Dive Brief:

• Seven of eight professors at a Manhattan Episcopal seminary who were fired in September after they went on strike have been reinstated and were scheduled to return to their classrooms today.
• The eight—out of 10 professors total at General Theological Seminary—had gone on strike to protest their treatment under the college’s dean, but the dean remains.
• The seminary’s professors and trustees say they hope to find a more permanent resolution to their dispute through mediation, The New York Times reported.

Dive Insight:

The eight professors told the trustees in a September letter that the dean, the Rev. Kurt Dunkle, had created an atmosphere of “deep despondency, anxiety, hostility, fear and retaliation” at the Episcopal seminary, the oldest in the country. They claimed Dunkle was a micromanager who threatened to fire those who disagreed with him, and that he made offensive remarks to faculty and students.

Four days into their strike, the professors were informed by the trustees that they had effectively resigned when they stopped working, though the professors disputed that interpretation. Hundreds of Episcopal clergy members signed a petition backing the professors. The board said an independent investigation of the dean found that he had not created a hostile work environment. For now, the seven professors have lost their tenure and are reinstated until the end of the school year. The eighth professor has accepted a severance package.