May 2 Events--2:30

The May 2 stuff seems to be winding down. There was a pretty large rally around the fountain east of Faner--several hundred folks I'd say. Speaking there were some of the same people who spoke at the "listening session" last week, and I'm told that the Provost, Susan Ford, was there listening (apparently unnoticed in the crowd). I panned her performance at the official listening session last week, but good for her for attending this rally.  The closest thing to trouble I observed was a someone holding up a Trump sign, who was shouted at until those leading the event worked to calm down the crowd. The Trump sign hoister was surrounded and no doubt got an ear full, but I think that was it.

I shuttled between this rally and the faculty teach-in, spending more of my time chatting with folks at the latter. The teach-in did not generate much interest--as was fitting enough, given that a student-led rally was going on nearby. Given the unpredictability of today's events, it was impossible to avoid this sort of overlap. It's well and good that the student event preempted faculty; and it was a positive thing that faculty were at hand and ready to provide a positive message.

As far as I know at this hour, then, the day has passed without violence or any other significant problems. This is confirmed by the only press report I've seen so far.

May 2 at 10:45

A few pictures from the May 2 "Student Strike". My guesstimate is about 150 marchers, though it is difficult to distinguish lily-livered "participant observers" like me from those more committed to the cause. Nothing at all violent or threatening, though the rhetoric is disruptive. "Chop from the top" was the chant in Anthony Hall, for example.

The core group who began the march on Poplar were perhaps 30 of graduate student age, presumably the May 2 Committee and their closer allies. On campus they were joined by a more diverse group.

Campus otherwise seems pretty normal--a fair amount of foot-traffic, cars in lots, etc., though I haven't spoken to people about what attendance in classes is like.

I don't believe any of the uppity ups were in the Chancellor's suite when the group arrived, though I bumped into a Vice-Provost in the hall.

April 20 Protest Day

A comment just made by Mike Sullivan reminds me that I should flag the April 20 rally in Springfield.

Here's the announcement, which came in a recent email from FA president Rachel Stocking:

The Faculty Association has already organized and/or participated in a number of budget actions over the last months.  On April 20, the FA (working with the Illinois Coalition to Invest in Higher Education and other unions across the state) will be taking people up to Springfield as part of a campaign to fund higher education in Illinois.

We will leave at 8:30am from the IEA office in Carterville.  We have a full day planned: IEA contingents will meet at 12:00 at the IEA headquarters, have an event with speakers, and then go speak with legislators in the capital.  Rides are open to people not represented by the FA as well, such as students, friends and family, etc. We want Springfield to know Southern Illinois is upset!
 
To RSVP call the IEA Carterville office - (618) 733-4472 and tell Linda or J’Neita.

Friday updates

1. Financial exigency. I emailed President Dunn a week ago but have received no response as to what he meant when he said the board might need to declare a financial emergency. As far as I can gather, no one else on the Carbondale campus knows what Dunn meant, either. There are concerns about a short-term liquidity problem as well as the long-term problem if our state funding is cut on the order of 20%, as the Governor has proposed (particularly when that cut is compounded by lower enrollment thanks to the state's failure to fund universities this year). The short-term liquidity problem may arise over the summer; Dunn may have been alluding to Board action required to deal with that. Furloughs of staff on contract over the summer would seem to be one possibility.

Update on turning in the keys and the rally at Chicago (whence the picture below) after the break.

UIC supporters join Chicago teachers at rally, April 1 2016.

Rally on April 1

The Speak for Illinois group is gaining momentum; President Dunn and state senate candidate Sheila Simon joined their last meeting, and they are holding a rally today (Friday April 1) at 11 at Morris library.

Advice for the Governor

A photo from a colleague at NEIU, shared via EIU-UPI; faculty on both campuses are preparing for large rally in Chicago on April 1.

Speaking up for public higher education

I'm slowly becoming aware of various groups which are actively speaking up about the budget crisis locally and statewide. This is heartening news. I've already posted links to these groups, but they deserve highlighting.

The GA United website has been quite active, as has the SIUC Faculty Association Facebook site. The Speak For Illinois group aims to unite local folks (including JALC and SIUC) to advocate for a state budget, with emphasis on higher education; they held a "Town Hall Meeting" today. I'll give a brief report on it in my next post.

Statewide, the Students, Staff, and Faculty of Illinois Higher Education (also Facebook) need a shorter name, but is quite active, with special emphasis on CSU and EIU.

Finally, the "I Need a Budget Because . . . " Facebook page posts great photos of SIU students giving their own stories. This is really moving stuff.

". . . because first generation college students deserve a chance."

GAU event to discuss response to budget crisis

A  link to an article in today's DE, in the unlikely event anyone is reading this blog and not reading the DE. On Saturday at 4:00 there will be a meeting in the library Guyon's Auditorium, sponsored by Graduate Assistants United, to brainstorm ideas on how students can respond to the crisis. Students, staff, and community members are welcome.

One of the lessons from 2011 was the value of student involvement in a crisis situation. It's one thing to have state workers (faculty & staff) protesting for things that are good in themselves but also in workers' self-interest (tenure in 2011, funding in 2016), another thing for students to be protesting for education. This isn't to imply that staff shouldn't be active, only that even when they are active—as they certainly were in Wisconsin—their efforts could be attacked as being self-interested in a way students' efforts cannot.

One does have to love the DE headline, "Graduate Assistants Plan Meeting to Solve Budget Crisis". You'd think it would require rose-tinted glasses to type "meeting to solve"—much less a meeting to solve this crisis.

The GA United website doesn't yet mention this event, but has been featuring useful updates on their negotiations and relevant events on other campuses, so is definitely worth a look.

Administrative bloat and union passivity?

On Monday (3/14) the Southern ran a fairly lengthy article with the thesis that folks at SIU blame Springfield, not the administration, for looming cuts. In it SIUC spokesperson Rae Goldsmith is quoted as saying that SIU already has a low ratio of administrators to students, so doesn't anticipate many cuts there. There is a similar conversation in this Carbondale Times story from Friday 3/11.

The last time I checked SIUC was not top-heavy at the highest administrative levels, compared to peers. We were however a bit heavy in administrative staff below the top grade. If there is bloat compared to peers, then, it resides at the level of all those administrators with words like 'vice', 'associate' or 'assistant' (or some absurd combination of such terms) before their titles, or in the broader ranks of AP and "Executive Civil Service" employees. (There certainly isn't bloat in rank and file CS positions, which have been cut back massively over recent years.)

Goldsmith's answer also begs the question of whether higher education in general is top-heavy. I remember a time some years ago—a rosier fiscal time, in fact—when the SIU administration was making a big point of limiting administrative costs, rather than defending them. At a very minimum, the current defensive stance strikes me as bad for morale (why not stress that we are all in this together and looking for cuts everywhere?) and bad PR (given that there's a bipartisan agreement, whether well-based or not, that universities have too much bureaucracy).

Supposed passivity by the unions after the break.

Something to do

One thing we can all do--it may have a minor impact but is no great burden--is to write comments on articles like those below on widely read websites. Comments on the Capitol Fax site are particularly likely to catch the eye of those in Springfield, I've been told; they also tend to be of a somewhat higher caliber than those on newspaper sites.

Capitol Fax story on the governor's predictable reaction to a Senate bill which would fund higher ed. Rich Miller (master of Capital Fax) appends democratic comments of Sen. Gary Forby (D) in support of SIU, together with another supportive democrat.

Chicago Tribune column contrasting our current governor, with his contempt for public higher education, with the Governor Altgeld who is honored by Altgeld Hall. [Hat-tip to Angela Glaros at the EIU-UPI facebook site.]