Monthly Archives: February 2009

“Eastern, other universities call for more state aid”

Posted on February 28, 2009 by | Leave a comment

From the AANews/mlive, “Eastern, other universities call for more state aid.” Not exactly a surprise that state universities would like more aid though, is it?

I know that the EMU-AAUP sent around in email the speech that Howard Bunsis (who is now the treasurer of the union but who still does a lot of speaking for it) delivered at this hearing. I hope they post it to their web site so I can link to it here.

UPDATE:
Howard Bunsis emailed me the link to his presentation. It’s at http://www.emu-aaup.org/node/372

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Posted in Administrator Life, Budgets, EMU President, EMU-AAUP, In the media...

You think YOU have got parking problems….

Posted on February 27, 2009 by | 1 Comment

From the Chronicle of Higher Education “blog” of sorts: “Kent State U. Dean Resigns After Police Say She Defaced a Parking Sign.”

When the dean of Kent State University’s Stark campus resigned abruptly last week, a press release issued by the university, in Canton, Ohio, said she was leaving for personal reasons.

But according to local news reports, the dean, Betsy V. Boze, actually resigned after a police report identified her as the vandal who earlier last week used a can of spray paint to alter a parking sign at nearby Stark State College. No charges have been filed in the case.

This article and a related one linked to in the CHE piece from a Canton newspaper say that Boze’s excuse was that she was merely “correcting” a sign, and the Canton paper has a picture of the sign in question.

This probably isn’t the best way of handling parking problems of course, but I can actually sympathize with ex-dean Boze a bit. I have more than once been tempted to erect some sort of homemade sign at the entrance of the Pray-Harrold parking lot to remind would-be student parkers that this was a faculty/staff lot during the day. So obviously, it was a stupid move on Boze’s part, but I at least admire her follow-through.

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Posted in Administrator Life, College Fun, In the media..., Parking

“Woman changes story,” Frat suspended, and sitedad on the road

Posted on February 24, 2009 by | 1 Comment

From Freep.com, “Woman changes story of EMU rape, but cops not done.” Basically, the victim of the rape at Kappa Phi Alpha is now saying “she ‘probably consented,’” which sounds to me like a young person still not completely sure what happened. In the mean-time, the fraternity (which, as others have talked about here, is not exactly like a “real frat” like the others on campus) has been suspended in some fashion.

By the way, the sitedad is operating EMUTalk.org from an undisclosed and remote location during this holiday break, at a very nice hotel with somewhat sketchy internet access and on a family trip. Updates and approvals will be somewhat infrequent until Sunday.

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Posted in In the media..., Security and Safety, Student Life, Ypsilanti

In other news…

Posted on February 22, 2009 by | 5 Comments

While linking to the article about the rape at the Kappa Omega Alpha house, I came across a couple of other articles that connect to some previous posts/news-bits here at EMUTalk.org. First, there is the front page story in today’s AANews, “Officials say proposed acquisition of country club by Washtenaw Community College tempting, but doubts remain.” Here’s an example:

Michigan already has more public golf courses than any other state in the nation.

“It’s the operating costs we’re concerned about at this point,” said WCC President Larry Whitworth. “And we certainly have a responsibility if we do take it over that we maintain this as an important community asset. Can we do that? That’s what we’re trying to determine. And, can this break even?”

Judging by other golf courses, that will be hard to do. Last year, Eastern Michigan University, which owns the Eagle Crest Conference Center and Golf Course in the Ypsilanti area, hired new managers. After years of losing money, the facility earned a net income of $94,875 last fiscal year.

And then there is this less than brilliant comment: “[Richard] Landau, the trustee leaning in favor of the deal, said the college runs lots of programs and services that don’t break even, citing the campus library as an example.” Yes, because a golf course is as essential to the mission of WCC as a library…. Knucklehead.

The other story that caught my eye is “Ave Maria law school gets Bar Association approval to move to Florida.” Apparently, courses are going to start in Florida this August, though not on campus yet since this is what the law school currently looks like:

Future home of....

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Posted in Ann Arbor, In the media..., Washtenaw Community College

Woman reports rape at EMU frat house

Posted on February 22, 2009 by | 17 Comments

From the AANews, “Woman reports rape at Eastern Michigan University fraternity house.” The commentary on the mlive.com site is kind of interesting. Among other things, this event is used by one writer as an example of why Ypsilanti is so “ghetto” (as if rape and/or sexual assault never ever happens over at U of M or something); about the Greek system at EMU; about the “he said/she said” nature of the crime; etc.

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Posted in In the media..., Security and Safety, Student Life, Ypsilanti

VOICE: Advocacy in Action Conference Announcement

Posted on February 21, 2009 by | 3 Comments

Kayla, a fine EMU student and regular EMUTalk.org reader/contributor, sent me an email the other day about a conference she’s organizing. It seems like a quite worthy event to me, so here it is:

Do you have a VOICE? Do you want to use it?

