New Provost: Long Live the Provost!
The Reign of Truth and Beauty continues. Who would have predicted this other than a few hundred people?
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A MUST READ FOR ALL ACADEMICS! Now on Amazon Kindle. Click on Professor Goat above to be directed to the book.
DON'T BE A SHEEP
UT's Officially Disapproved Information Source and HISTORICAL ARCHIVE. The only source of truth, where Paradox Manifests: Hundreds of thousands of visits. Yet No One Admits to Reading It. Welcome to the "Grey Area" where "Unethical Utterances," i.e., criticisms of administrators, are commonplace. Make U.U. here where genuine civility still reigns, a.k.a., freedom......................... UNIVERSITY OF TOLEDO'S EQUIVALENT TO RADIO FREE EUROPE
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NEW!!! Hard Eight by Professor Extreme
HARD EIGHT
Hard Eight: Auto-Ethnographic Essays on Academic Culture Featuring the End of the Arts & Sciences College, University of Toledo, 2010
Daily Koan
Should the newly discovered black hole be named in honor of UT BOT?
Swamp Bubble
Do you agree or disagree that University of Toledo suffers from administrative bloat?
How do you feel about the proposed UT Degree Guarantee program? (Reposted to allow more people to vote.)
How do you feel about the proposed UT Guarantee program?
How would you grade the overall performance of the Jacobs' administration on running the University of Toledo?
COMMENT OF THE WEEK
Bloggie applauds this perspicacious observer:
"The administration is in a panic mode to implement controversial and irreversible structural and curricular changes campus-wide by early February fiscal plan deadlines with only the vaguest notions of their impacts. The plan is, according to an interview with a top administrator published in the most recent Independent Collegian, to cast out many seeds and "see what grows." This experimental garden, as most senators articulated in many different ways, seems a costly recipe for disaster. Utter madness. Stay tuned."
Print Version of Dictionary of Academia Available on Amazon.com
The profound ruminations of the goaty Sage are now available in this 119 page satirical masterpiece. See: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1480292494/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_2?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B009RC0SJA&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1JV8N5BYAYY9WC9SJWD2
"Dictionary of Academia" Read it While it's Hot
A MUST READ FOR ALL ACADEMICS! Now on Amazon Kindle. Click on Professor Goat above to be directed to the book.
Comment of the Week
"This is that old tension between the corporate way of doing things and the academic way of doing things. In the corporate world, you sweep everything under the rug to make your b.s. as shiny, pleasing to the nose, and profitable as possible. In the academic world, you operate with a higher moral standard. Veritas and all that."
Comment of the Week of August 13
Re UT academic posers and hypocrites:
Have their checks calculated in units of postmodern theoretical currency and issued in photocopied legal tender notes signed by Walter Benjamin with a photo of Karl Marx and a seal stamped “In Derrida We Trust”.
Comment of the Era
Wow! Ain't that something.
-Anonymous
Comment of the Week
Mention goes to the the anonymous commentator of Feb 7, who, regarding UT President Llloyd Jacob's "Investing in Faculty" letter, stated: "If we could use the same criteria for 'investing in administrators' we could cut most of those positions."
Comments to HLC
Make sure you address your comments to HLC to the email address listed below in the "Higher Learning Commission Wants to Know" post. This may be the only chance you have to be heard. Bloggie hears that UT administration has discussed giving faculty "training" so that faculty members know how to "properly" talk to the HLC folks. How's that for stacking the deck? Does everyone get a little script to read? Make sure you practice before a mirror at being bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.
Comment of the Week!
Definitely, the Comment of the Week award goes to Anonymous 12:14 pm, Dec 3, under the "Higher Learning Commission Needs to Know" posting by Diogenes. Pithy and pointed!
