For a few minutes yesterday morning, Thomas Kovach thought he was safe.

Kovach, head of the German studies department, and his nine faculty members had feared the prospect of merging with Russian and Slavic studies, their department's neighbor in the Learning Services Building.

He was expecting to hear yesterday from his boss, Humanities College Dean Charles Tatum, if German studies would be targeted.

At 10:30 a.m., Tatum hadn't called. When an administrative assistant from Russian and Slavic studies told Kovach the dean hadn't called them either, Kovach briefly thought German studies was spared.

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Tatum called a few minutes later.

"It was one of those bitter moments," Kovach said. "It has not been the happiest day since I've been at the university."

The possible combination of the German studies and Russian and Slavic studies was one of only two merger proposals released yesterday involving two academic departments, and both department heads are already gearing up for a fight to save their departments.

"I'm sure once we've made our case everything will be fine," said George Gutsche, head of the Russian and Slavic studies department, who characterized his initial reaction to the merger proposal as "puzzlement."

President Pete Likins and Provost George Davis wrote in the document outlining their plans that the move was needed because both departments had low numbers of faculty.

They recommended the merger to maintain a "cohesive critical mass" of faculty in the two departments, Davis said. Because the master's program in Russian may face elimination, he expects the number of faculty in the Russian and Slavic studies department could drop from eight to six. Nine faculty call the German studies department home, and Likins and Davis wrote in their proposal yesterday that sustaining that number would be difficult.

That rationale doesn't sit well with Kovach or Gutsche, who say they don't understand how combining two departments could make them more viable. Rather, Gutsche said, it could make life more difficult for students accustomed to getting academic advising from professors of their choice, and create a feeling of impersonality in a department that heavily values personal interaction.

"We've tried to view ourselves as a family," Gutsche said. "I can't imagine a larger department being better for students."

Now, he said, students can talk with any of the professors in the department when they need academic advising. In a merged department, he doubts that would be possible.

On the third floor of the new Learning Services Building, the two departments already coexist in a large bullpen cluttered with bookcases and desks and lined with faculty offices. Physical boundaries between the two departments don't seem to exist.

Faculty too, have forged professional bonds, lunching together and hosting joint film showings. But they have been vocal opponents to the merger, and now that it's a step closer to reality, Kovach describes their attitude as a "general atmosphere of demoralization."

Administrators have assured tenured faculty that their jobs are safe, but Kovach and Gutsche still may have to fight to keep people from leaving a merged department, and more fights trying to recruit new faculty.

"You're giving a different message when you say the department of German and Russian and Slavic studies," Gutsche said. "It's a matter of prestige and recruiting value."

In the last two years, Kovach has hired two junior faculty members. He's cautiously optimistic they'll stay in a merged department, and says he's gone out of his way to convince them of their importance.

But even before the merger proposals were announced, Kovach warned a merger would hurt faculty morale. For Gutsche, yesterday's announcement was the second piece of bad news he's received this month. Last week, Likins and Davis released a preliminary plan to eliminate the master's program in Russian.

That proposal was based on what Gutsche says is the false assumption that the program has awarded an average of two degrees per year over the last five years.

Seated in a conference room in the Russian and Slavic studies department, Gutsche points at data showing that 21 students have earned masters' degrees in the last five years, including seven last year. Kovach believes that if administrators can be convinced to save that program, the rationale for merging the two departments will be eliminated.

For now, both Kovach and Gutsche will fight to convince administrators to keep their departments. Cautiously optimistic, they share a hope that the merger won't materialize.

"It's not an insurmountable obstacle," Gutsche said.