This resolution is the second of four presented and unanimously endorsed at The Ohio Conference annual meeting on November 7. Whereas members of the Ohio Conference AAUP harbor a grave concern that our colleagues in Wisconsin have lost tenure protections and collective bargaining rights; Whereas the members of the Ohio Conference AAUP believe that for…
The growing trend toward secret presidential searches and the emerging tendency of governing boards to appoint corporate executives or politicians with no experience in higher education has gained considerable attention on this blog (see for examples the University of Iowa and the University of Missouri, the latter with well-known disastrous consequences). One recent example is…
Bruce Joshua Miller and Ned Stuckey-French have written a splendid piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education that provides further perspective on the recent events at the University of Missouri, most specifically their connection with broader disturbing trends in higher education. The entire piece deserves a reading, but here are some pertinent excerpts: Timothy Wolfe…
Here is the e-mail from the Chief of the Campus Police at Adams State University to the campus community: From: Adams State University Police Department <pgrohowski@adams.edu> Date: Wed, Oct 28, 2015 at 8:05 AM Subject: Message from Chief Grohowski Open letter to campus staff, students and faculty, I want to take this opportunity to bring…
First Item: Nation of Change has published a very succinct overview of the Koch family’s various foundations, an article that includes links to further and fuller information on each of the entities. Written by Dave Levinthal of the Center for Public Integrity, the article is available at: http://www.nationofchange.org/2015/10/31/the-koch-brothers-foundation-network-explained/. Second Item: A website called Inspiration…
While a lengthy exposition of Marx is more appropriate for a “scholarly” venue, I have long believed the academic community’s nineteenth-century persecution of Marx, and one of his colleagues has not been sufficiently exposed. Would Marx and Bruno Bauer have benefited from an AAUP, that was formed thirty-two years after the former’s death in 1883? The AAUP would have probably…
In a piece published last week by Huffington Post, Laurie Jones and Wanda Evans-Brewer ask and answer that rhetorical question in promoting a new short film called Professors in Poverty. The last three paragraphs of the article are particularly strong: “The sub-contractor business model is becoming increasingly popular in our “shared economy” society. But is…
In one of my recent reviews of recent news items on higher education [https://academeblog.org/2015/10/23/u-s-higher-education-news-from-september-29-2015/], I opened with an item on the elimination of continuing contracts for faculty at Florida State College. Now the member of the college’s board of trustees who initiated that change of policy has been emboldened to advance a proposal that faculty…
This is an op-ed written by John McNay, president of the Ohio Conference, and published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer: Gov. John Kasich’s task force on affordability and efficiency in higher education released its recommendations to the General Assembly recently, and the results were to be expected. The task force was headed by Geoff Chatas,…
Writing for Nation of Change, Paul Buchheit has provided a very succinct but comprehensive overview of how corporatization has had a very damaging impact on higher education. In his article “Higher Education: Capitalism at Its Most Despicable,” Buchheit focuses on five inter-linked phenomena that are undermining the value of higher education because they undermine the…