--Love,
Bloggie
MESSAGE OF THE DAY:
DON'T BE A SHEEP
Independent Collegian Article on Dicey Administrative Spending
IC reporter Casey Cheap looks at bow ties, apartments and movie tickets purchased by UT administrators at university/public expense. See
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Letter and Petition from Foreign Languages Faculty Member
A couple weeks ago, at the beginning of summer break, we in the Department of Foreign Languages were informed that our secretary's position was being eliminated and that while she will not lose her job (she'll be transferred), that position is not to be filled. We apparently will be expected to do our own jobs plus what we can of the secretary's. That is clearly not acceptable, and so one of the steps we in FL are taking against it is an online petition now available for any who want to (including those who for whatever reason--not a registered Ohio voter, not a US citizen, etc.--cannot sign the petition against SB5), to read and sign.
I know not everyone on the blog will be interested in this; I'm not asking anyone who doesn't want to, to sign or even read the petition. I do think that there are many who would be interested and would want to sign it--if they knew about it.
It's scary to post this under my own name; I'm as afraid as anyone of repercussions. But this is simply too important to keep quiet on, and we have to do something! FL is not the first department that this has happened to, and it's almost certain not to be the last if we don't speak up in a way that the administration will hear us and in a way that makes clear that other people are seeing that it's going on.
Here's the link to the online petition:For those who can make it, there will also be an informational meeting--including lunch and petition-signing--next Friday, May 27 in FH 2420, 12:00 - 2:00 p.m.
I know not everyone on the blog will be interested in this; I'm not asking anyone who doesn't want to, to sign or even read the petition. I do think that there are many who would be interested and would want to sign it--if they knew about it.
It's scary to post this under my own name; I'm as afraid as anyone of repercussions. But this is simply too important to keep quiet on, and we have to do something! FL is not the first department that this has happened to, and it's almost certain not to be the last if we don't speak up in a way that the administration will hear us and in a way that makes clear that other people are seeing that it's going on.
Here's the link to the online petition:For those who can make it, there will also be an informational meeting--including lunch and petition-signing--next Friday, May 27 in FH 2420, 12:00 - 2:00 p.m.
Katherine Best
Wave of the Future or Merely Sometime Later This Week?
The Chronicle of Higher Education ran a deeply fascinating article called, "When to Dissolve a Faculty Senate." Apparently this is any time that it becomes "adversarial" to administration.
The online comments to the article are priceless.
Nemeth on Mammon in IC
David Nemeth's most recent tour-de-force
Professor Nemeth has another fabulous and timely article in the new and increasingly wonderful Independent Collegian. See http://www.independentcollegian.com/forum/the-kraken-attacks-1.2340091
Nemeth Does it Again
See the forum article in The Independent Collegian at:
Nemeth's New Article in Collegian
The Independent Collegian has run another of Professor Nemeth's fine and provocative articles in its latest edition. This one discusses the double-talk by mouthpieces for the current UT administration concerning the effects of and reasons behind so-called strategic reorganization. Make sure you get the latest version of Newspeak 5.1 if you want to decode what UT administrators are really saying.
UT Ranks 13th Nationally on Administrative Bloat
See Appendix B of the Administrative Bloat report posted on 8/28 for evidence, but UT now has a higher proportion of administrators to students than all but 12 public universities in America. President Jacobs has finally put University of Toledo in the top tier. With Strategic Organization he may be aiming for number one.
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Recent Letters from The Blade
Jacobs' arrogance is astonishing
Recently, President Lloyd Jacobs of the University of Toledo stated that bonuses were justified because his administrators "took all the risks."
As a professor at UT, I am outraged that President Jacobs claims that administrators take all of the risks. What risks do they take that the other faculty and staffs on campus do not?
Administrators are protected by state and federal employment laws and by their contracts.
When ex-President Vik Kapoor was terminated, he remained a professor with a salary near what he was paid as president.
As president emeritus, Dan Johnson retained a salary greater than his pay as president.
In the recent layoffs, exceptionally few administrators were terminated. It seems to me that low-level personnel at UT have far more risks because the greater proportion of the layoffs have come from their ranks. And they did not have continuing salaries.
