http://chronicle.com/weekly/v54/i04/04a02101.htm
From the issue dated September 21, 2007
When Research Criticizes an Industry
A professor says Idaho State U. gave too much deference to mining
interests, at his expense; the administration says it did nothing wrong
By GOLDIE BLUMENSTYK
When Robert W. Van Kirk released a study in January about selenium
contamination in trout streams in southeastern Idaho, he expected some
flak from the influential phosphate-mining industry. He didn't expect to
feel pressured by the administration of his own institution, Idaho State
University, where he is an associate professor of mathematics.
His research, paid for by a local environmental group, indeed raised the
hackles of mining interests. Executives of one major mine operator, the
J.R. Simplot Company, called the university's leaders about the study
just days after it came out.
The provost, Robert A. Wharton, responded by asking a vice president to
investigate Mr. Van Kirk and his collaborator. That inquiry found no
irregularities, but Mr. Wharton disclosed to the company the name of the
journal where the research was to be published before Mr. Van Kirk could
object that it might compromise the peer-review process.
The university leaders defend their actions, but experts on academic
freedom say the situation, while hardly black and white, reflects the
growing high-stakes challenges for higher education, and especially for
academics and administrators at state universities, when public-interest
science comes into conflict with powerful political and economic interests.
Mr. Van Kirk says he doesn't know if he will ever want to pursue
controversial research again at Idaho State, especially if he wants to
make full professor. And his research collaborator, Sheryl L. Hill, who
also happens to be his wife, may have already paid a price.
This summer she was removed from her post overseeing instructional
biology laboratories at Idaho State in a move that both researchers
contend the provost carried out to appease mining interests. She has
since been given another position that ends after this academic year.
While it may be commonplace for companies to try to exert pressure on
researchers, says Mr. Van Kirk, "it's the job of the university
administration to protect its faculty."
Responding to Industry
Last month Mr. Van Kirk and Ms. Hill went to the university's president
to seek an investigation of Mr. Wharton's actions and a direct assurance
that Mr. Van Kirk's academic freedom would be protected in the future.
The response didn't satisfy them. They say the investigation that the
university conducted did not deal with the issues they raised and that
the assurance was inadequate.
The university's president and top two academic officials say the two
researchers' charges are groundless, and they assert that nothing about
the way they handled Simplot's inquiry resulted in any damage to Mr. Van
Kirk or to the prospects for the research, which was published in an
Elsevier journal, Ecological Modelling, in May.
"There was concern raised by a corporation," said Arthur C. Vailas,
Idaho State's president, in an interview last week. "We had an inquiry,
and we responded."
The company had met with Mr. Wharton, the provost, to find out whether
the research had been undertaken outside of regular university channels,
whether the researchers were members of the Greater Yellowstone
Coalition, the environmental group that paid $8,867 for the study, and
whether the findings would be undergoing peer review.
The research involved development of a mathematical model to determine
how much selenium, a byproduct of phosphate mining, could be absorbed by
Yellowstone cutthroat trout before the populations would suffer. The
research was based on data from the watersheds of the Blackfoot and Salt
Rivers, near Idaho State's campus in Pocatello.
The model developed by the researchers found that the concentration of
selenium in fish could actually be higher than the limits now being
considered by federal regulators without hurting the trout population.
But the researchers also found that many trout in the watersheds already
had selenium levels far above the limit recommended by the study.
Selenium, which leaches into soil and water as a result of phosphate
mining, is toxic at high concentrations.
'I See No Issue Here'
Marv Hoyt, Idaho director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, says the
findings presented an immediate problem for Simplot because the Salt
River watershed is affected by runoff from its Smoky Canyon Mine.
Simplot is seeking to expand that mine.
Mr. Vailas says that when the university's vice president for research
found nothing improper about the researchers' ties to the coalition, the
provost reported that back to Simplot. He says there also was nothing
sinister in the provost's decision to answer the company's question
about the identity of the journal. He says that all that the provost did
was "reassured Simplot" that the research was going through the
peer-review process at a respected journal.
The provost says that in his meeting with Simplot executives, at their
Boise headquarters, he emphasized to them that research "is what we do"
at the university.
Mr. Vailas, who has been president for just over a year, says the
university is well aware of the mining industry's economic and political
influence in the state. The current governor, C.L. (Butch) Otter, a
Republican, is a former executive and board member at Simplot. The
president pro tempore of the State Senate, who was part of the search
committee that chose Mr. Vailas, works for Monsanto, another major
phosphate-mining operator in Idaho. Still, Mr. Vailas and the other
administrators say the inquiry was handled no differently than if it had
been brought by any other company or community group.
