for many and probably most.