President Jacobs' answer to questions on two occasions regarding relinquishing part of his bonus was to the effect that he earned his bonuses and what he did with them was his business.
Administrators do not risk their personal money in their duties: they use taxpayer money and funds collected through donations and grants to the university.
Administrators take home salaries in the hundreds of thousands of dollars and then add bonuses for longevity and whatever else the president decides is fitting for their contracts.
However, the lower-level personnel have much lower salaries and no such bonuses. Where is the risk?
It seems to me that these bonuses are convoluted: The lower-level personnel are taking the greater risks with no bonuses while the administrators with very rewarding jobs with little risk receive large bonuses.
Am I missing something here?
WALTER W. OLSON,
Mechanical, Industrial, and Manufacturing
Engineering,
University of Toledo
It's the same old, same old at UT
I could hardly believe the arrogance of Dr. Lloyd Jacobs, president of the University of Toledo, when a reporter asked if he would be willing to forgo his bonus in light of the layoffs, raise in tuition, etc.
His comment was that he worked for it. Is that to say that the ones being laid off did not work for their pay?
All I can say is, business as usual at UT. Some things never change.
SANDY FLICK
Rose Acres Drive
UT also has checks, balances
In response to letter titled "Professors must focus on teaching," I would like to point out that the University of Toledo operates on the basis of shared governance.
This means that faculty members participate in the administration of the university.
A focus on teaching requires faculty to address administrative issues such as policies, procedures, and yes, finances, because these all affect classroom outcomes. A university with solid and equitable finances benefits everyone, including and especially the students. Just as the U.S. government is constituted to have checks and balances, so is our university government.
The UT-AAUP is one of those checks against UT administrators who most recently have displayed more concern for their own profit rather than a concern for the common good.
LINDA M. ROUILLARD,
Associate Professor
of French,
University of Toledo
Quote of the Year (so far)
The following is excerpted from the recent UT AAUP newsletter concerning the official university response to news of the bonus scandal:
. . . . Either Jacobs is misleading the media or he has misled the Board of Trustees. President Jacobs objected to "the general tone" of the UT-AAUP Newsletter. Many persons on this campus object to the "general tone" of the Jacobs Administration. During his tenure as President, he has introduced an administrative culture of fear and intimidation. . . . A point of logic must be raised here, with all respect to UT AAUP, the conclusions that President Jacobs has (1) misled the media and (2) the Board of Trustees are not mutually exclusive. Both would seem likely given his considerable talent at spinning "visions." |
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41 comments:
In his public comments about how this selection came about, Dr Jacobs responded, "It's good to be King".
Quoting Mel Brooks!
How long do dictators survive?
As long as they are allowed to.....
Hosed again!
When will the faculty learn that unless they take the nuclear option and walk out, nothing is going to change at UT?
I notice there was no mention of the search committee in El Jake-o's announcement. What was their conclusion? Did they actually think this guy was the right choice?
The presentations were just charade and dog-and-pony show. Most attendees have realized that by the fourth visit. They invited their friends (the other three candidates) to come down and speak to the faculty, but they were already set on Scarborough.
The new trio: Lloydie, Goldie, and the Scary! Let's start boycotting the businesses that those BOT stooges represent! I bet their companies will enjoy the attention they will be getting soon!
see article on Mr Scarborough at: http://www.ibhe.state.il.us/NewsDigest/NewsWeekly/090607.pdf
Because you, with the most highly protect jobs in the world, will only take action anonymously on this blog, Jacobs doesn't have to pretend you matter.
