SACRAMENTO, California, USA - The idea is simple, perhaps too simple.
Disband the California State University system and set the 23 campuses that make it up, free.
Let's say it again: Disband the California State University system and set the 23 campuses that make it up free.
At this point the question probably being asked is: Are you nuts?
No.
But the State of California - more specifically the state Legislature, the CSU administration and CSU Board of Trustees- clearly are nuts if they believe the current arrangement is acceptable to anyone (except perhaps them...).
There have been so many egregious things happen because of the hapless (and occasionally malevolent) central administration of the CSU (the Chancellor's Office and the Trustees) they are hard to even catalog.
No need here to rehash the Common Management System, the subject of a blistering report by the California State Auditor a few years ago. Or recently, the CSU's stated position that it will not put any limits on lodging costs for any of its world-traveling (and well-paid) executives. (This while student fees soar, enrollments are cut, faculty are taking pay reductions - and teaching more students in their classes.)
The Chancellor's Office needs to be shutdown, shuttered and perhaps its Long Beach building fumigated - or an exorcism performed - to banish the corruption, the bureaucratic thinking (and the anti-student & anti-faculty attitudes) to let ideas (and higher education) flourish again in the state.
Each of the 23 campuses should be set free to pursue their own destiny, freed from the bureaucracy of the central administration and the CSU Trustees.
What would that pursuit of destiny look like?
I don't know.
There are 23 campuses in 23 different geographic areas of the state with 23 different faculty, staff and students invested in the success of their campuses. And all 23 have spent years under the heel of an administration that treats all 23 campuses almost exactly the same, when they are clearly different.
And in that difference, in those 23 campuses filled with people who have a real stake in providing quality education (as opposed to simply protecting a bureaucracy) there are likely 23 models waiting to be revealed. Twenty-three!
It would be a beautiful thing to watch - and in which to participate.
But the idea is simple, perhaps too simple.
Showing posts with label CSU trustees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CSU trustees. Show all posts
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Friday, November 20, 2009
Sometimes it takes Jimmy Buffett to get things done
SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Writing inspiration for me comes from lots of different places. And for most of my adult life, I have been what pros in the writing bizz call a 'facile' writer.
The short definition is, if I want to write, I generally just starting banging away on the keyboard.
Just like this.
Generally.
But this fall, the writing hasn't been coming just like this much of the time. In fact, for the last two months, I thought I was afflicted by the dreaded writer's block, a syndrome most professional writers will tell you is, well, total crap. They also are the same writers who have never faced it.
Even though for months I have been outraged at the lunacy of ideologues like Glenn Beck, the lack of caring (and arrogance) of the people entrusted with running the two public university systems in California, and the seeming inability of Americans to have rational discourse, writing about these issues (and corollary matters) has seemed, well, sooooo daunting.
Daunting and frankly just plain old depressing.
Enter Jimmy Buffett.
Jimmy Buffett on stage
It wasn't actually Jimmy Buffett himself who got mixed up in my writing, it was a book by Buffett, A Salty Piece of Land, mailed to me by my nephew Tony Fitzgerald.
Tony had read the book, and while he admitted the prose wasn't exactly 'Homer,' he said it had certain style to it and that he thought I would enjoy it.
If it had been Homer, I doubt it would have been as effective.
The tale is about a cowboy/sailor from Wyoming who ends up in the tropics tending to the rebuilding of a lighthouse. That's about all I'll reveal today, because I am about halfway through reading the book and suspect that I will be recommending it later on in a longer review.
But even if I didn't read another page, A Salty Piece of Land, has helped me crack the formation of a writer's block.
While reading about the odyssey of Tully Mars (the main character), I suddenly envisioned myself writing about (and living in) sub-tropical Mexico - the very place Admiral Fox and I will be as soon as the fall semester at the university ends. And the thought of that writing - as opposed to spilling words about the idiocies of a Glenn Beck, for example - made my fingers positively twitch to get to a keyboard.
Is the writer's block gone? Will I never write again about loons like Glenn Beck or the trustees of the California State University system?
No to the first, and probably no to the second, too.
But thanks to Jimmy Buffett and Tully Mars, I think I understand what was blocking the words, and keeping the blood pressure up.
Get the lighthouse back on line Tully, please. I have things to write.
A Salty Piece of Land
The short definition is, if I want to write, I generally just starting banging away on the keyboard.
