Monthly Archives: March 2008

More President Search News: Getting closer, getting worried…

Posted on March 10, 2008 by | 16 Comments

After the “Read More” part is an email from Ward Mullens about the status of the Presidential search. The committee has apparently interviewed some folks and has narrowed it down, I presume to five candidates since there are five forums being held. What concerns me is that even at this late date we still don’t know who these people are and this carefully worded announcement says that the forums “will consist of invitations to faculty, students, senior administrators, community members and all members of the bargaining units on campus.” Am I being a little paranoid here, or are these people saying that the only folks who will be allowed into this event will be ones who have an invitation? This would obviously be problematic.

Anyway, read on, and again, if anyone on the committee for the search has any comment to post, either as a commentator or something you want to pass on to me to post (and I know you’re out there, PSAC and BoR members!), let me know.
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Posted in Board of Regents, EMU President Search

What if EMU budgets were this transparent?

Posted on March 8, 2008 by | 1 Comment

Also from Inside Higher Ed, “Who gets how much money and where it goes.” The opening paragraphs:

Sure, public universities generally make their annual budgets available. But how much did the chemistry department spend on copying at Kinko’s – yesterday?

At Oregon State University, that kind of detailed information on financial transactions is accessible online, albeit only to those connected to computers on the campus. “It’s pretty basic, but it is very transparent. Everybody in the institution can see everything that goes on everywhere,” says Mark McCambridge, vice president for finance and administration at Oregon State.

“There’s always this mystery — ‘The vice president is holding back money,’ or ‘This person got more money than I did’.… There’s always that mystery that surrounds the budget, and in our case it isn’t there.”

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Posted in Budgets, In the media...

The fine line between “fund raising” and “selling out:” two IHE articles

Posted on March 7, 2008 by | Leave a comment

I just thought I’d pass along a couple of Inside Higher Ed articles that might be kind of interesting to the group, especially given some of our talk here about fund raising.
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Posted in Academics, EMU Branding, EMU Fund Raising, In the media...

Yes, multi-million dollar cuts coming. Does this explain why?

Posted on March 6, 2008 by | 24 Comments

While some people have doubted the reports that multi million dollar cuts were about to be made by Welch Hall in the academic affairs budget, confirmation of this is now made public in the following memo, sent to some or all faculty. Parts of the memo are written in the passive voice, in that responsibility for budget matters is at times left vague and choices are presented as inevitabilities. Even more curiously, the memo says little about university resources and merely assumes what needs to be proven: That the university has a real fiscal crisis, rather than a crisis of managerial competence.

The memo’s reference to the university President is also odd, given that there is no president now. Still, I applaud this effort by the Associate Provost Dr Bob Neely, and Russ Larson and David Clifford of the Faculty Council, to present some budget information to the EMU faculty. Whether the document is really a sufficient explanation of the situation is something else entirely. Strangely, the letter does not even suggest that focusing on academics is how the university can overcome any financial problems, as we are student revenue dependent, and by cutting academics, we give students reasons to not come here or to take classes elsewhere. Last year’s cuts cost us revenue.

What do you think of this memo? Can this level of cuts in academics be made without cutting essentials?
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Posted in Academics, Board of Regents, Budgets, Buildings and Grounds, EMU President, EMU President Search

Another 14 hour day

Posted on March 5, 2008 by | 1 Comment

9:30pm, Wednesday March 5, 2008. So ends another 14 hour day with three classes, two meetings (computer science advisory group and AAUP-related), finalizing grades on one midterm, giving another midterm (plus allowing time to go over), taking several demos, struggling with failed projection equipment in class, strategizing with colleague.

Still, it could be worse — I did 18 – 20 hour days once a year when a research engineer at Ford, and today, I think four students had the “I get it!” moment for recursion.

Plus, I finally internalized that the Navier-Stokes equations are linear for my research problem (low Reynolds number micro-swimmers). Wahoo!

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Posted in Faculty Life

Weird announcement about a special BoR meeting

Posted on March 4, 2008 by | 8 Comments

Pam Young sent around an email to announce a special BoR meeting on March 14 that struck me as kind of, um, odd. Here’s what she wrote with a few comments along the way:

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Posted in Board of Regents

Who really cares about the students?

Posted on March 4, 2008 by | 9 Comments

I ask this question to start a conversation about the motives for each the administration and the faculty.

Are we a truly student centered university?

Faculty – How do you put the students 1st before yourself?

Admin – How do you put the students 1st before yourself?

Every day I wake up I ask myself “How am I going to enhance the experience of the students on campus?”

Also everything I do or anything I ask for I always ask “Is this going to benefit me or the students” If I find myself answering the question as it would only benefit me I don’t do it. Everything we do needs to benefit the student first before anyone else. If that means I have to put in extra hours or it makes my day just a bit more stressful as long as the students are being served then thats the point of me being here.

Sometimes, yes I do these things at the cost to my own health, friends, and family. However this is the life I chose to live. Students must and will always come first.

Now with that being said one needs to look out for themselves as well…if one does not survive then they can not serve the students. One needs to ensure one can live a healthy life and provide for their family. Also, someone can have career goals – but as long as they are trying to advance into “higher positions” to enhance the experience for the students then great – however if someone wants to advance into “higher positions” because they want the title or the money it is time for them to leave the profession.

As long as very decision is made to put the students 1st no decision will be wrong. It may not be agreeable to everyone, but if the students are effected in a positive way and the faculty and staff are inconvenienced in some little ways, sorry I will go the way that will enhance the student experience.

Thoughts, everyone?

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Posted in Uncategorized

emYou Fundraiser/Judge Mathis an EMU alum?

Posted on March 3, 2008 by | 2 Comments

Since I am of course a (semi) loyal Facebook user, I am “friends” with the folks over at emYou. I was happy to hear that they have a playground fund raiser coming up this weekend at TC Speakeasy (perhaps one of those folks can comment here to send along the message?).

But what really caught my eye was that the next cover of emYou which features TV’s own Judge Mathis, who is an EMU alum. Go figure!

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Posted in College Fun, In the media..., Student Life, Ypsilanti

“Building blitz” to include EMU and Pray-Harrold (finally?)

Posted on March 3, 2008 by | 3 Comments

Loyal reader/fan Brian sent me this link from the Detroit News, “Building blitz to boost colleges.” Someone at the paper was probably working for a long time to come up for a synonym to “university” that began with a “b,” but they settled for “college” instead. Some quotes and thoughts after the “Read More” section.
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Posted in Buildings and Grounds, In the media...

Governance problem at UC. How’s our own governance?

Posted on March 3, 2008 by | 4 Comments

This article reminds me, somehow, of our own BoR that thinks it reasonable to review and approve presidential firing decisions. http://insidehighered.com/news/2008/03/03/uc

Note the concern on damage to presidential searches caused by inappropriate governance! Could EMU have the same problem?

I still think that any new Board members would be well served by some training. I know that when I was on a school board (small potatoes compared to EMU BoR, but still!) I felt all at sea regarding the extent of my authority and the board’s powers. I know, I know, we don’t have any new board members any more — I think, though that some high quality training would be a good idea for new BoR members as a matter of policy.

(P.S. Training should include actual conversations with the faculty leadership, including AAUP leadership, if only to demonstrate that members do not have horns and forked tails.)

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Posted in Board of Regents