"Would you like ketchup on that degree?"
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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
TO CONTACT BLOGGIE . . .
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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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16 comments:
What's the next step: mail order degrees? Just send us a check or credit card number...maybe we could do subscription degrees. As long as you pay your continuing subscription, you degree will be valid.
You are not being fully fair to the BOT or the administration on this. What about the pressure from Washington and Columbus to increase graduation rates? What we are going to do is give credit for "prior experiences", dumb down the curriculum, put courses online where student cheating is rampant, and create an incentive structure (more emphasis on teaching evaluations, online instruction, student assessment..) that leads faculty to engage in the "social passing" of students. All of this will help increase graduation rates.
http://peoplesworld.org/author-calls-for-fight-to-prevent-extinction-of-the-college-prof/
"You are not being fully fair to the BOT or the administration on this."
My overwhelming sense is that the BOT and the administration are in league with the Republicans in Columbus and their reckless approach to higher education.
None of their public remarks have led me to believe otherwise.
I believe what the previous poster was referring to were that many of the changes and concerns expressed on this board about UT are also reflective in part to emerging issues and trends in higher education across the U.S. I recently was talking to a colleague from another mid sized public university and before I explained any of what was happening at UT, he spent 20 minutes expressing the frustration of his faculty over their administration and many of the same issues raised here at UT. Not to take all the blame off the UT BOT and Administration but perhaps to look at it with a broader perspective.
http://chronicle.com/blogs/conversation/2013/10/02/a-machiavellian-guide-to-destroying-public-universities-in-12-easy-steps/
Anonymous 6:45pm
This concise critique in CHS is spot-on. I recommend that Bloggie publishes this 12-step guide word for word on this site.
The students may be invited to "drive thru" and pick up their diploma at UT, but the faculty of this institution are being thrown under the bus by administrators who would eagerly drive over us with their shiny new dl programs that will be overseen by non-subject-matter "experts" and delivered by part-time instructors paid a pittance.
Contract: Faculty will pay the Provost a sum of $5,000 if he signs over his intellectual property regarding "strategic management." Said contract will include language that allows us to staff the work of being a Provost at our discretion.
Interesting possibility. Since you bring up the issue of contracts, here's the course development agreement contract Cruickshank is asking faculty to sign for Distance Learning:
Course Development Agreement
This Course Development Agreement (the “Agreement”) is made and entered into by and between The University of Toledo (the “University”) and name, whose Rocket ID number is R and who teaches in the Department of xx at the University (the “Faculty Member”), this th day of date (the “Effective Date”).
1) The University wishes to create modern, high technology, high touch courses that will better engage and educate students, as well as help distinguish the University’s brand. The Course being developed will be offered in conjunction with The University of Toledo’s World Campus College Credit Plus Program.
2) The Faculty Member has subject matter expertise essential to the development of course number, course name (the “Course”), and wishes to provide such expertise to the development of the Course.
Therefore, for the good and valuable consideration set forth in this Agreement, the receipt and sufficiency of which is hereby acknowledged, the parties hereto agree:
Course Development
1) Faculty Member agrees to develop the Course for the University with the assistance of a development team provided to Faculty Member by the University. Faculty Member agrees to meet with the “Development Team” to ensure the Course conforms to best practices in teaching and learning, incorporates Quality Matters (QM) standards (see Appendix A) into the course design to ensure course quality, and meets American’s with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act requirements for accessibility.
2) The course will be prepared over the xx week period beginning date, so that the Course may first be offered to students in the semester of year.
3) The Course will be developed as a x semester hour course so that it complies with the course development criteria set forth in Appendix A (the ”Course Development Criteria”).
4) The Faculty Member agrees to develop the Course using a “master course” model that consists of a reusable course template with content that can easily be replicated in multiple sections that can be taught or facilitated by multiple instructors.
5) Faculty member agrees to develop the Course for all three of the following modes of delivery:
100% online: asynchronous online interaction and content delivery.
Blended (Option #1): synchronous interaction via web-conferencing software and asynchronous online content delivery.
Blended (Option #2): asynchronous online content delivery and synchronous on-campus activities.
More to follow...
DL contract continued:
Course Offering and Ownership
1) The Course is being developed by the Faculty Member as “work for hire” for the University. As such, ownership of the Course and all related intellectual property rights and all copyright responsibilities belong to the University.
