UO Matters

Change in Information Services leadership

2012-02-01T16:27:00.000-08:00

2/1/2012: Change in Information Services leadership

Following much consultation and deliberation, I have decided to make a change in leadership in the University of Oregon’s Information Services (IS) operation. Effective February 1, Susan Hilton and Tony Saxman will assume the roles of co-senior directors for the unit on an interim basis while we conduct a national search for a new Chief Information Officer.

Information Services is comprised of Enterprise Initiatives, Enterprise Administrative Applications, Academic Services, Network and Telecommunication Services, the Advanced Network Technology Center, Systems and Operations, and the management of NERO (Network for Education and Research in Oregon). Tony and Susan will assume the shared responsibility of broader leadership of the entire operation of Information Services while continuing their specific oversight of Enterprise Initiatives, Network and Telecommunication Services and the Enterprise Administrative Applications team respectively. The two have extensive experience running information technology operations and together will build on the recent successes of the Information Services unit.

Don Harris will transition from his role as Chief Information Officer and will be responsible for special projects in the Office of the Provost for the next year.

Please join me in thanking Don for his service and welcoming Susan and Tony into their new interim roles.

Lorraine Davis
Senior Vice President and Provost

Search Committee announced

2012-02-01T12:07:00.000-08:00

Dear UO Community,

Following is an announcement about the presidential search committee that will be released to the media later today. I wanted to share the information with you first.

George Pernsteiner
Chancellor, Oregon University System
---------------------------------------------
News Release
February 1, 2012

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Di Saunders, Office: 503-725-5714; Cell: 971-219-6869

Chancellor Announces Search Committee for University of Oregon President

PORTLAND, February 1, 2012 – George Pernsteiner, chancellor of the Oregon University System (OUS), today announced the Search Committee for the next president of the University of Oregon (UO). The new president will replace interim president Robert Berdahl, who began in this role in late December.

The Search Committee will be chaired by State Board of Higher Education member Allyn Ford of Roseburg, and he will be assisted by Dr. Sona Karentz Andrews, vice chancellor of Academic Strategies for the OUS, and Tim Black, UO assistant vice president, Office of the President.

Search Committee members will include the following representatives from UO's many constituent groups, including:

[edited by group]

students

Miriam Abelson, UO graduate student in Women's and Gender Studies;
Maneesh Arora, UO undergraduate student in Environmental Studies;
Ben Eckstein, undergraduate student in Planning and Public Policy Management, and president of Associated Students of the UO;

staff

Miriam Bolton, UO executive assistant, Lundquist College of Business;
Eric Clark, UO libraries' student coordinator and assistant to unit manager;

admin

Frances Bronet, UO dean, School of Architecture & Allied Arts;
Robin Holmes, UO vice president for Student Affairs;

outside

Allyn Ford, search chair, and president of Roseburg Forest Products;
Dan Giustina, managing partner, Giustina Resources;
Gregg Kantor, CEO, Northwest Natural Gas Company;
Anne Marie Levis, president, UO Alumni Association, and president & creative director, Funk/Levis & Associates;
Ed Maletis, UO Foundation member;
Gwen Lillis, chair, The Lillis Foundation;
Preston Pulliams, president, Portland Community College;
Mary Spilde, president, Lane Community College.

faculty

Michael Hames-Garcia, UO professor of Ethnic Studies;
Robert Kyr, Phillip H. Knight professor, UO School of Music and Dance;
Alec Murphy, UO professor of Geography;
Margie Paris, UO professor of Law;
Geraldine Richmond, UO professor of Chemistry;
Kim Sheehan, professor of Journalism;

The Committee will begin its search process for a new president immediately, working with a national search firm which was selected through an open RFP process. Search chair Allyn Ford noted that the target for the selection of the new president of UO by the State Board of Higher Education is this summer. The chancellor and Allyn Ford are continuing to meet with members of the UO community, faculty, and students to identify the qualities, qualifications and characteristics needed in the next president.

Allyn Ford said, "My thanks go out to this Committee, which is representative of the many strengths and perspectives of the UO community, as well as those of the state of Oregon. We appreciate the Committee's willingness to work collectively on this critically important work. We are excited about beginning the search process, and are committed to moving through an accelerated schedule, but one that does not compromise quality, so that we can have the University’s next president appointed this summer and ready to lead the institution this coming fall. The University of Oregon’s next president will be both an institutional and a state leader in higher education, so the work of identifying candidates is one that has important ramifications for all of Oregon."