THE MANY FACES OF ZELIG, THE HUMAN CHAMELEON
EARLY MANIFESTATIONS OF EXISTENTIAL ANGST:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5U1-OmAICpU&feature=fvwrel
THE SEARCH FOR MEANING:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h93THijHeq0&feature=related
THE KAFKAESQUE TIME WARP METAMORPHOSIS: FROM SCARFACE TO PAGLIACCI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUW8JsLDsNo
THE POSTMODERN KARMA CHAMELEON:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVfWr6qye-k&feature=fvwrel
Did you seen an example of the new provost's scholarship? Enjoy:
http://site.scottscarborough.us/uploads/Grammar_Sheet.pdf
this is just total student centeredness ! The cheat sheet for English grammar!
Some well deserved praise and some recommendations for UT:
As someone who can still remember the days long past in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s when unsightly WWII era military barracks still stood on the UT quad – many kudos are in order for those who have been instrumental in transforming UT into a truly beautiful campus.
Significant improvements began in the 1980’s, but as recently as just a few years ago there were still numerous shabby patches around campus – like the areas behind and adjacent to Carlson Library, which have recently received much needed improvement – walkways, lighting etc.
Things are still underway, but now, from Dorr Street to Bancroft Street and from the Engineering and technology buildings on the far side of Douglas Road all the way across campus to Secor Road, the entire UT campus is REALLY looking good.
Well done.
Here are a few additional observations and recommendations regarding traffic flow, safety and good neighbor policies (local media please feel free to reprint or discuss these recommendations):
1) The traffic bottleneck at the campus main entrance, at the bottom of Campus Drive, still needs to be addressed.
Solution: A pedestrian/bike tunnel or footbridge to allow pedestrians to cross onto main campus from the area around the parking garages, without impeding optimum traffic flow into and out of main campus.
2) Pedestrians routinely cross Douglas Road near and around the vicinity of Savage Hall – on their way to and from classes and/or to and from campus events.
Many of these pedestrians are young, pre-college age (going to and from campus events) and quite a number of these pedestrians are in groups, having fun and undoubtedly often somewhat inebriated – going to and from concerts or sporting events, or to and from party venues on Bancroft St.
They SHOULD be crossing up at the light by the Engineering buildings, but that’s a long detour and not surprisingly people often take the shortcut across high speed, four-lane Douglas Rd.
A walkway/bike path along the east side of Douglas Rd. – running along the western boundary of Ottawa Park, from Kenwood Blvd. all the way to Dorr Street, along with a pedestrian/bike tunnel or footbridge placed at the most strategic shortcut point across Douglas Rd. onto main campus, are desperately needed.
Mark my words; there will be pedestrian fatalities along Douglas Road here if a safe pedestrian remedy is not installed.
Cont.
Recommendations cont.
3)One recent blog post mentioned noise from the south side of campus. There are going to always be campus events and these will sometimes be a bit loud – but some simple remedies can mitigate the annoyance to people on campus, who are seeking quiet study or research time, as well as for those off campus who do not want to hear loud music or noise from football games.
For outdoor music events in the open grass field area behind Carlson Library – an acoustic amphitheater should be erected so sound can be focused into the desired area and not proliferate all over campus and into surrounding neighborhoods.
Also, the loudspeakers from football games and other stadium events can be heard well into surrounding neighborhoods – for example, as far away as the far side of Central Ave. – not to mention the poor residents of Old Orchard, who must feel UT football games are being held in their living rooms.
Some of these stadium events occur early on Sunday mornings. How about a little mercy for Old Orchard residents trying to catch up on some much needed sleep?
Solution: Appropriate sound baffles should be installed on the upper walls of the stadium and the loudspeakers should be placed and directed so as to address only those people inside the stadium – and NOT everyone else in greater West Toledo.
4)UT’s decision a few years back not to invade Old Orchard by putting a parking lot on the far side of Bancroft across from U-Hall was the right thing to do. That field is a pristine part of the neighborhood. However, some minor improvements to the field – perhaps a few well placed trees and park benches – might not be a bad idea for both Old Orchard residents and UT.
