Ruling finds professor's firing from Calgary university disproportionate to conduct

Mount Royal University's decision to fire a controversial tenured professor in 2021 was disproportionate, even if her conduct did warrant discipline, an arbitrator has ruled.

The decision, which runs more than 300 pages, was delivered in July. It concerns 10 grievances filed by the professor, Frances Widdowson, and the Mount Royal Faculty Association, tied to Widdowson's dismissal on Dec. 20, 2021.

The hearing took 30 days spread over 10 months as 25 witnesses gave evidence. The hearing included thousands of pages of exhibits, focusing on complaints of harassment filed by Widdowson's colleagues. Widdowson also filed complaints that said she was harassed.

The hearing's main focus was not on comments from Widdowson that made headlines in 2020, when she suggested there were educational benefits to Canada's residential school system and complained the Black Lives Matter movement had "destroyed" MRU — though she now says the statement about BLM was intended to be hyperbolic.

She was back in the headlines last year when a faculty member invited her to speak at the University of Lethbridge, spurring student protest.

Widdowson joined Mount Royal University in 2008 and was granted tenure in 2011. She taught courses in political science and policy studies, with a specialization in Indigenous peoples' policy and Indigenous affairs.

"She has controversial views on a number of topics. However, there has never been a complaint about the quality or ethics of her scholarship; she has never received performance management counselling for either her teaching or scholarship; and the university has supported and recognized her scholarly activities," reads the decision from arbitrator David Phillip Jones. 

Over a period of months, Widdowson and a number of colleagues traded a series of complaints about harassment and bullying as they took part in a "Twitter War," Jones wrote.

A series of investigations followed. Some of Widdowson's tweets were found to have constituted harassment, while some of Widdowson's complaints against colleagues were also substantiated. 

In July 2021, Widdowson made a complaint against another colleague for his tweets. An investigation found in November 2021 that none of those tweets constituted harassment, and characterized Widdowson's complaint "as being malicious, frivolous, vexatious and made in bad faith." Widdowson's firing took place in December 2021.

As a part of the arbitration, the faculty association suggested the case was about breaching Widdowson's academic freedom, and submitted that there was no harassment.

They suggested that the investigations were procedurally unfair, and that there was no just cause for any discipline. Therefore, the association said Widdowson should be reinstated with full retroactive salary and benefits.

The university, on the other hand, submitted that the case was about harassment and had nothing to do with academic freedom. Widdowson's conduct was just cause for a two-week suspension and the termination of her employment, the university said.

As a part of the arbitration, eight grievances were related to the process used to investigate the complaints while two were related to the suspension and dismissal of Widdowson.