Berdahl v. Pernsteiner, Friday Feb. 3, City Club

2012-02-01T10:13:00.000-08:00

2/1/2012: OUS Board Chair Matt Donegan is still cut up from the Portland fight, and for all his bravado he apparently hasn't shown his face in Eugene since the meeting where he and Allyn Ford told Lariviere the board had decided to fire him. So Donegan has sent us a washed-up lightweight to take his punches for him. This should be fascinating:

This Friday, February 3rd, the City Club of Eugene will host a debate on the future of higher education governance in Oregon, with Chancellor George Pernsteiner and Acting UO President Robert Berdahl. At the Eugene Hilton at 11:45.

Following the presentations, there will be an opportunity for questions from the audience. Robert Kyr, president of the UO Faculty Senate, will ask one of the first questions. Andrew Rogers, ASUO Communications Director, will ask the other.

This will also be broadcast on KLCC on Monday evening, Feb 6.

More info: http://cityclubofeugene.org/component/content/article/34/307-program-2012-02-03.html

The Eugene City Club hosts many interesting talks and is a strong part of Eugene's civic life. They want more UO faculty members, so do what you can to make this event.

The smart money is on Berdahl - but then the smart money was on Lariviere. Pernsteiner's a sneaky bastard, with lots of student tuition money and state perks to dole out to his entourage of suck-ups.

GEC's Ron Bersin rejects OUS board complaint

2012-02-01T09:06:00.000-08:00

2/1/2012: From the RG:

An attempt by a University of Oregon faculty member to pursue an ethics complaint over the firing of former UO President Richard Lariviere has hit a dead end.

The complaint was rejected by the director of the Oregon Government Ethics Commission in late December.

... Bersin said the ethics commission has only very narrow jurisdiction in such matters and can act only on actions that are taken during a formally convened executive session. The board did the informal poll prior to any meeting and therefore it was outside the commission’s purview, he said.

You'd think Ron Bersin, the Director of the Government Ethics Board, would be a little more curious about government ethics. But he's a political appointee, so he never even bothered to request the OUS board emails. Let's do a bit more dredging:

Hi Mr. Bersin -

This is a public records request for all public records involving

a) communications between the GEC and Oregon DOJ employees involving the ethics complaint below.

b) all communications between the GEC and OUS employees involving the ethics complaint below.

I ask for a fee waiver, on the grounds of public interest.

Pernsteiner still can't form search committee

2012-01-31T17:21:00.000-08:00

1/31/2012: It's more than 2 months since the OUS board fired Richard Lariviere. Board Chair Matt Donegan told us repeatedly at the Portland meeting that he was confident the board could find a qualified replacement quickly. But Chancellor George Pernsteiner still has not even been able to assemble a search committee. (Though he has hired Kim Morrison and the search firm "Diversified Search".) We've been hearing for 3 weeks now that the committee announcement would be made within a few days. Tomorrow?

UO faculty take control of athletics

2012-01-31T08:07:00.000-08:00

From the UO archives, 18 September 1895:

My OCR chokes on this, but it appoints a committee of 2 profs and 1 student and says

"All proceedings of the Athletics Club concerning Intercollegiate games must have the approval of this committee. This shall in no way interfere with the paramount authority of the Faculty. ..."

Back in 1895 the Ducks were leaders when it came to faculty governance of athletics. I'm no history professor, but Teddy Roosevelt didn't found the NCAA until 1906, motivated in part by public outrage over what would now be called repeated MTBI, in part because he figured it would give Harvard an edge over the public universities with recruiting. Since then, there's been a certain amount of slippage here at UO, and nationwide. Harvard, however, is still embarrassing itself over sports. So is Yale. So is UO. Some things never change.

As for the NCAA and UO's place in it, read the latest from NYT columnist Joe Nocera on what he calls the "moral bankruptcy" of the NCAA. UO Faculty Athletics Representative and former law professor Jim O'Fallon sits on their infractions committee. What was his role in this decision? Good question - but good luck trying to get our Faculty Athletics Representative to actually communicate with mere faculty. We do have to pay his salary and expenses from academic funds, however.

