But think the board could use a more diverse collection of narrow-minded business-type leaders – no experience with higher education needed: From their most recent self-review, with responses filtered by Board Secretary Angela Wilhelms:
Posts tagged as “UO Trustees”
The list of possible subjects is large. As usual, Board Chair Angela Wilhelms isn’t giving specifics:
[reposted because of reserve and media contract stuff]
3:00 p.m. Finance and Facilities Committee https://trustees.uoregon.edu/sites/trustees2.uoregon.edu/files/meeting_packet_-_ffc_final_12.3.18.pdf
1. Audited Financial Statements: Jamie Moffitt, Vice President for Finance and Administration and CFO; Kelly Wolf, Associate Vice President and Controller; Scott Simpson, Partner, Moss Adams
Here’s one metric where UO is not at the bottom of the AAU – reserves:
2. Quarterly Financial Reports and Annual Treasury Report: Jamie Moffitt, Vice President for Finance and Administration and CFO; Karen Levear, Director, Treasury Operations
All these business people on the board, and the only trustee who found the error in the report is the UO staff trustee, Jimmy Murray, a librarian. Controller Kelly Wolf thanks him.
As usual these reports do not include any information on the athletics budget, or the various tax changes affecting it, or their subsidies, or their debt obligations. This is despite the fact that in the past trustees have specifically asked to see this.
Live-blog: Really not that hard, was it? I thought the student trustee Katharine Wishnia had the best comments, here. Pres Schill promised some stuff, and maybe called out implicit bias training as the sort of window-dressing we could do without, but I wasn’t really listening, sorry. If anyone brought up what to do about the Duck’s exploitation of mostly minority football players to pay for coaching, travel, and scholarships for mostly white non-revenue sport athletes I missed it.
Mostly this meeting is online – I mean virtual – but a few of the trustees are in JH:
One of them is wearing what appears to be an American flag mask. I’m no vexillologist who once got chewed out by my Boy Scout Troopmaster for wearing an American flag bandana on a canoe trip, but this is a violation of U.S. Code § 8. Respect for flag:
No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor.
(d)The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery.
(e)The flag should never be fastened, displayed, used, or stored in such a manner as to permit it to be easily torn, soiled, or damaged in any way.
(i)The flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever. It should not be embroidered on such articles as cushions or handkerchiefs and the like, printed or otherwise impressed on paper napkins or boxes or anything that is designed for temporary use and discard. …
(j)No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform.
Also, the flag should be displayed so that the union (i.e. the stars) are on the observer’s left.
6/24/2020: This is either going to be the shortest board meeting since the one where they bought out Gottfredson, or an opportunity for Pres Schill and our Trustees to give long, heartfelt speeches about their newly acquired but deeply held beliefs about the symbolic importance of de-naming Deady.
The next meeting of the Board of Trustees is scheduled for June 24 at 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time. This meeting will be limited to the topic of Deady Hall. The next regular, quarterly meeting of the Board is scheduled for September 10-11, 2020.
The June 24 meeting will be held remotely due to ongoing social distancing guidance. Members of the public or media may view a livestream feed at: https://youtu.be/diSuPRnX6Ko , or listen via audio only by dialing 1-888-337-0215 and entering Access Code: 9504541.
Those wishing to provide public comment to the Board for this meeting may do so in writing via [email protected]. All comments will be shared with trustees, but only comments received by 8:00 a.m. on June 24 are guaranteed to be shared with trustees prior to the meeting. Thank you for understanding.
6/10/2020: Pres Schill’s response to Trustee Colas ignores exploitation of black student athletes, accepts denaming Deady
Pres Schill’s letter is below – he says he’s changed his mind on denaming Deady and the Board will meet on it soon. He ignores the exploitation issue.
