From the 
Editor's Desk Ernest A. Lynton 

It is not good form for an editor to contribute a paper to her or his own journal. 
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?, which translates freely into "who edits the editor 
down to size?" A word of explanation is therefore in order. As some of our readers 
know, I have for many years been deeply concerned with, and variously pontificated 
about, faculty roles and rewards. Most recently my work on this issue has been 
intensified in two ways. I have been involved with Russ Edgerton, Clara Lovett, and 
now Gene Rice at the American Association for Higher Education in its Forum on 
Faculty Roles and Rewards. I am also working for Ernest Boyer on the preparation 
of a follow-up report to Scholarship Reconsidered. The working title of this second 
report is Scholarship Assessed, and it will focus on some of the issues mentioned in 
my article: the shared characteristics of all forms of scholarship, the common crite-
ria of quality which can be applied, and the similarity of the necessary documenta-
tion. That is why Clara Lovett, Guest Editor for this issue, asked me to contribute -
- and that is also why, in spite of being the journal's editor, I jumped at the opportu-
nity. 

Clara carried out her responsibilities as guest editor in spite of the fact that 
after being immersed for many months in the preparation for the second national 
conference of the AAHE Forum on Faculty Roles and Rewards, she soon after this 
event assumed the presidency of Northern Arizona University. It is a great pleasure 
to express to Clara Lovett both a profound gratitude for her work on this issue and 
best wishes in her new position. 

With my article I am already taking up more than enough space in this issue 
with which we begin the fifth year of our quarterly publication. No editorializing, 
this time; only one brief comment about the theme of the issue. We all know that 
change in the academy is, at best, slow to the point of being imperceptible. But after 
attending the two national meetings of the AAHE Forum which have been held to 
date and noting both the numbers and the commitment of participants, after visiting 
many campuses and witnessing the growing attention to the nature of scholarship 
and the faculty reward system throughout the country, and knowing the astonishing 
circulation of Scholarship Reconsidered (well into five figures), I am convinced that 
we are witnessing the first stirrings of a real change. Those who will be around at 
the tum of the century will, I am quite certain, witness then a marked difference from 
the state of affairs, say, in 1990. Looking back, they will recognize that the nineties 
have been a decade of a marked reordering of priorities and values in higher educa-
tion. But to make this optimistic projection come true, much work by many people 
is needed. I hope that this will happen, for without that reordering, the academy will 
be in great difficulties. 


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