Faculty union quotes

2012-01-30T21:46:00.000-08:00

1/31/2012: Sam Stites of the ODE has a good story with quotes from several pro-union faculty:

“We’re hoping to have the card-check done by the end of the term,” said Deborah Olson, union representative and special education instructor. “We’re actually shooting for a higher number. We want more than 50 percent plus one so we have a real clear statement that this is something that the faculty wants.”

“It would provide clarity and an opportunity for the next generation in how to find excellence in the face of the challenges that face state universities,” University professor Louise Bishop said.

“I believe that most faculty are pretty enthusiastic, and I think that they see a real need so it has a good chance,” said Scott Pratt, union representative and philosophy professor. ... He says that a union will allow the faculty to have a larger stake in making decisions, setting budgets and other fiscal and administrative issues that the University faces.

It is not going to be all gravy though. Unions do some ridiculous things.

Think Out Loud on faculty union tuesday, 9:45

2012-01-30T08:34:00.000-08:00

1/31/2012 The website is hard to figure out, no indication who is speaking, but it looks like it will be live at 9:45 today, and you can submit questions here: http://www.opb.org/thinkoutloud/shows/unionizing-university-oregon/ and listen here: http://www.opb.org/listen

Independent board this year is a longshot

2012-01-30T07:48:00.000-08:00

1/30/2012: None of the competing bills get even a mention in this Bill Graves story on the likely legislative agenda. Session starts Wed. Bills must be out of committee in 2 weeks.

Professor who leaked emails to admin quits senate

2012-01-30T07:32:00.000-08:00

1/30/2012: Courtesy of Insidehighered.com, story here:

A Springfield professor who shared emails from other faculty leaders with the University of Illinois president's chief of staff has resigned from the campus senate amid a vote of no confidence by her peers.

Tih-Fen Ting, professor in environmental studies on the Springfield campus, resigned as chairwoman of the University of Illinois at Springfield campus senate on Friday. She also resigned from the University Senates Conference, a cross-campus committee of faculty leaders.

The UIS campus senate has no confidence in her leadership and "condemns her unethical and unprofessional conduct both prior to and during the anonymous email investigation," the resolution stated. Ting's actions violated shared-governance principles and diminished the standing of the campus senate and the influence of the campus within the University Senates Conference, according to the resolution.

Earlier this month, an investigation revealed that Ting sent dozens of emails to Lisa Troyer, UI President Michael Hogan's former chief of staff. Those emails, from an anonymous gmail account, contained various communications and forwarded emails from members of the University Senates Conference. Troyer later resigned amid the investigation into anonymous emails sent from a Yahoo account from her computer to the senates conference.

IU president Hogan's apology is here.

Faculty union, faculty governance, new Constitution

2012-01-29T15:24:00.000-08:00

1/29/2012: Many people are wondering if a faculty union would strengthen or weaken existing faculty governance. For example, could the union write the new UO Constitution into a contract and then have legal recourse if our administration walked all over it? What about the Policy on Policies? One of the union organizers forwards some info that might help people make up their minds on this:

I found two contracts that illustrate how a union contract can reinforce faculty governance. The first is in the current University of Delaware contract that can be found at http://www.udel.edu/aaup/cba.html, article XVII. Our situation is a little different because we have a constitution that could be specifically endorsed. The Portland State contract has a better example of wording since they are also governed by OARs and have a constitution. They have just signed a tentative agreement on a new contract and it still needs to come to a vote of the members, so the contract through 2011 is current and can be found at http://www.psuaaup.net/resources.html.

The second link has a lot of info on the PSU AAUP union. I haven't read the contracts, comments on the substance welcome.

RG's Greg Bolt on faculty union

2012-01-28T20:33:00.000-08:00

1/29/2012: Story here, not much new:

“We support a worker’s right to organize,” UO spokesman Phil Weiler said. “Our involvement is we just want to make sure we’re providing everybody with factual information so they can make informed decisions, but beyond that we support their right to organize if they think that’s the right thing to do.”

Sure you do. Here's a link to a 2010 post on Johnson Hall secretly hiring a labor consulting firm to deal with the union:

The official line is that the $300 an hour consulting fee was not for advice on how to "oppose the union" - that would be illegal under Oregon law - instead it was for help "conveying relevant and factually accurate information" to the UO faculty. Which explains why the administration tried to keep the contract secret, to the point of including a nonstandard confidentiality clause preventing McKnight from even disclosing the existence of a contract:

Because you don't want to give the faculty factually accurate information about who is giving the faculty factually accurate information. The contract was limited to $25,000 because OUS rules require a public posting on the OUS procurement website for contracts more than that. Clever. Too clever. Dumb.