2) The parties understand and agree that although the Course may include an online component and materials, and may in the future be offered as a pure “distance learning” course, the Course is not being created solely as a “distance learning course” and as such the provisions regarding distance learning courses included in the current Collective Bargaining Agreement between the Board of Trustees for the University and the American Association of University Professors, University of Toledo Chapter, including Article 28, will not apply to the Course nor to this Agreement.
3) Offerings of the Course will be staffed and scheduled at the discretion of the University, if at all.
4) From the date of execution of this Agreement, Faculty Member must diligently and continuously pursue the final development of the Course and cooperate with the Development Team and other University employees. The Course will be reviewed by the Development Team when the Faculty Member is ready or four months from date of execution of the Agreement, whichever is earlier, to determine if it meets the Course Development Criteria. If the University, in its sole and absolute discretion, finds the Course Development Criteria have not been met, the University will inform Faculty Member with a notice of the elements of the Course Development Criteria that have not been met. Upon receipt of such notice, Faculty Member will prepare a course revision plan (the “Course Revision Plan”) that will make future offerings of such the Course meet the Course Development Criteria and submit it to the Development Team for approval. If the University does not approve one or more elements of the Course Revision Plan, the University will give notice to Faculty Member of such non-approved element(s) for Faculty Member to correct. The foregoing described process between Faculty Member and the Development Team will continue until all aspects of the Course Revision Plan have been approved by the University.
5) At the conclusion of the initial offering of the Course, the Development Team will assess the Course as it was offered to determine that it in practice met the Course Development Criteria. If necessary, the Development Team will provide a notice to Faculty Member of the elements not met. Faculty Member will then prepare a Course Revision Plan that will make future offerings of the Course meet the Course Development Criteria. This process will continue until all aspects of the Course Revision Plan have been approved by the Development Team. If at any time during the process described in Course Offering and Ownership 4) or 5) the Faculty Member is not continuously and diligently pursuing final approval of the Course, the University will provide thirty days’ notice to the Faculty Member and he/she must prove to the Development Team’s satisfaction the progress of the Course development. If not proven, Development Team will provide a notice to Faculty Member to reimburse any amounts paid by University. If not paid within thirty days of this notice, Faculty Member hereby authorizes the University to withhold the amount due and owing from his/her paycheck(s) until paid in full.
6) The Faculty Member and the University acknowledge that upon signing this agreement any and all work product related to the Course, which is generated by the Faculty Member, the Development Team or the University is wholly owned by the University.
DL contract concluded:
Compensation
Compensation for creation of the Course will consist of support in the form of either money or release time, either of which constitutes significant financial support from the University, as follows:
1) Money - University will provide significant financial support to Faculty Member in the form of money beyond his/her normal salary in the amount $5,000.00 for all services connected to the development of the Course as set forth in this Agreement pursuant to the following timetable:
A) 30% upon both parties signing this Agreement; and
B) 50% after the course has been taught for the first time and the Faculty Member has submitted an assessment report (including student evaluations, course data, etc.); and
C) 20% upon the first to occur of:
a. at the conclusion of the Course provided the Course meets the Course Development Criteria such that a Course Revision Plan is not needed; or
b. after the Faculty Member makes the changes required by the Course Revision Plan and said plan has been approved in its entirety by the University.
2) Dean XX has agreed to provide a course release for XX semester(s) of 2014.
Notwithstanding the foregoing, if Faculty Member has not completed development of the Course by the end of the period specified in Course Development 2), above, Faculty Member will reimburse the University the payment made under (A) in the preceding paragraph. Furthermore, if Faculty Member has not completed any requested Course Revision Plan for the Course within ninety days of the end of the semester in which the Course was first offered, the University will be relieved of its responsibility to make the payment described under (C) in the preceding paragraph.
And LV project team members who provide insufficient support for UTxNet course development will be required to reimburse the University a portion of their pay or have those funds deducted from their regular pay
Sounds like a great deal! Negate the need for your services and those of your colleagues, lifelong, in exchange for five thousand bucks!
Regarding this distance learning scam:
If you work for management outside the scope of the collective bargaining agreement, that makes you a scab, right?
May as well. My brain's been French-fried.
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