As the faculties at one University of Wisconsin system campus after another vote “no confidence” in the leadership of system head Ray Cross and the Board of Regents, new evidence has emerged to demonstrate that, despite public claims by Cross that under his leadership “the substance of tenure was simply moved from statute to board…
On May 4, the AAUP released an investigating committee’s report on unilateral actions taken by the administration and board of the College of Saint Rose in New York to reduce or eliminate twenty-seven academic programs and thereby to terminate twenty-three tenured and tenure-track appointments. The report, available here, concludes that the cuts and layoffs, “the result…
BY HANK REICHMAN This blog has in the past posted several items concerning the efforts by the notorious conservative Charles Koch Foundation to influence curriculum and even hiring at institutions of higher education. Early last month I had the privilege of participating in a panel discussion of the issue at the annual higher education conference…
On April 27, University of California President Janet Napolitano announced that Linda Katehi, Chancellor of the UC Davis (UCD) campus, had been placed on “investigatory leave” and named Provost Ralph Hexter as Interim Chancellor. The following statement from thirteen University of California, Davis (UCD) graduate students appeared yesterday in the Davis Vanguard: Dear Colleagues, We,…
Yesterday the Faculty Senate of the University of Wisconsin at Madison overwhelmingly voted no confidence in Ray Cross, president of the University of Wisconsin System, and in the system’s Board of Regents. The vote followed the board’s rejections of proposals made by faculty groups that would protect academic freedom in new system policies on tenure…
BY HANK REICHMAN On April 27, University of California President Janet Napolitano announced that Linda Katehi, Chancellor of the UC Davis campus, had been placed on “investigatory leave.” The action came in the wake of repeated calls by legislators for Katehi’s resignation or dismissal. This was not yet, as some have reported, tantamount to her…
AkronAAUP Survey Reveals Increasingly Negative Faculty Sentiment More than 80% of reporting faculty are not confident in University of Akron leadership. AKRON, Ohio – May 2, 2016 – A recent AkronAAUP survey of the faculty indicates even less confidence in University of Akron leadership than was measured by a similar survey during the fall…
BY HANK REICHMAN [UPDATE 4/20: Yesterday an eighth legislator and the first Republican, Sen. Joel Anderson (R-Alpine) added his name to the roster of California lawmakers calling for Katehi’s resignation, declaring in a tweet that the University of California exists to educate students, not enrich administrators.] Calls for the resignation or firing of University of…
BY HANK REICHMAN This is the second in a series examining issues in the University of California (UC) system, the nation’s premier public research university. The first entry in the series, on the UC’s funding challenge, may be found here. On March 5, I began a post on this blog entitled “Corporatizers Gone Wild!” with…
The following piece by Christopher Newfield, Professor of English at the University of California at Santa Barbara, is re-posted with permission from his Remaking the University blog. Somewhere Michael Lewis tells the story about what the boss of a trading floor–perhaps John Meriwether–would do when a trader hung on too long to a losing position,…