I’m particularly impressed by the quotes from Provost Coltrane, who finally apologizes for how he dug CAS a budget hole while he was dean and then when he became provost and president, ignored Marcus’s attempts to fix things until the inevitable crisis occurred. And, in a first, Around the O actually links to a public record – Marcus’s Jan 2014 letter to Gottfredson, Coltrane, Moffitt, Shelton, and Taylor laying out the problems Coltrane had left for him, here.
There are also some good quotes from VPFA Jamie Moffitt, explaining why CAS is still bailing out Michael Moffitt’s law school, and detailing the $6.1M that will be used this year alone to give free tuition to roughly half the law school students. That’s followed up by some tough talk from Marcus about the ruination that Brad Shelton’s budget model has brought CAS, and asking some pointed questions about why Shelton has been left in charge of writing a new one.
Nah, just kidding, it’s a pointless puff piece. Too bad – Marcus deserves better.
I read Dean Marcus’s 2014 letter and it doesn’t take a brain scientist to see that the CAS financial condition is and has been building for a long time. In addition, there are a number of metrics available showing CAS teaching hours reducing over time, and CAS staffing increasing over the same period, especially GTTF and NTTF. In essence, it appears that TTF and TF are not teaching as much as they used to or should. Marcus goes on the say many other colleges are in a similar situation, which again appears to be supported by metrics previously published in UO Matters, (bring back the charts).
So, I predict a similar very head count reduction for School of Education, Journalism…soon, maybe at a rate of one college a year. So stayed turned. I suspect President Schill is fully aware of this, and changes to all colleges will be coming down the line driven by the trend of TF and TTF teaching less, raising salaries and pension costs, past lax staffing practices, and generally the past laissez faire approach to running an university.
The people of Oregon and students who pay the freight deserve better.
What a downer. I actually thought that Coltrane, now that he had announced his retirement, would ‘come clean’ on the many deficiencies of his deanship, and the poor choices he made in personnel matters, esp. G. Taylor. But he is not the only the sole cause of the problems. Departments need to look closely at how they manage teaching, research and service loads. Giving too many courses off is not a viable solution.