More NCAA transparency from Randy Geller

2012-01-28T15:14:00.000-08:00

December's entire bill is $15,441.41. I'm no art history professor, but I think this page has the most aesthetically appealing redactions, though page 2 has a certain stark symmetry.

Per the agreement between UO's general counsel Randy Geller and CFO Jamie Moffitt, the academic side is on the hook for half the total for Mike Glazier's cleanup of the Willie Lyles scandal - now $100,527.44. You'd think this would mean we'd be allowed to read at least half the words in his invoice.

When Chip Kelly does good, he gets a cut of the Autzen gate and a bonus. When he does bad, the academic side pays. Now that Moffitt is CFO for the entire UO, instead of just the AD, do you think she'll start looking out for the academic side? Get with the transparency program? I'm skeptical. But maybe Kelly will send the faculty and students a nice thank you letter for paying his legal bills, like the one he sent Lyles:

PS - Thanks to bojack.org for his link to this.

Science start-up debacle

2012-01-28T12:27:00.000-08:00

1/28/2012: From an anonymous commenter:

Having squandered millions in excessive administrative budget increases, remodeling their offices, golden parachutes, and other brilliant ideas, Johnson Hall’s solution for science startups is to spend against reserves in the humanities and social sciences. Despite having the least funding per student on campus, these programs and the college in which they reside have exercised the financial discipline and responsibility so lacking centrally, and so they have slowly accumulated substantial reserves over the last decade. These are funds they or their college on their behalf, could spend to support the humanities and social sciences.

Instead, Johnson Hall is expropriating the reserves by forcing CAS to use them for science startups without any provision for even partial repayment from the Research office. Repayment could be done slowly by promising a small share of future overhead, but ‘no, we’re in charge,’ said our czars. The longstanding ‘covenant’ with the research office has been that they receive and allocate all grant overhead. In return they assume primary responsibility for startup packages for hires anticipated to receive substantial grants. Having broken that covenant, they now demand that the humanities and social sciences, the least well-funded programs per student on campus to fix their failures.

Were did the money go? Athletics, in part. Jim Bean made the call to spend $1.8 million a year of general funds on the Jock Box tutoring operation. And he's so proud of that he wrote an Op-Ed for the Oregonian about it. Clueless.

Jim will be back

2012-01-27T23:09:00.000-08:00

1/28/2012: Berdahl should have announced he was giving Bean an interim appointment ending June 2013. This would satisfy the immediate need for a body to fill out the provost's suit. It would also leave the deck clear for the next president to do an open search. But no:

Colleagues:

The time line for transitions in the Provost office has been determined. Jim Bean will return as Senior Vice President and Provost beginning July 1, 2012. He will continue his sabbatical through May 31, 2012, and then serve in a transitional capacity during the month of June. This will permit appropriate planning and coordination with me, the Executive Leadership Team, and Bob Berdahl as well as an overlap period with the current and soon-to-be-appointed Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs.

As the presidential search gets underway, it will be helpful to know who will serve as Provost on an ongoing basis. I look forward to continuing in my current acting leadership role through the end of this academic and fiscal year. I appreciate the continuing support and assistance I have experienced.

Lorraine

We're all on a first name basis here, so who needs a job announcement, search, or a performance review? That sort of stuff is just for those faculty schlubs - the ones that Jim gets to evaluate and sign off on tenure and promotions, as provost. The month long overlap with Lorraine is so Jim can recover from his research efforts with old friends and get back up to speed on administrative matters.

FWIW, Pat, the OUS internal auditor, sent out this earlier this week, on her investigation of Jim's sabbatical terms:

FYI.. update
We hope to complete the review this week.

Oregon University System
Internal Audit Division

     Patricia A. Snopkowski, Chief Auditor
     P.O. Box 488
     Corvallis, OR 97339
     Ph (541) 737-0505 Fax (541)737-9133
     Web- http://www.ous.edu/dept/intaudit
     Email- patricia_snopkowski@ous.edu

Nothing yet.

