CSU layoffs; Rauner's optimistic spin; swastikas at U of I.

The Tribune and Sun-Times are reporting that Chicago State has laid off 1/3 of its staff, about 300 people; no faculty have been laid off, but almost 50% of the rest of the staff are now gone. Faculty are expected to finish CSU's semester off, and are thus technically on contract through May 15, but it is unclear how many will be back in the fall. CSU in effect laid off everyone, and issued 'recalls' to those who still have jobs. They will be reviewing academic programs this summer (with no faculty around) in order to decide what will stay and what will go given the budgetary situation.

CSU got a higher percentage of its state allocation through the recent stopgap funding bill than any other school (about 60%), but it was still too little, too late. The school will attempt to limp through the summer in hopes of surviving for the fall.

In news from a day or two earlier in the week the Tribune reports that Rauner has put on his happy face and suggested a grand bargain on the budget was possible by the end of May, and the SJR reports that he may dip into his own private fortune to pay for a special session and that he wanted more money for higher education budget in FY 16 (i.e., the current fiscal year, the one for which we've gotten only 30% of our state funding). The Tribune story on Rauner's optimism  includes the following bit of analysis.

By broadcasting he's open to a deal, Rauner is seeking to avoid blame as an obstructionist should an agreement remain elusive. It’s not the first time Rauner has declared he’s “cautiously optimistic” about a pending deal. He said as much nearly a year ago, though those talks quickly fell apart. His optimism has since wavered depending on whether he’s in attack mode.

In other news, swastikas drawn on campus buildings at the U of I are leading administrators there to call for tolerance; in the same announcement, the U of I administration noted that an employee had been fired for leaving a noose on a table in a work area. 

We live in interesting times.

NTT faculty on strike at U of I

NTT faculty at the U of I are now on what they've announced as a five day strike.

The NTT union at Illinois is new (their TT are not unionized); they are affiliated with the AFT (UPI). They are trying to get something that NTT faculty here at SIUC do not have: the right to multiyear contracts after years of service. Unionized NTT faculty at UIC did successfully win this right: after five years NTT at UIC get two year contracts; after ten years they get three year contracts.

The U of I administration position seems to be that departments should be allowed to offer such long-term contracts, but they do not want to guarantee such contracts in the current budgetary situation. That position sounds reasonable at first glance, but in an acute financial crisis even faculty with multi-year contracts can be furloughed or laid off, as can tenure-track and tenured faculty. So I don't think that's much of an argument.