Trustee Andrew Colas, speaking at last weeks Board meeting:
First he pointed out to Duck AD Rob Mullens that it’s the football players – mostly black – whose unpaid labor earns 75% of the AD budget and supports Mullens and the “non-revenue” sports, which are mostly white. So Black Lives should Matter to Mullens, if he wants to keep getting paid. Video of Colas’s response to AD Rob Mullens is here:
Then, in thoughtful and moving remarks, he called for the Board to vote – immediately – to dename Deady Hall, here:
President Schill’s letter:
Just kidding, they’re going to meet, but just about de-naming Deady. Gosh, I wonder what they’ll decide this time. This Wednesday Thursday at 1 PM, online. Corrected materials here. (The original agenda had the day as Thursday, but it’s really on Wednesday.) Livestream will presumably be on the UO Channel…
And nothing else. Because they’ve got all the money and power and don’t have to listen to any more complaints from you whiners. Football starts in September, love it or leave it:
A brave man. Trustees are not supposed to disagree with Lillis in public. I’m sure there will be consequences. I hope there may be action. First he pointed out to Duck AD Rob Mullens that it’s the football players – mostly black – whose unpaid labor earns 75% of the…
Live! I’ll try and add some commentary below, but it’s pretty depressing realizing these are the people who actually control our university, and I’m not sure I’ve got the stomach to watch it all. Befuddled chairman of the board Chuck Lillis needs a little help with the tubes: As usual…
In June 2015 UO projected that debt expense payments for 2021 would be about $43M a year: Now in June 2020 they are projecting debt expense payments for 2021 will be about $58M a year – a $15M increase: Why the increase? Mostly for 30 year bonds sold to build…
Just kidding. Our Trustees rely on Angela Wilhelms to spoon-feed them their agenda, and these data will not be on the menu for their June 4 meeting: They have hired a consultant to explain this to them though:
Our Trustees will meet again on June 4th by Zoom, presumably to approve another $12M Jumbotron for Uncle Phil. Meanwhile, The Daily Emerald has the story on Governor Kate Brown’s nomination of current OHSU VP for Administration and Board Secretary Connie Seeley as the latest UO Trustee, here: Seeley graduated…
Just kidding, Ralph threw them a few softballs. Then Chairman Chuck Lillis (best known for his role in the 2008 bankruptcy of WaMu) asked Mullens something about the Duck’s magical season, they all laughed and our Board of Trustees voted unanimously for it and for a new media licensing deal…
What else can you say to the people who hired you and set your salary and bonuses? You can promise them that you’re continuing the hidden athletics subsidies and won’t use any of the Duck’s budget bucket to help the academic side:
Some snippets, full report below the break:
Under the direction of the Board of Trustees, the university recommitted with full force to improving its educational and research capacity to pursue excellence in support of its academic mission. Those plans, developed by the UO administration and faculty, are now propelling the university forward. Five years later, the UO is on a sustainable upward trajectory and has strengthened its overall standing as a comprehensive university distinguished by the disciplinary breadth and depth of our programs in education and research. The progress has been noted by external reviewers, who use words such as “transformational” to describe the progress of the past five years.
He’s pretty happy with the faculty union too:
The UO also works collaboratively with its faculty union on matters related to employment. The UO is unusual among nationally prominent universities in having a unionized faculty. Among the UO’s AAU peers, only Rutgers University, the State University of New York, and the University of Florida have tenure-related faculty in a bargaining unit. A faculty bargaining unit was also certified at OSU in 2018. The leadership of United Academics has been stable and they have collaborated with the UO administration to solve such challenges as the new teaching evaluation process, benefits for postdoctoral fellows, and mandatory discrimination training for faculty. There have also been periodic instances of friction over a variety of issues, for example, funding allocations.
And even the University Senate:
Shared governance, as embodied by the University Senate, has long played an important role at the UO. At times, the senate and administration have been at odds. Relations have improved substantially over the last four years, aided by greater stability in Johnson Hall and a willingness from both administration and the senate to improve communication and collaboration. Disagreements still occur from time to time, but they are rarely over academic matters, the prime area entrusted to the University Senate. Indeed, there have been notable examples of successful collaboration, including work on curricula, teaching evaluations, sexual violence reporting requirements, and academic continuity.
On athletics, Pres Schill takes the unprecedented step of explicitly rejecting proposals to get the Ducks to help the academic side of the university, with money. Past presidents, including Frohnmayer and Gottfredson, had endorsed calls to eventually use some of the athletic department’s ever increasing revenues to support academic scholarships for undergraduates. Not President Schill:
Through the extraordinary generosity of passionate donors, athletics is able to balance its budget and maintain self-sufficiency annually. [UOM: This is not true. The academic budget pays for the Jock Box, Matt Court land bonds, we give them a break on overhead expenses, and we pay most of their legal costs, etc.]
If these donors were to suspect that their gifts were being siphoned off to benefit other parts of the university, as some members of the UO community have suggested, donors would likely reduce their support resulting in insolvency for the program. [Why does this work at other universities? Is there something peculiar about Duck donors?]
3/16/2020: N0 liveblog since meeting is closed to visitors, live-streaming is failing. I showed up at Ford Alumni this morning and was told the Board has banned all visitors from the room – no advance notice and no mention on the Board’s website. The last time I got kicked out…
Trustee Connie Ballmer is quitting 3 years early. The normal replacement procedure is for President Schill and Gov Brown to cut a secret deal on a new Trustee for the “Independent” Board that sets his salary and bonuses at a basketball game, with followup by Chuck Lillis’s Board Secretary Angela…