A faculty union will solve all UO's problems

2012-01-27T22:52:00.000-08:00

1/27/2012: Or maybe not. Reality check from Rutgers

Who’s right and who’s wrong? The bottom line is that it doesn’t matter, since the administration has lost the trust of its own professors, who routinely perceive it as incompetent, venal and corrupt. As Eaton and her colleagues put it, “The administration has violated our trust and we have lost confidence in its ability to properly manage university resources.”

Sound familiar? There's a sports problem too, of course.

Meanwhile, outside our ivory tower,

2012-01-27T10:55:00.000-08:00

1/27/2012: things are *really* going to hell. From Susan Palmer in the RG:

The Springfield district also had a slight increase in the four-year graduation rate, up a point to 62 percent, even as one of its schools, Springfield High, saw its rate drop by almost 6 points. ... The Bethel School District in west Eugene saw its overall graduation rate decline this year, to 57 percent from 62 percent.

And from an op-ed in the NYT:

Only 7 of 10 ninth graders today will get high school diplomas. A decade after the No Child Left Behind law mandated efforts to reduce the racial gap, about 80 percent of white and Asian students graduate from high school, compared with only 55 percent of blacks and Hispanics. ...

If we could reduce the current number of dropouts by just half, we would yield almost 700,000 new graduates a year, and it would more than pay for itself. Studies show that the typical high school graduate will obtain higher employment and earnings — an astonishing 50 percent to 100 percent increase in lifetime income — and will be less likely to draw on public money for health care and welfare and less likely to be involved in the criminal justice system. Further, because of the increased income, the typical graduate will contribute more in tax revenues over his lifetime than if he’d dropped out.

When the costs of investment to produce a new graduate are taken into account, there is a return of $1.45 to $3.55 for every dollar of investment, depending upon the educational intervention strategy. Under this estimate, each new graduate confers a net benefit to taxpayers of about $127,000 over the graduate’s lifetime.

As a self-interested professor, I'm all for more public investment in higher education. But the highest social return may well come from much earlier investments. And of course these students are not going to enroll at UO if they don't graduate from HS. Here's info on SAIL, a program run by volunteer UO professors, aimed at addressing this issue.

Moffitt erases Frances Dyke from org chart

2012-01-27T09:25:00.000-08:00

1/27/2012: Apparently she's still on the payroll though - as a special assistant to interim Provost Lorraine Davis. Sure is fun spending other people's money on your friends.

Shades of John Moseley. I don't envy Moffitt having to do the performance evaluations on the rest of her crew. Lots of good people - but also cases who will presumably also soon be bought off with fat golden parachutes, filled with tuition money that should have gone to support research and teaching.

Phil Knight's opinion of independent university trustees that cross "his hero".

2012-01-26T21:13:00.000-08:00

1/26/2012: Pretty chilling to watch:

<a href='http://msn.foxsports.com/video?videoid=a4f05d91-a347-4968-93eb-60b3c15e5069&src=v5:embed::' target='_new' title='Nike's Knight rips PSU Trustees' >Video: Nike's Knight rips PSU Trustees</a>

Berdahl and Geller claim President controls faculty authority:

2012-01-26T14:20:00.000-08:00

Update: Geller's quotes come from here: http://ous.edu/state_board/polipro Check out the board policies and IMD pdf's - for example athletics. There are all kinds of things UO and OUS pay no attention to in practice. Except when it's convenient for them to use them against the faculty.

1/26/2012: This will get the union a bunch more cards. An email from interim President Berdahl today, apparently written with the help of Randy Geller, asserts he has the power to "define the scope of faculty authority" down to what Senate committees can do:

... as summarized below from information provided by the Office the General Counsel, the President is assigned the power to define the scope of faculty authority, including the charges of senate councils and committees.

•           The University of Oregon Constitution must be consistent with Oregon Law and State Board of Higher Education policies and Internal Management Directives.

•           ORS 351.010 provides that the Oregon University System is conducted under the control of the State Board of Higher Education. Under ORS 351.070(4)(b), the Board has the authority to adopt rules and bylaws for the government of each institution under its control.

•           As outlined in ORS 352.004, the president of each state institution of higher education within the Oregon University System is also the president of the faculty and the executive and governing officer of the institution. Subject to the supervision of the State Board of Higher Education, the president of the institution has authority to control and give general directions to the practical affairs of the institution.