I got the email to the alumni this morning. The subject line is "Student Centeredness the Critical Criterion for Selection of Provost at The University of Toledo." That should not be the "critical criterion." We're talking about the chief academic officer of a supposed research university, not a clerk in the bursar's office. Will those of you who are still at the university do something about these clowns? I would like my degree to retain some value over the years.
It's institutional incest and we all know what incest, eventually, leads to. Additionally, no "serious" candidates will apply to UT positions because the word will get around that UT only hires from within. This will make the administrative gene pool even less competitive, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy whereby the "best" candidates will be internal ones because good outside candidates will know the process is a joke. If you made a list of admins who have been promoted or simply placed in high end admin positions you will see this process is already well established at UT. Pretty much a defining characteristic of the Jacobs model.
To SVR. Two comments. 1. Scarborough and Jacobs' cronies seem to have the most highly protected jobs in the world. 2. And since when does remaining anonymous cause any more or less disregard from Dr. Jacobs. He ignores faculty governance, sets up rigged committees and then even ignores them. His superficial attempts at "involvement" are time wasting shams. Remember the roundtables and the Zemsky era? The hundreds of hours wasted in lets pretend that was supposed to create a new university? Meanwhile the dear Doctor kept whittling away at the old one, carving away healthy tissue and building up his crony-bureacracy. The roundtable report is in the wastebasket of UT history and the mealy-mouthed thrive. Someone mentioned a walkout. This would be foolish and would hurt faculty and students. What we need is a sleaze-in, where all the cronies and VPs march around campus for a day.
"Someone mentioned a walkout. This would be foolish and would hurt faculty and students." // No, this and other direct action would teach a much more valuable lesson to the students than another day in your lecture course. Come on people, start acting outside the system.
You need look no further than the University of Virginia to see how a concerted action by faculty, students, staff and alumni can make a difference. Their actions were in support of a University President (with integrity) and against a Board. In our case, the Board and the President are both dressed in the same garb and it will take us all coming together to declare the Emperor is wearing no clothes!
Regular gatherings of protest would draw attention. No speeches necessary. Just a gathering. We could wear black to mourn the death or our university. Fridays on the Quad?
To Anonymous 7:16. If you want direct action try this. Call the State of Ohio Ethics Commission, 614-466-7090, and tell them about the cronyism and such. And the lack of real searches for candidates.
This may be better than pretending it is still 1968. All that incense certainly reeked, did it not?
Once again, I am sad to be an alum of UT. Jacobs and co. are ruining this place for everyone, EXCEPT themselves and their wallets.
SVR said, "Because you, with the most highly protect jobs in the world, will only take action anonymously on this blog, Jacobs doesn't have to pretend you matter."
There's a logic to it, SVR. Because they have tenure, a union, and pretty good salaries, the faculty have the least to gain from upsetting the apple cart. Sure, they have philosophical disagreements with the admin-o-clowns, but there's not really anything on the table for them. So anonymous internet comments are a great way for them to vent without having to commit to anything. At better universities, change comes from the bottom up, and faculty aren't close enough to the bottom. Some of us have to start taking risks.
Anonymous 1:41:
Your deride anonymity and then sign yourself "anonymous."
And who is "us"? Certainly not you, so it would seem.
Boycott the businesses employing these greedy thugs:
William C. Koester, Chair (2013)
Koester Corporation - - the only green they know is money
Joseph H. Zerbey, IV, Vice Chair (2018)
Blade -- there are other Toledo papers...
Joshua R. Beekman, Student Trustee (2013)
He is into medicine, so avoid his future practice... People do not forget that easy (he is into psychology)
Susan E. Gilmore (2013)
Waterford Bank -- find other lenders. She is a carryover from the MUO days (merger, what a sham), now sworn to ruin UT and kills two birds with one stone.
S. Amjad Hussain (2016)
UT/Blade: just steer clear of UTMC and ignore his columns if you can't stay away from the Blade. He should be out sooner than 2016...way too many golf tournaments on taxpayers money!