Just like this.
Generally.
But this fall, the writing hasn't been coming just like this much of the time. In fact, for the last two months, I thought I was afflicted by the dreaded writer's block, a syndrome most professional writers will tell you is, well, total crap. They also are the same writers who have never faced it.
Even though for months I have been outraged at the lunacy of ideologues like Glenn Beck, the lack of caring (and arrogance) of the people entrusted with running the two public university systems in California, and the seeming inability of Americans to have rational discourse, writing about these issues (and corollary matters) has seemed, well, sooooo daunting.
Daunting and frankly just plain old depressing.
Enter Jimmy Buffett.
Jimmy Buffett on stage
It wasn't actually Jimmy Buffett himself who got mixed up in my writing, it was a book by Buffett, A Salty Piece of Land, mailed to me by my nephew Tony Fitzgerald.
Tony had read the book, and while he admitted the prose wasn't exactly 'Homer,' he said it had certain style to it and that he thought I would enjoy it.
If it had been Homer, I doubt it would have been as effective.
The tale is about a cowboy/sailor from Wyoming who ends up in the tropics tending to the rebuilding of a lighthouse. That's about all I'll reveal today, because I am about halfway through reading the book and suspect that I will be recommending it later on in a longer review.
But even if I didn't read another page, A Salty Piece of Land, has helped me crack the formation of a writer's block.
While reading about the odyssey of Tully Mars (the main character), I suddenly envisioned myself writing about (and living in) sub-tropical Mexico - the very place Admiral Fox and I will be as soon as the fall semester at the university ends. And the thought of that writing - as opposed to spilling words about the idiocies of a Glenn Beck, for example - made my fingers positively twitch to get to a keyboard.
Is the writer's block gone? Will I never write again about loons like Glenn Beck or the trustees of the California State University system?
No to the first, and probably no to the second, too.
But thanks to Jimmy Buffett and Tully Mars, I think I understand what was blocking the words, and keeping the blood pressure up.
Get the lighthouse back on line Tully, please. I have things to write.
A Salty Piece of Land
Sunday, July 12, 2009
CSU faculty vote on pay cut proposal a lose-lose proposition
SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Members of the California Faculty Association will start voting Monday (July 13) on a proposal from the California State University Chancellor to take two-day per month furloughs, beginning with the fall semester.
The two-days-per-month furloughs have been suggested/recommended/demanded (pick your verb) by the chancellor as a way to lessen the impact of the $583.8 million budget cut Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) is saying the 23-campuses of the system must take this year. The $583.8 million represents the university system's share of the current state-budget meltdown with a savings of about $147 million if faculty agree to the furloughs.
And the idea of CSU faculty furlough falls ever-so-neatly in line with the governor's furloughs of state workers. The governor has ordered three furlough days per month for almost all state workers and would really like to implement a fourth as the legislature and he debate how to deal with the $27 billion state budget deficit.
In the CSU, perhaps the major problem is although the chancellor is calling his suggested/recommended/demanded furlough, a furlough, these furloughs will simply result in open-ended pay reductions of nearly 10 percent, with no guarantees about, well, anything, including how many years they might continue.
To date, the chancellor - and the trustees of the California State University - have declined to say if these proposed furloughs could result in a concomitant reduction in workload (which furloughs do for state workers who are given days off). And perhaps more disingenuously, the chancellor and trustees have also declined - some would say obstinately refused - to say what the effects of the furlough will likely be.
They will not say how many faculty jobs will be saved (if any), how many faculty might still be laid off, and how the furlough/pay cut will impact how many classes can be offered.
In California politics, as a general rule of thumb, if voters are unsure what a ballot measure means, they simply vote no.
And that is a highly likely outcome of the faculty vote on the chancellor's suggested/recommended/demanded furloughs, because he and the trustees have opted to keep whatever data they have amassed secret, sowing only confusion, anger, and more than a touch of resentment at all levels of faculty.
On campuses around the system, faculty are debating what the two-day-per-month furlough will mean if faculty vote to approve it.
Optimists spout that it is obvious that the chancellor will use the saved monies so he doesn't have to order faculty layoffs on campuses.
The less-optimistic think he will use the money to lessen the blow, but that there will still be a significant number of layoffs, perhaps gnawing almost into the ranks of tenured professors.