•           Board Policy 3.105(F)(7) authorizes each institution to formulate a statement of internal governance expressed as a constitution or in another appropriate format. "All statements of internal governance will be consistent with statutes governing the Oregon State Board of Higher Education, the Oregon University System, and any applicable Board rules, policies, or IMD."

•           Board Policy 3.105(F)(6) states that "the institution president is authorized to convene and preside over the faculty and to veto any decisions of the faculty or its representative bodies. The institution president will define the scope of faculty authority – including its councils, committees, and officers, subject to review by the Chancellor – except as provided in Board rule, policy, or IMD." ...

Regards,

Bob Berdahl

The faculty union organizers have argued that one reason to support a union is that it would be able to write faculty governance into the contract, establish a clear legal basis for it, and provide experienced lawyers to help the faculty regain the control it once had over university matters.

At the moment, we are utterly at the mercy of Randy Geller's peculiar interpretations of the law, and the benevolence of our president. No recourse. Geller works for Pernsteiner, and Pernsteiner picks our next president.

UO Police swearing in ceremony

2012-01-25T13:25:00.000-08:00

1/25/2012: Had a comment about this a few days ago:

DPS secretly swore in police officers last week and no one from the public was invited. Free lunch and beverages provided along with the rights to be a cop and arrest people. I heard it was mainly the administrators that were sworn in. So if it was administrators becoming full fledged sworn police then what about the officers?

Anyone know any more?

Dr. Pernsteiner speaks - but no Matt Donegan

2012-01-25T10:52:00.000-08:00

1/25/2012: It's taking George a while to find UO community members willing to serve on a committee with him. Wonder why. If you are faculty and haven't been contacted, you are probably not on the list. Pernsteiner and Ford will be here next month to explain themselves - Matt Donegan is clearly never going to set foot in Eugene again in public.

I wanted to update you on the search process for the University of Oregon president. Although we had hoped to be able to name the search committee by now, we do not yet have commitments from all the people we are contacting. We hope now to be able to finalize the membership late this week or early next. With the advice of Interim President Berdahl and a panel of faculty and students, we have chosen a consulting firm to assist in the search. We selected Diversified Search as the apparently successful proposer. This is the same company that recently assisted in two high level executive searches at the University. We are currently in the midst of the legally required period for other proposers to protest that selection. If no protest is lodged, Diversified can start work later next week.

We continue to expect to have a series of forums and meetings regarding the search process on February 8, including the University Senate meeting at 3:00 that afternoon.

Thank you.

George Pernsteiner
Chancellor, Oregon University System

New Budget Model revisited

2012-01-25T08:08:00.000-08:00

1/25/2012: Back in Feb 2010 - almost 2 years ago - I wrote the overly optimistic post below, about Brad Shelton's "New Budget Model". The idea was that money should follow students - except for a tax for central admin expenditures. At the time the tax rate for Johnson Hall was 28%. How's this working out?

Not so good. Read Shelton's web site here. The September 2011 tax rate had been raised to 35%. And it turns out even this is not enough to pay the $2 million in raises for administrators like Frances Dyke and de Kluyver, Jim Bean's beamer and 5 big pet ideas, Police, the $1.83 million Bean and Frances Dyke have had us paying for Jock Box tutoring, subsidized overheads rates for athletics, etc. Forget about legitimate basic central administration functions like IT support, research startup, accounting, classrooms, etc.

So, word down at the faculty club is that the central administration is now organizing another raid on the money that is supposed to support our academic mission. Either another tax increase, or possibly new CFO Jamie Moffitt will abandon the whole thing, and go back to budgeting a la Moseley. Comments welcome.

2/11/2010: Brad Shelton, UO's new VP for Budgeting, has been working on a new budget model for UO. This model will specify how UO's money is allocated to the schools and the administration. I think this budget model will do three important things.

First, it will provide some basic transparency about where our money comes from and where it goes. Many of the newly available public resources on UO expenditures derive from Shelton's need for the information to complete this process. Until he got involved, this information was deliberately hidden away from the faculty and even the colleges, and there was no prospect for open debate on UO spending priorities.

Second, the model will, for the first time, impose a hard budget constraint on the administration. In the past, when Frances Dyke and Linda Brady wanted to spend a few million remodeling Johnson Hall, or Frohnmayer wanted to give Moseley a fat retirement deal, or Moseley needed to spend a million on a new Diversity office quick to cover up a lawsuit, or Jim Bean wanted to give his friends a raise on the sly, they simply did it. Then they figured out later who to take the money from. Under the new model, the administration will get a cut of the gross, and they will have to live within it. How radical - education comes before administration.