Linda N. Mansour (2014)
There are other law firms -- stay away from hers and from Sidley & Austin.
Susan Farrell Palmer (2014)
Toledo Museum of Art should exercise better judgment on its eployees...but again, there are many other museums.
Juan Jose "John" Perez (2020)
Stay away from Perez & Morris LLC also. Now I can see the Texas connection: Perez, Rice, Scarborough. Maybe we can have a Texas style education system in Ohio... Stay away from Mount Carmel Health System and Columbus First Bank, as well for the next decade. Well-connected man, so more businesses to avoid if you go to his BOT page
Sharon Speyer (2019)
I pulled my money out of Huntington not long ago. They should not mis/handle your money either. 2019 is too far into the future for her bank to live off your hard-earned money.
John S. Szuch (2015)
Stay away from Fifth Third as well, it ate Capital Bank like MUO is eating UT. He is into free market cannibalism...
Gary P. Thieman (2017)
Medical Mutual of Ohio? Be easy on this fella, as the new insurance system may force his company to cover you so you an be healthy.
Interestingly, most earned their degrees here at UT. Don't you love the irony that these alums and alumas are agreeing to cannibalize the very university whose tenure-track and tenured faculty wrote recommendations on their behalf.
Pinocchio has more conscience, compared to these. Use the free market system against these thugs!
To 1:14
Shared governance on this campus is non-existent. The BOT and the Jacobs administration sneer at faculty, staff and students. Working conditions are terrible, morale is lower than low. The faculty have a LOT to gain from upsetting the apple cart. This is not just about philosophical disagreements: this is about the welfare of our students and about their future.
The faculty has been divided and conquered. The arts, humanities, and social sciences are beaten, and will soon be extinct. The STEMM faculty are too busy writing grants and buying their way out of teaching undergraduate classes to care or even know what is happening.
I used to be very sympathetic and supportive of the faculty. Not anymore. Through their inactions, their apathy, and their trivializations (i.e. most of this blog) they have become unwitting collaborators in their own destruction and the destruction of OUR University.
It amazes me how a group of people individually as intelligent, articulate, and hard working as our faculty can collectively be as stupid, short sighted and apathetic as they are.
The faculty has been divided and conquered. The arts, humanities, and social sciences are beaten, and will soon be extinct. The STEMM faculty are too busy writing grants and buying their way out of teaching undergraduate classes to care or even know what is happening.
I used to be very sympathetic and supportive of the faculty. Not anymore. Through their inactions, their apathy, and their trivializations (i.e. most of this blog) they have become unwitting collaborators in their own destruction and the destruction of OUR University.
It amazes me how a group of people individually as intelligent, articulate, and hard working as our faculty can collectively be as stupid, short sighted and apathetic as they are.
" Mark my words; there will be pedestrian fatalities along Douglas Road here if a safe pedestrian remedy is not installed."
There should be speed bumps on all university roads to keep speed down. They disregard pedestrians. Start writing down license plates and report them violators to administration, police (trust me they will not do anything in the name of student-centeredness), and post them on the Web as well so they can be searched as a public record for a lawsuit brewing.
Fatalities? The Scarborough mini-regime is using this to get rid of tenured and tenure-track faculty and replace them with low-paid adjunct or highly paid drones.
"Working conditions are terrible, morale is lower than low. The faculty have a LOT to gain from upsetting the apple cart. This is not just about philosophical disagreements: this is about the welfare of our students and about their future."
Here is a scenario. The Jacobs regime artificially suppresses the standards to attract the highest paying students from China, some of whom come in with fake documentation.
The lowered morale is necessary to lose dissenting faculty.
You know what: screw the Edict on vacations during the first two weeks of the semester, and take time off anyway! Civil disobedience should be the first non-violent response to the Jacobs bullying. Don't forget: the brainless police is watching.
Soon there will be drones flying over the campus to scare the paranoid.