And the truly pessimistic wonder if the chancellor is using the budget problem as a wedge to get senior and junior faculty at each other's throats as they debate his vague furlough proposal. The truly pessimistic are also fearful that the chancellor doesn't really have any plan at all, but is throwing out the furlough proposal like a Hail Mary pass in a high school football game.
Hail Marys may be in order for everyone before this budget crisis is passed.
How easy it would have been for the chancellor and trustees to do the right thing here.
What right thing?
The right approach would have been to ask faculty to consider a pay reduction. A pay reduction, perhaps on a sliding scale, could help ensure that junior faculty could keep their teaching posts, that classes could be maintained, that the entire system could pull together to survive this latest crisis.
If faculty were voting on that question - with supporting data about what a yes vote would actually mean in numbers of jobs saved - CSU faculty could have an above-board discussion about the future of the institution.
And most senior faculty would probably suck it up and vote yes, even if reluctantly. (Who wants their salary reduced?)
Instead, faculty are confronted with a muddle of confusion, anger, and more than a touch of resentment as they begin voting in what looks like a lose-lose election.
Of course, the chancellor and trustees could unveil any grand plans they have this week (sooner rather than later) to help faculty in the decision-making process as they vote on the chancellor's proposal for a furlough/pay cut.
It's not too late to get back in the game Chancellor Reed, even if it is to throw a Hail Mary pass.
The two-days-per-month furloughs have been suggested/recommended/demanded (pick your verb) by the chancellor as a way to lessen the impact of the $583.8 million budget cut Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) is saying the 23-campuses of the system must take this year. The $583.8 million represents the university system's share of the current state-budget meltdown with a savings of about $147 million if faculty agree to the furloughs.
And the idea of CSU faculty furlough falls ever-so-neatly in line with the governor's furloughs of state workers. The governor has ordered three furlough days per month for almost all state workers and would really like to implement a fourth as the legislature and he debate how to deal with the $27 billion state budget deficit.
In the CSU, perhaps the major problem is although the chancellor is calling his suggested/recommended/demanded furlough, a furlough, these furloughs will simply result in open-ended pay reductions of nearly 10 percent, with no guarantees about, well, anything, including how many years they might continue.
To date, the chancellor - and the trustees of the California State University - have declined to say if these proposed furloughs could result in a concomitant reduction in workload (which furloughs do for state workers who are given days off). And perhaps more disingenuously, the chancellor and trustees have also declined - some would say obstinately refused - to say what the effects of the furlough will likely be.
They will not say how many faculty jobs will be saved (if any), how many faculty might still be laid off, and how the furlough/pay cut will impact how many classes can be offered.
In California politics, as a general rule of thumb, if voters are unsure what a ballot measure means, they simply vote no.
And that is a highly likely outcome of the faculty vote on the chancellor's suggested/recommended/demanded furloughs, because he and the trustees have opted to keep whatever data they have amassed secret, sowing only confusion, anger, and more than a touch of resentment at all levels of faculty.
On campuses around the system, faculty are debating what the two-day-per-month furlough will mean if faculty vote to approve it.
Optimists spout that it is obvious that the chancellor will use the saved monies so he doesn't have to order faculty layoffs on campuses.
The less-optimistic think he will use the money to lessen the blow, but that there will still be a significant number of layoffs, perhaps gnawing almost into the ranks of tenured professors.
And the truly pessimistic wonder if the chancellor is using the budget problem as a wedge to get senior and junior faculty at each other's throats as they debate his vague furlough proposal. The truly pessimistic are also fearful that the chancellor doesn't really have any plan at all, but is throwing out the furlough proposal like a Hail Mary pass in a high school football game.
Hail Marys may be in order for everyone before this budget crisis is passed.
How easy it would have been for the chancellor and trustees to do the right thing here.
What right thing?
The right approach would have been to ask faculty to consider a pay reduction. A pay reduction, perhaps on a sliding scale, could help ensure that junior faculty could keep their teaching posts, that classes could be maintained, that the entire system could pull together to survive this latest crisis.
If faculty were voting on that question - with supporting data about what a yes vote would actually mean in numbers of jobs saved - CSU faculty could have an above-board discussion about the future of the institution.
And most senior faculty would probably suck it up and vote yes, even if reluctantly. (Who wants their salary reduced?)
Instead, faculty are confronted with a muddle of confusion, anger, and more than a touch of resentment as they begin voting in what looks like a lose-lose election.
