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Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Toxic Mushroom Invasion! Save UT and A&S College!


Before the UT/MCO merger, our Arts & Science College competed successfully with quality public higher education institutions in our region for quality traditional and non-traditional students anxious to earn quality undergraduate and graduate diplomas that could be displayed with pride. Our nearest competitors (including Bowling Green University and Eastern Michigan University) also offered quality earned degrees in liberal education and so prompted us to constantly strive and succeed to improve ourselves as an excellent A&S community of students, faculty, staff and alumni. With the Jacobs administration came its “New Entity” business model, increased privatization and outsourcing, and its distance-learning drive to achieve quantity at the expense of quality. Their mission is to manufacture diplomas for students who don’t have time or the inclination to earn them. Their competitors in this predatory and cutthroat "for profit" educational market include the following degree mills, all who have recently sprouted like toxic mushroom around the rot created by our mismanaged university:

Herzing University – Toledo Campus

"A student can progress seamlessly from a diploma program to an associate degree to a bachelor's degree, and now to a master's degree, stopping anywhere along the line and then resuming when the time, need, and ambition of the student warrant. And the student can choose the method of instruction that fits his or her time commitments and learning style - from all resident to EdFlex (part resident, part online) to entirely online."

http://www.herzing.edu/campus.php?id=23

http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/herzing-college-toledo-to-celebrate,742480.shtml


Excelsior College in Toledo

Excelsior College helps busy working adults earn the degrees they need with flexible distance education programs. A World Leader in Distance Education: As a world leader in distance education, we apply the college credit you have already earned to a respected degree in Liberal Arts, Business, Technology, Nursing, or Health Sciences -- giving you the best start toward degree completion.

https://www.excelsior.edu/Excelsior_College/About

Southwestern College – Toledo Campus

We offer a wide-range of Diploma and Associate Degree programs that can help you start living out your dream.

http://www.lincolnedu.com/campus/toledo-oh

Toxic mushroom are on the move! Its approaching midnight! Where is your institute of quality public higher education? It is time to save our UT soul, spirit, tradition and reputation, and to reverse this trend to poison the deep roots of quality liberal education at UT. Preserve the high quality of our diplomas! The present UT administration has to reform its mission and strategic plan, or depart. Save A&S College!

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

See: http://journals.utoledo.edu/budget/index.php/expanding-our-educational-boundaries

Why does Scott Scarborough think it is his role as CFO to talk about academic issues; which belong to the faculty?

He failed to provide the faculty senate a clear answer as to how he calculated each college's budget deficit. He needs to focus on his job (explaining the budget) instead of the job of the faculty (discussing academic concerns).

Anonymous said...

Why does Scott Scarborough think it is his job to discuss the quality of academics? See: http://journals.utoledo.edu/budget/index.php/expanding-our-educational-boundaries

Academic issues belong to the faculty; not the CFO.

Anonymous said...

Do you get the feeling we're playing "Whack-A-Mole?" Every time we put one of these "innovative" projects down, it triggers three more to pop up.

When will they GET THE HINT!

Anonymous said...

The article in today's Blade about the Jacobs/Haggarty Texas debacle illustratrates once again their scorn for faculty members who raise questions about quality.But another point needs to be made. They also have no business sense. School boards are not clamoring to hire teachers and administrators with cut rate cheap and quick degrees. Already I hear talk of plans in various school districts in the region to turn to BGSU for interns and teachers because of reservations about what has already happened at UT. Our university never had a reputation for great academic excellence, but it was once considered fairly solid. Much of that good reputation . has already been lost. If the clowns currently running this place move beyond their assault on the liberal arts and wage war on the education faculty as well-denying them a dean who's a real educator, for example - the outcome could be achievement of a new level of mediocrity. Does anyone really think that students will flock to an institution that churns out degrees no one respects ?

Anonymous said...

The Jacobs administration is trying to create a futuristic university that would fit into the society pictured in the movie "Idiocracy." Except the future is now. If anyone hasn't seen the film, the plot revolves around a man with an IQ of 100, exactly average, and finds himself transported to the future, where he is then the most intelligent person in the world. The Jacobs vision falls far short of mediocrity.

Anonymous said...

This is the saddest blog on the planet.

Anonymous said...

With the proposed appointment of local businessman and trustee Brady as interim dean of education, it is now clear that academic credentials are a disqualification in Jacobs new university. Education may now join Arts and Sciences in the dubious distinction of being led by deans who have never held a full time academic position. It is to be hoped - though not likely - that the Governor who must grant a dispensation for trustee Brady will strike a blow for educational integrity and say no. Anyone concerned with this university's furure should urge him to do so.

Anonymous said...

Re "Sad" above--Yes, following the ongoing Jacob's tragedy is a sad, sad affair. It the classic tragic template--the hero's character strength is also his great weakness and leads ultimately to destruction and great woe.

The decisive surgeon operates on the University and installs shunts such as Brady. And in the medical model--even if the patient dies the operation can still be a success to the bloated surgical ego and bank account as well. Don't forget that even if the patient dies, the surgeon still gets paid. We should all be sad. You. Me. Students. Alums. Community. Faculty. Staff.

Except for Brady and Jacobs, who now get to extend their playtime at public and social expense.

So sad..... Big tears of woe for UT.

Anonymous said...

Sad, depressing, what's the appropriate word for what Jacobs and company are doing to what used to be a very fine university.

I retired two years ago. Glad I did. I don't think I could take it if I had to face this crap on campus every day.

Anonymous said...

Has anyone checked with the Attorney General's Office whether it is legal to appoint a sitting board member as interim dean? What about the Ohio Ethics Commission? This doesn't even pass the common sense test, and I suspect there are laws against it in Ohio.

Remember, this follows on the heels of this administration trying to sell HEH, LLC to the JHCOE to sell master's degrees for $4900 total (a company that followed Scott Scarborough through three states). Some good ethics there too despite his denial of having any financial relationship.

This administration seems to be grasping at straws and dealing in some dubious ethical behavior.