"Boycott the businesses employing these greedy thugs:"
I am afraid they will respond with milk cartons displaying their faces with a caption: "Do you know me? -- if not, you will soon..."
Anonymity on Blogs: This is a war of utterances which are clearly targeted and identified; names are not needed until petitions are signed and votes are cast in person. The point of this blog is to identify viable rallying issues.
This venomous regime which has just cannibalized itself (it does not know it yet; just wait when it self-destructs) will not stop just because you expose you identity.
Don't be a fool because on this blog you do not know who is taking notes: maybe a future student government president, or prospective medical student, or some other future yes-man or doormat. Of course, if they do who cares? They will see this as case of "where there is smoke, there is fire."
The Academic Hypocrites
The real irony in all this is that the academic careers and personal ideologies of Pryor and the rest of the Gang of 12 & Co. are all grounded in leftist, PoMo PC Marxist Feminist humanities, social sciences, political theory, philosophy etc.
Everything they are and everything they have in the way of academic degrees and careers and job security and advancement and personal wealth have until recently been driven entirely by their leftist, anti-establishment La-La Land worldview and milieu.
They all fancied (and probably still fancy) themselves heroic counter-cultural progressive watchdog pit bulls, fighting the good fight for the little guy and guarding the house of “social justice” (regardless of how deluded they and their quaint sophomoric notions may be).
And yet The Man had to whistle but once for them and throw them some scraps from the table. The curs all came running and salivating - with any lingering concerns for "the cause" quickly forgotten.
They are now all submissive, obedient, complacent lapdogs curled up at Master’s feet (oh, and incidentally drunk and besotted with the new found power of their petty administrative fiefdoms and sporting new fancy titles, positions, promotions and offices and making 150-250K).
But what would Nietzsche and Sartre and de Beauvoir and Marcuse and Foucault say about all this hypocrisy and “power” and "patriarchy" and “bad faith”?
Hey - who cares when you’re knockin’ down the big bucks!
At least Jacobs & Co. are authentically and unashamedly what they are…
Until we see some published articles or public statements from this crew of academic turncoats, with titles like: “Confessions of a Repentant and Reformed Former Marxist Feminist Postmodernist” – hypocrisy is the only word for it.
To 5:27
Thanks for the list of businesses to avoid. Fortunately, I believe that the UT students that we currently nurture are of much higher quality than the alumni on our BOT.
Attention Ivory Tower Liberals: The year is 2012 not 1912
Bloggie, you hit on one of the fundamental disconnects in contemporary academia and society.
Liberals, unionists, Marxists, feminists, academics, Democrats etc. are all still largely - to their own detriment and the detriment of everyone else - stuck in the past.
They still think it's 1968 or 1938 or 1848 - like Warren Beatty, who clearly thinks he's playing Jack Reed in his own real life fantasy version of his movie Reds, handing out leaflets in 1920's Bolshevik Russia.
This is the intellectual equivalent of trying to plan modern cities for horses and buggies or trying to fight modern warfare with horse-mounted cavalry and drawn sabers.
Liberals still try to play the "N" words (ni--er and Nazi) and toss around populist Jimmy Hoffa and bra-burning style 60's rhetoric about women and the "working man" etc. but even the hardcore rank and file aren't buying this anachronistic nonsense anymore.
And just as nobody can have a rational conversation with a crazed homeless religious zealot carrying a sign that says "The end is near. Repent!" - nobody can take hardcore liberals seriously when they are in effect still wearing Mao uniforms or Che Guevara T-shirts and holding signs that say "Workers of the world, unite!"
Because they are able to seal themselves off like medieval monks from what even they themselves call the “real” world – academics tend to be among the worst offenders when it comes to self-delusion.
If that's a picture of Jerry Lewis with this post, I protest the implied comparison of Jacobs or Scarborough with Jerry Lewis. Lewis was very good at his art of making comic films, and is a real humanitarian.
You need a picture of Solyndra. It probably ran on the same business model as many of the BOT's investments. Not excluding the College of Perpetual Solar Motion.
