Management fads are sweeping the nation's public universities
under cover of the economic crisis. Programs called
“rightsizing,” “restructuring,” “prioritizing,” and
“reengineering,” and inspired by theories like "deliverology,"
involve cutbacks and changes that faculty members say are
undermining the quality of CSU degrees.
In addition to the controversial decisions regarding executive
pay and student fees that were leveled at the July Board of
Trustees meeting, the Trustees also passed a smaller but no less
important change to Administrative Code that governs the system.
The UCLA Civil Rights Project has put together a series of
research papers on “The CSU Crisis and California's Future” to
examine the impact of funding cuts on the California State
University system from various angles, including the impact on
student access to financial aid and on the faculty's ability to
deliver a quality education.
Diverse magazine reports on one paper that finds CSU students are
working well in excess of 15 hours a week, the point at which
studies decline. http://diverseeducation.com/article/15728/
Mark your calendars now to take part in the historic launch of
the “Campaign for the Future of Higher Education.”
As you may remember, back in January, education leaders from 21
states gathered in Los Angeles to tackle ways to insert the
faculty voice from the campuses into the national debate over
public higher education. Since, they formed a campaign dedicated
to fighting for America’s public higher education institutions.
Last weekend, NEA’s National Council for Higher Education voted
to endorse the campaign at NEA’s Higher Education conference in
Boston. The American Association of University Professors is
already onboard and the American Federation of Teachers is moving
the endorsement through its process.
Gary Rhoades, General Secretary of the AAUP, spoke about the
national crisis in public higher education last week at the
plenary meeting of the Academic Senate of the CSU and at campus
meetings at Long Beach and Dominguez Hills.
In his presentation, "The Higher Education We Choose, The
California We Choose," Rhoades talked about the dimensions and
trends of the crisis and lessons for the future.
Last week, leaders of the California Legislative Tri-Caucus –
which is comprised of the Asian Pacific Islander Legislative
Caucus, Latino Legislative Caucus, and the Legislative Black
Caucus –
sent a letter outlining the concerns they had with the CSU
Graduation Initiative.
More than 70 faculty leaders from universities across the country
met in Los Angeles last weekend for a first-of-its-kind
discussion on how to assert the faculty's voice in the national
debate over the future of American higher education.
“Watching what is going on at our campuses and hearing from
colleagues around the country, we have become convinced that we
must act—together and quickly—for the good of our students, our
profession, and our institutions,” said Susan Meisenhelder, a
retired English professor at CSU San Bernardino and CFA’s
point-person for the national meeting.
Former Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch published a
well-thought out critique of the recent documentary “Waiting for
Superman” in a recent edition of the New York Review of Books.
Much like the CSU, the State University New York (SUNY) system
has been ravaged by budget cuts in recent years. Administrators
at SUNY have launched ill-conceived plans to "prioritize" and
then eliminate entire academic programs – a process similar to
those that CFA has fought vigorously here in California.
On October 1, the president of SUNY Albany announced plans to cut
160 full-time positions – including tenured faculty – in five
programs: French, Italian, Russian, Theater, and Classics.
Kimberly King, a Psychology professor at Cal State LA and member of the Early Start Task Force; Pat Fuscaldo, Men’s Basketball Head Coach at Sonoma State University addressed the CSU Trustees on Early Start
A diverse array of faculty, staff and a head basketball coach
were In Long Beach last week to voice their concerns about the
Board of Trustees’ Mandatory Early Start Program (MESP).
Meantime, at the campus level, CSU Bakersfield is at the
forefront of campus experimentation to implement the executive
order.
Last year the Dean of Natural Sciences at CSU Bakersfield took
control of the remedial math program to conduct a money-saving
all-online experiment, over the objections of math professors.
The pass rate in remedial math at Bakersfield plummeted from 75%
in Fall Quarter 2008 to 40% in Fall Quarter 2009.
CSU Chancellor Charles Reed’s Executive Order 1048 stipulates
that the 23 campus presidents must mandate a special summer
program as a matriculation requirement for freshmen who need
developmental math or English courses. The cost for this will be
borne by the student, now classified as an "Early Entrant."
Failure to participate in a summer program will result in
disenrollment from the CSU, even though the student is CSU
eligible and was accepted for the fall term.
Among those who attempted to address the CSU Board of Trustees at
their one-day summer meeting on July 13, CFA leader Teri Yamada,
a professor of Asian and Asian American studies at CSU Long
Beach, spoke of serious concerns about the reengineering of
student remedial programs in the CSU.
Yamada told the Trustees that “Mandatory Early Start,” their new
required summer program for students needing help with math and
English, is pedagogically unsound and will undermine access to
college education.
