University of Colorado regents unanimously adopted rules Thursday that sharply reduce the time it takes to fire a tenured professor.

The new rules come as the case of ethnic studies professor Ward Churchill drags through the appeals process, more than nine months after a committee recommended that he be terminated for violations that included plagiarism, inventing facts and publishing essays under pseudonyms, which he then quoted as scholarly sources. He continues to draw his $96,000-a-year salary during the appeal.

The new rules limit the appeals process to 100 days, barring extraordinary circumstances, although the regents themselves have no deadline to render a final decision on dismissals. The current rules have no time limit.

The idea of reviewing tenure rules came from faculty leaders in 2005 amid evidence that former administrators arranged for Churchill to obtain tenure in violation of university procedures.

A panel that included faculty members recommended dozens of rule changes to the regents, including the new dismissal process. The new rules won 2-to-1 support in a faculty vote.

President Hank Brown called the rules "a tribute to our faculty."

He said the new rules and the faculty's role in drafting them are receiving nationwide attention.

English professor RL Widmann, who chairs the CU Faculty Council, said the new system is faster but allows all sides to be heard in an appeal.

"Everybody gets to have his or her say," Widmann said.

A five-member faculty investigative committee in May 2006 determined that Churchill had fabricated facts in some of his scholarly essays. The panel went further, charging that the specific infractions added up to "patterns of conduct and behavior" throughout his work.

He was recommended for dismissal the following month.

Brown is awaiting a report on Churchill's case from a faculty hearing panel.

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