As flattering as I suppose it is to imagine that UT is the locus of some kind of Jacobs led assault on higher education, this is not the case. UT is a backwater location for something that is playing out all across the US and at even top tier universities (at the national level, the state level, and the university level). Economic problems are being used as the cause célèbre for a slew of ideological and political agendas which are attempting to restructure US higher "education": who should have access to it, who should pay for it, what its purpose is. Jacobs is not leading this effort, he didn't start it, he's caught up in the jetstream (and in the very back). And so economic problems, sour grapes from the FDR years (recall "That man in the White House"), and the demonizing of unions have crated a political and ideological opportunity across the US and is operating at many levels. The worm, in other words, has turned.
give it up, faulty lost. the war is over. move on.
"The real irony in all this is that the academic careers and personal ideologies of Pryor and the rest of the Gang of 12 & Co. are all grounded in leftist, PoMo PC Marxist Feminist humanities, social sciences, political theory, philosophy etc."
I think, this gang forgot their leftist ideas, or they faked real good. Now, someone like Pryor (I mean, good old Benster the Toys R Us kids replacing our fellow library faculty -- I love them so much.. the most helpful and true professionals on campus), he is an exception. Whatever I posted about him in the past is not a reflection of his person (he IS a cool guy don't get me wrong), but just a statement on his incompetency as leader of the library. Dude, toys will not make you any more popular with that generation. You are forgetting those who do need the resources your predecessor has forces the library throw out. And you are just sitting there like you don't know. Maybe you do not belong their either...just like Gabry (sp?)
If we could have some of these former "leftists" join us, that is all we need for the next move... or we may not even need them. Let's all walk out on week 1 of Fall 2012-13. Get your AAUP attorneys ready!!!!
"If that's a picture of Jerry Lewis with this post, I protest the implied comparison of Jacobs or Scarborough with Jerry Lewis. Lewis was very good at his art of making comic films, and is a real humanitarian."
Good point! UT leaders can't even come close!
"Thanks for the list of businesses to avoid. Fortunately, I believe that the UT students that we currently nurture are of much higher quality than the alumni on our BOT."
In most cases, you right, but whoever (student) mingles this BOT (bloody old t...) gang, should know the bridges they have burnt." They have sealed their fate... These ones are ready for devolution Jacobs style.
Take notes of such names. In Candide, Voltaire was extremely suspicious of some brainwashed priests following people and taking notes... We should do the same: walls have ears, and the windows have eyes!
And do not use your computers to access this site at work. They are watching, so just be careful but don't be paranoid. They are not god although they may think they are! There is no such thing...
"give it up, faulty lost. the war is over. move on."
After you dude/tte! The War ain't over yet. You lost to some heavy brainwashing... You have no effing idea who are among these ranks. And if the faculty is lost, your best bet for the next job is at the scrapyard... That's where scabs belong!
It would great to see the faculty to rise up in opposition against the Jacobs Administration, but they have had plenty of reasons to do so over the last several years but have done nothing widespread, public or very effective and I see no reason to think at this point that they will, too many are unaffected and comfortable in their positions and status. Plenty of talk on campus and in this blog, but no actual actions.
"I see no reason to think at this point that they will, too many are unaffected and comfortable in their positions and status."
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The developments at BGSU and Wayne State will prove these cozy-comfy faculty that their position is not on solid ground, and should be thinking of future allies...
If there is an internal division between tenured and tenure-track faculty, the administration will exploit that sooner than you think.
From what I am reading here, the bifurcation of library faculty structure has already begun: tenured [maybe not for long], [indefinitely] tenure-track, and non-TT whose conversion to TT status was halted by those least invested in the library (Gaboury, Pryor).
AAUP: get all your ranks involved in this fight, or you'll see the union dissipating when the "right to work" rage takes the most vulnerable members out. You are collecting their dues, so it's time you flex some muscles.
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