Third, the model will make clear the extent to which student tuition money from CAS, Business and Journalism goes to support the other colleges and the such administrative adventures as Bend, Portland, Sustainability, OIED, and Bean's "big ideas". No comment on whether or not these are good ideas, but if they are good, why hide the numbers?

The basic plan is simple: Colleges will keep the tuition they collect, but pay a 28% tax to the administration for central services. The administration will also get the state allocations. (This seems odd - it would be more politic to allocate them to instruction.) The details are already getting ugly however. The biggest issue - after the tax rate - is what gets grandfathered in. The administration has been on a splurge for the past 5 years - does this go into their base? Similarly, some colleges are subsidized by others. In particular, CAS and to a lesser extent Business subsidize Law, Music, Bend and now Portland. According to some calculations CAS gives up $23 million to the other schools, Business give up $9 million, and Journalism also is in a hole. Are these arrangements going to continue, or will more money go to CAS? From what I hear the new model will lock in the current subsidies. But since new tuition money will be allocated to where the students are, over 5 or 10 years the percent going to administrative bloat, and the extent of the cross-subsidies, will gradually decrease.

Importantly, this model will be applied at the college level - not at the department level. But obviously it will make it easier to think about allocation issues between departments as well, and it's hard to imagine that won't have some impact before long

One critical part of this plan is improved financial transparency. As I said, developing this plan has required the preparation of much more information than has previously been available about UO expenditures, and Shelton has been great about making it public, along with Kelly Wolf, and Laura Hubbard. But once the system is in place, the games will begin. Administrators will try to put their pet projects onto the instructional side. So it will be important for the ongoing expenditures to be transparent too.

As it happens, because of a motion Nathan Tublitz got through the Senate last year, the UO Senate Financial Transparency Working Group is developing a solution to this now, in collaboration with UO Controller Kelly Wolf. Soon any UO employee will be able to access transaction level details from UO's accounting system, via a link on your duckweb page. So next time the administration decides to give one (or three) of their own $750,000 golden parachute buyouts, everyone will be able to see that the money comes from a fund that was established for retiring tenured teaching faculty. We still might not be able to do anything about it, but at least it will be common knowledge.

Bottom line, the administrators will keep their current loot. Music, Law and AAA will still be subsidized by CAS. But the sort of thing that Moseley is (still) doing with Bend will not happen again. And if UO continues to grow, over time more of the new tuition money will go to CAS for instructional purposes than has been true in the past.

VP for Academic Affairs candidates

2012-01-24T13:11:00.000-08:00

1/24/2012: Wow - they are actually asking for faculty opinions:

We present, for your consideration, Barbara Altmann and Doug Blandy as finalists for the position of Senior Vice Provost. We will be holding an open forum for each of the candidates during the week of January 30th. Presentation details, candidate application materials, and a feedback link can be accessed at: http://provost.uoregon.edu/finalist-for-the-senior-vice-provost-office-of-academic-affairs/. I encourage your engagement with each candidate at their respective forum.

Lorraine Davis
Acting Senior Vice President and Provost

Expect these to be ignored. Our administration already knows what is best for us.

Union Event at art center Today

2012-01-24T00:02:00.000-08:00

1/24/2012: The most common reason workers unionize is bad management. Johnson Hall is a case study of dysfunction, so guess what's happening? Word is that the union organizers already have more than 1/2 the signatures they need, and they are ending the quiet phase early:

An Invitation from the United Academics Organizing Committee

Join colleagues for the official LAUNCH of our union authorization card drive!

Tuesday, January 24^th

Papé Reception Hall, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art

12:30-3:30 – Drop by Anytime!

Coffee, tea and light refreshments provided

Organizing Committee members will be sharing the reasons they are involved in building United Academics and answering questions about the official certification process. Please come and share your questions and join the discussion.

An art museum with light refreshments. The last time I tried to join a union the boss waved his stainless 357 at us, and the oil company brought in the scabs from Texas. They gave a few of the troublemakers promotions, then fired the rest of us. The Cody Wyoming cops sat around the landing zone guarding the choppers til we sobered up and left, for better jobs on the CGG crew down in Pinedale.