The end of Ivy envy

It’s not quite the rankings of U.S. News and World Report, but the latest group of additions to the University faculty suggest that at last, Duke has arrived. Among the 34 professors who have committed to join the School of Arts and Sciences next year are a chemist from Princeton, a biologist from Yale and an ethnomusicologist from Northwestern. In short, Duke is professor stealing—a hiring game that a few years ago Duke couldn’t even think about playing.

Now, after 10 years of building facilities and one year with lifetime Yalie Richard Brodhead as president, the University is competing with the Ivies for faculty and winning.

Professor Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, a sociologist who turned down the University of Pennsylvania to come to Duke, said: “Anyone who has been following academia for the past 15 to 20 years knows that Duke has been an institution that is rising.” But at a school many students regard as choice No. 2 (after Harvard or Stanford or Yale), “rising” is not as thrilling as sitting at the top. Plus students, most of whom are only here for three to six years, don’t have time to wait for Duke to become a better school. But plenty of students endured campus construction, as first the Fitzpatrick Center for Interdisciplinary Engineering, Medicine and Applied Sciences and then the French Sciences Center rose from the ground. These new labs were a major draw for many of the professors, nine of whom are in biology and chemistry.

Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences George McLendon said teaching ability was a major consideration when choosing the new professors. If this is true, the University is well on its way to developing a culture of celebrity professors. This breed of prof, common among the Ivies, is famous for research but better known on campus for packing lecture halls. Until now, famous professors like these have been part of what made Blue Devils view the Ivies with a tinge of green. Now Duke has proven its ability to attract the professors. Let’s bring on the classes.