A former Iowa State assistant professor of English has sued past and present members of the Iowa State faculty over their failure to grant him tenure.

Roy Higginson, a former assistant professor of English, was denied tenure for professorship after first being recommended for tenure by a preliminary review committee. He said he thinks that he was discriminated against because he is homosexual.

At issue in the case is whether a former head of the English Department at the university did, in Higginson’s words, “exercise undue influence on the tenure decision due to his alleged homophobic views.”

Higginson, who is openly gay, alleges in court documents that he “was treated differently than others similarly situated in his department and that the difference in treatment was a result of defendant [Frank] Haggard’s homophobia.”

Steve Young, assistant attorney general for Iowa representing the defendants in the case, disputed the allegations, saying, “it was determined by a multiple level of review that Higginson was deficient in the area of research in his field.”

According to ISU policy and procedures, “the standards for promotion and tenure are based on an evaluation of four areas of performance.” One of these four areas is research. According to the policy, “to be promoted or given tenure, a candidate must demonstrate excellence in at least one of the first areas and competence in other areas relevant to the candidate’s appointment.”

Higginson said that during the Fall of 1990, he applied for a faculty improvement leave (FIL). The English Department rated Higginson’s FIL application as first in the department. At that time, Higginson also received his mandatory tenure review.

The tenure review committee, which is comprised of 12 English department faculty members, was headed by Haggard at the time. The review committee voted 7-5 to tenure Higginson but not to promote him to associate professor.

According to court documents, “Haggard did not agree with the committee’s decision and recommended to the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, David Bright, that Higginson not receive tenure. Bright agreed with Haggard and recommended to the Provost that the plaintiff not be tenured or promoted.”

At the time, provostial duties had been shared between Jean Adams, Edwin Lewis and Patricia Swan. Swan served as the senior member of the three.

Higginson said, “from the time I was hired in June of 1985, Dr. Haggard and I have had a very unpleasant relationship.” Higginson would not elaborate on whether this “unpleasant relationship” was due to the fact that Higginson is gay.

Higginson said, “Swan told B.C. Gerstein, who was chairman of a grievance committee assigned to investigate the tenure decision, that she was under tremendous homophobic pressure not to grant tenure.” Swan is quoted in court documents as stating that Gerstein “told me that he had wondered whether Mr. Higginson’s homosexuality was involved in the decision of the department head not to support him for tenure.”

Young said, “it is not a common practice for a department head to dispute a preliminary tenure review committee, but it has occurred before at Iowa State.”

He added that the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Promotions and Tenure Review Committee, which holds precedence over the English Department’s tenure review committee, voted, four to zero, not to grant tenure.

A May 24 summary judgment in U.S. District Court dismissed eight of Higginson’s nine claims