Of course, the chancellor and trustees could unveil any grand plans they have this week (sooner rather than later) to help faculty in the decision-making process as they vote on the chancellor's proposal for a furlough/pay cut.
It's not too late to get back in the game Chancellor Reed, even if it is to throw a Hail Mary pass.
Saturday, July 04, 2009
A lot of questions about university furloughs
SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - The downward spiral of the finances of the state of California have come to the California State University in the form of a $583.8 million cut to the overall 23- campus system budget for the coming year.
After years of cutting the budgets of these 23 campuses over and over, this one has pushed the university administration to jump on the furlough bandwagon, made popular by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) as he struggles with a struggling state legislature and a whopping $26 billion state budget problem.
Schwarzenegger just added a third monthly furlough day for state workers, giving them an effective 15-percent pay cut in total.
In the CSU, a sketchy proposal has been floated by the central administration for two furlough days per month - about a 10.78 pay cut for all CSU employees. But because the CSU has binding agreements with the three unions representing the employees, each unit must vote to accept the furlough idea.
Two unions have voted to accept the idea of tw0-day per month furloughs, but the faculty - and its bargaining unit The California Faculty Association - have questions. A lot of questions.
The furlough proposal would reduce the proposed deficit, but leave as much as $309 million yet to be cut. That's $309 million out of a $583.8 reduction in funds. And at this point, Chancellor Charles Reed and the CSU Trustees are not saying how they would cut the budget sufficiently to cover this $309 million. In fact, through spokesmen, they have given the definite impression they haven't pondered it fully yet.
Uh-oh...
And when faculty have asked if agreeing to the furloughs would guarantee there would be no faculty layoffs - just for this academic year - the response has been that the administration won't guarantee anything.
Uh-oh, redux...
With $309 million not accounted for, it's easy to see why the administration wants to keep its options open. This total $583.8 million cut is unprecedented and will likely damage the university system in ways hard to imagine.
Still, before faculty vote to voluntarily reduce their salaries, the CSU Trustees should come clean about how they are planning to deal with the balance of the $309 million budget reduction.
If it is layoffs - in addition to the furloughs - the trustees need to say so. And they should be honest and put some numbers with the announcement.
If it is massive student fee hikes (30-percent fee hikes and higher are reportedly under discussion), those numbers should announced sooner rather than later.
And if the CSU Trustees and administration are planning both? Well, school starts in just seven weeks.
After years of cutting the budgets of these 23 campuses over and over, this one has pushed the university administration to jump on the furlough bandwagon, made popular by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) as he struggles with a struggling state legislature and a whopping $26 billion state budget problem.
Schwarzenegger just added a third monthly furlough day for state workers, giving them an effective 15-percent pay cut in total.
In the CSU, a sketchy proposal has been floated by the central administration for two furlough days per month - about a 10.78 pay cut for all CSU employees. But because the CSU has binding agreements with the three unions representing the employees, each unit must vote to accept the furlough idea.
Two unions have voted to accept the idea of tw0-day per month furloughs, but the faculty - and its bargaining unit The California Faculty Association - have questions. A lot of questions.
The furlough proposal would reduce the proposed deficit, but leave as much as $309 million yet to be cut. That's $309 million out of a $583.8 reduction in funds. And at this point, Chancellor Charles Reed and the CSU Trustees are not saying how they would cut the budget sufficiently to cover this $309 million. In fact, through spokesmen, they have given the definite impression they haven't pondered it fully yet.
Uh-oh...
And when faculty have asked if agreeing to the furloughs would guarantee there would be no faculty layoffs - just for this academic year - the response has been that the administration won't guarantee anything.
Uh-oh, redux...
With $309 million not accounted for, it's easy to see why the administration wants to keep its options open. This total $583.8 million cut is unprecedented and will likely damage the university system in ways hard to imagine.
Still, before faculty vote to voluntarily reduce their salaries, the CSU Trustees should come clean about how they are planning to deal with the balance of the $309 million budget reduction.
If it is layoffs - in addition to the furloughs - the trustees need to say so. And they should be honest and put some numbers with the announcement.
If it is massive student fee hikes (30-percent fee hikes and higher are reportedly under discussion), those numbers should announced sooner rather than later.
And if the CSU Trustees and administration are planning both? Well, school starts in just seven weeks.
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