The VOICE: Advocacy in Action Conference will talk about what it means to be a student advocate or activist here at EMU and beyond, how to become an advocate or activist, and more!
All workshops will be lead by YOUR peers, for YOU.

Founder of Students for a Democratic Society, Alan Haber, will be speaking!

Registration is from 3:15 – 4p, and is accompanied by a tabling event showcasing advocacy & activism organizations around EMU and the Ypsilanti community.

The Conference runs from 4p – 9p, and includes 3 workshops & dinner.

There will also be service & leadership opportunities after the conference. Ask how to to become more involved!

Cost? FREE!
Date? Saturday, March 14, 2009
Time? 3:15 – 9 pm

To sign up for the conference, follow the link!
http://tinyurl.com/VOICEconference

For more info, email us at voice.emu@gmail.com.
Or stop by the VISION office in the Student Center and ask for Kayla.

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Posted in College Fun, Student Life

“Michigan schools spared from cuts” (in theory)

Posted on February 19, 2009 by | Leave a comment

An alert EMUTalk.org reader sent me a link this morning to an article that could be an intriguing twist to the budgetary soap operas in higher ed in Michigan: from The Detroit News, Michigan schools spared from cuts: Federal stimulus rules prevent state from slashing funds for colleges, public schools. The opening paragraphs:

Michigan can’t slash aid to public schools and universities, as proposed in Gov. Jennifer Granholm’s budget plan for next year, because federal stimulus package rules won’t allow it, lawmakers were told Wednesday.

Gary Olson, director of the Senate Fiscal Agency, said the legislation adopted by Congress and signed this week by President Barack Obama stipulates that funding for schools and colleges must be kept whole to be eligible for federal recovery money.

That means the 3.2 percent reduction in state spending for the 15 public universities and the $59-per-pupil reduction in public school aid proposed by Granholm for the budget year that begins Oct. 1 can’t happen, Olson said.

Now, before we start popping the champagne corks, it seems that the governor’s office has a potentially different interpretation of the law.

Liz Boyd, spokeswoman for Granholm, said “it is not our interpretation” that federal recovery rules won’t allow the higher ed and per-pupil cuts. But her comments indicate only shades of semantic difference.

“The federal economic recovery money is separate from the budget,” she said. “We can make the budget decisions we need to make to balance our budget going forward, but certainly we will use the stimulus dollars to make them whole. We’re talking about making them whole, not restoring cuts.”

Plus there might be some kind of deal where EMU’s budget (and the other state supported universities) isn’t cut from the state on the condition that EMU doesn’t raise tuition, which could in itself represent a bit of a budget cut because of lost revenue. Or it could actually represent a bit of a budget increase because more students will be able to afford to enroll. Who the heck knows.

In short, this ain’t over by a long-shot.

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Posted in Budgets, In the media..., The Market Crash of 2008

A sign of the times?

Posted on February 18, 2009 by | 31 Comments


Just the other day, I saw this sign on each of the entrance doors of Pray-Harrold Hall. The rather direct warning seemed to have the intended impact: all the smokers were dutifully away from the building. Of course, it’s easier to obey a “no smoking near the building” warning when it is sunny and (for February) on the warm-side of things, but still….

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Posted in Buildings and Grounds

“EMU Becomes First Non-HBCU University To Have 6 Minority Leaders”

Posted on February 17, 2009 by | Leave a comment

Once again, that pesky day job has taken me away from various blogging activities lately. Anyway, this came to me via a press release from the Franco Public Relations Group, which (I think?) represents athletics at EMU. As the sentence summary of the release puts it, “Eastern Michigan University is the first NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision athletic department to be led by six African American men and women.”

The whole press release is below the “Read More” part.
Continue reading →

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Posted in Blogosphere, In the media..., Sports

Budgets as a confusing moving target

Posted on February 16, 2009 by | Leave a comment

I didn’t have a chance to write a post over the weekend, but President Susan Martin sent around the email I include below about the prospect of fairly severe budget cuts for 2010. Martin’s email was mostly a cheer-leading effort to buck up the troops, including a reference to her one-room schooling with a school teacher who graduated from what was EMU, the Michigan Normal School.

I appreciate Martin’s efforts, and I also appreciate what appears to be a comparatively open process. Budgets were never this openly discussed prior to John Fallon’s presidency, who tried to open things up but bungled that process a bit. But it’s awfully hard to really know what the cuts are going to be.

Martin suggests up to $12 million, but that assumes that EMU really won’t raise tuition, which seems ridiculous to me. I was at a meeting last week about Pray-Harrold that included actual suits from Welch Hall (more about that tomorrow or so) in which the deficit was described as being more like $3 million. And besides, the governor’s budget still has to be approved by the state and we aren’t quite sure what the impact of the federal stimulus is going to be.

So I predict a budget cut between $12 million and $0.

It’d be nice if this were to settle into place though….
Continue reading →

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Posted in Administrator Life, Budgets, EMU President, The Market Crash of 2008