UMass Labor Center Saved from Shutdown
POSTED BY MARTIN KICH In a September post to this blog [https://academeblog.org/2016/09/05/saving-the-labor-center-at-umass-amherst/], I reported on the efforts to keep the UMass Labor Center from being closed. Earlier this month, the Amherst Bulletin included a story by Jack Suntrup titled “UMass Labor Center Saved from Shutdown and New Scholarships to Center Available”: “After months of upheaval…
Are Higher Ed Professionals a Resource or Part of "the Swamp"?
BY BRIAN C. MITCHELL One of the striking features of the new presidential administration appears to be the difference between fact and perception. On most levels, it seems that optics matter more than words.Facts seem to be afterthoughts to positions floated. Further, it looks like many positions shift regularly depending upon how the outcome is likely…
Nice Work If You Can Get It
POSTED BY HANK REICHMAN The following is excerpted from a story in Pensions and Investments online and reposted on the blog of the UCLA Faculty Association under the above title. University of California gives CIO $841,000 bonus despite year of negative returns By Randy Diamond | December 9, 2016 The University of California Regents approved…
Jindalism Casts a Long Shadow
POSTED BY MARTIN KICH This is the opening of an article on Louisiana’s continuing budget crisis, written by Heath Allen for WDSU News: “Louisiana’s state colleges and universities face another $18 million in budget cuts as part of Gov. John Bel Edwards’ plan to fill a looming $312 million budget shortfall. “But during a meeting…
The “Relentless Rise” in Administrative Positions
POSTED BY MARTIN KICH Here is a short but telling item from the Hechinger Report: “The number of executive, administrative and managerial employees on university campuses nationwide continued its relentless rise right through the recession, up by a collective 15 percent between 2007 and 2014, federal data show. “”Hear a SpareMin podcast on this topic here with Matt…
OCAAUP 2016 Annual Meeting: Resolution 2–Instruction First
POSTED BY MARTIN KICH Whereas the primary mission of Ohio’s colleges and universities is to educate students, Whereas colleges and universities have increasingly and irresponsibly devoted resources to bloated administrative bureaucracies, to equally ambitious and expensive sports programs supported by ever-more elaborate and more expensive athletic facilities, and a seemingly endless succession of other expensive…
Donald Trump's War on Education
BY JOHN K. WILSON Donald Trump spent most of the 2016 campaign saying almost nothing about education. But recently, Trump has made comments revealing that if he wins the presidency, it could have dramatic and alarming effects on public schools and universities. In his latest pronouncements about universities and in his “Contract with the American…
Reich: "Public Higher Education is Dying in the U.S."
BY HANK REICHMAN Public higher education is “dying” in the US, with the pricing out of students from poorer backgrounds amounting to a “national tragedy in the making.” So warned Robert Reich, chancellor’s professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and secretary of labor in the Bill Clinton administration, in a…
The Stubbornly High Cost of Doing Business
BY BRIAN C. MITCHELL In the Hechinger Report’s recent story, “University Bureaucracies Grew 15 Percent During the Recession, Even as Budgets Were Cut and Tuition Increased,” reporter Jon Marcus examined the confounding trend that many university systems are showing “new resolve . . . to improve the efficiency and productivity of stubbornly labor-intensive higher education”…