"I see no issue here," says Mr. Vailas, who noted that in a letter he
sent to Mr. Van Kirk last month after their meeting, he praised him for
his "continued leadership in ecological research" and thanked him for
"bringing important recognition to our institution."
Says Mr. Vailas: "If that's not support, what is?"
While declining to discuss the specifics of Ms. Hill's employment
because it is a personnel matter now in a confidential review, President
Vailas did assert that "none of the issues related to Sheryl Hill had
anything to do with this."
Academic Freedom
But Mr. Van Kirk, Ms. Hill, the organization that sponsored the
research, and the publisher of the journal where the work appeared say
the university administrators' conduct was unusual and in some cases
improper and unethical.
And a number of academic-freedom experts contacted by The Chronicle say
the case illustrates the kinds of pressures that arise when university
researchers undertake studies that threaten powerful economic interests,
as well as the dangers to society if researchers' institutions fail to
strenuously back them up.
Linda Ray Pratt, provost of the University of Nebraska and a former
president of the American Association of University Professors, says
that for state institutions in particular, two important principles
should apply: "State universities should be defending the academic
freedom of their faculty, and the more transparency that you can have at
a public university the better." In this instance, she says, it may be
that the two principles came into conflict because of the way the
university responded to the company's concerns.
Francesca T. Grifo, director of the scientific-integrity program at the
Union of Concerned Scientists, says her office, in Washington, regularly
gets calls from university researchers — particularly from state
universities — who, like Mr. Van Kirk, feel that their institution is
buckling to industry pressure instead of defending them against
influential parties.
It is understandable that a researcher might feel at risk, she says, if
"they asked questions without reassuring him of his importance to the
university and the importance of his academic freedom."
And even if it cannot be proven that Ms. Hill lost her job as a result,
she says the situation may have lasting consequences. "There is harm if
he hesitates to pursue this line of research in the future," because
good science that is found worthy of publication in a peer-reviewed
journal benefits society, says Ms. Grifo. "If he decides after this
experience not to do this kind of applied research, we lose."
Mr. Van Kirk says the university's actions last year and this summer
have indeed given him pause, and not only because of his wife's employment.
He says the university's failure to establish a "fire wall" against
industry made him more vulnerable to attacks by Simplot. Had the article
not been accepted by the journal for any number of reasons unrelated to
its scientific merit, he says, Simplot could have tried to undermine it
by saying "it wasn't good enough."
Is It Sound Science?
Simplot has in fact been questioning Mr. Van Kirk and Ms. Hill's
science. Soon after Mr. Van Kirk presented his findings at a news
conference organized by the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, Simplot hired
an environmental consulting firm to evaluate the researcher's report to
the coalition. The report, which was similar to what was eventually
published, had been posted on the coalition's Web site.
Alan Prouty, Simplot's director of environmental and regulatory affairs,
says he asked the consulting firm, Parametrix, to evaluate "the
technical validity of the paper." He says his only interest in knowing
where it had been submitted was to follow where the paper was in the
scientific process, and he had never considered interfering with
publication.
He says Simplot initially raised questions about the study because early
news accounts of the coalition's news conference "made it sound like
this was an Idaho State University project."
In an e-mail correspondence with The Chronicle, the journal's publisher,
Nicolette van Dijk, confirmed that as far as she knows, "no one from the
mining industry (or related to it) has tried to contact our editors to
interfere with the publication of the article or requested to submit a
rebuttal or a review." In a separate e-mail exchange with Mr. Van Kirk,
she said the administration's releasing the journal's name to the mining
company did not violate any policy of the journal, although Ms. van Dijk
added, "the editors of the journal and I probably agree that the
behavior of your administration is unethical."
Mr. Prouty says he has not yet decided what he will do with Parametrix's
findings. They "flagged a couple of things" that might raise questions
about the study, he says. The Parametrix study has not been subjected to
peer review.
Mr. Van Kirk says he wants to continue to study the effects of phosphate
mining and says he is confident his work can withstand criticisms that
the mining industry might raise. But he is less confident about where he
stands at Idaho State.
The administration's actions leave the impression that "the university
is willing to entertain whatever the mining industry asks," he says.
"Next time I submit a proposal to work on selenium, do you think the
provost will sign it?"
"We approved the first proposal, why wouldn't we approve the second
one?" was Mr. Vailas's response, when the question was posed directly to
him by a reporter.
Mr. Hoyt, of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, says the events have
given him pause as well.
"We would have to think long and hard as to whether we would ever fund
more research at Idaho State after this," he says. He says the
university's response to Simplot raises questions about its commitment
to backing good researchers.
"What I would want is a provost saying, 'How dare you even ask me that
about my faculty?'" says Mr. Hoyt. "That's what he should have said."
