Workers World: California budget crisis hits students, education workers
The economic crisis in California spells hardship at the state’s public universities as budgets are balanced through a combination of tuition hikes and pay cuts for faculty and other workers.
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Posted in Budgets & Funding
Tagged California, economic crisis
Oregon Daily Emerald: Staff rally against pay freezes, furloughs
Members and supporters of the union that represents classified employees at the University held an on-campus rally Thursday outside of Knight Library, protesting the contract proposed by the Oregon University System for the coming year.
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Posted in Protests
Tagged Budgets & Funding, furloughs, Oregon University System, pay cuts, Protests
Globe and Mail: Staff cuts to boost class size on campus
Services hurt as universities strapped for cash
A wave of staff reductions at cash-strapped universities will mean larger classes and fewer services for students at campuses this September.
The budget squeeze – the result of falling investment income and rising costs, especially for pensions – has left many universities scrambling to find millions of dollars in savings for the coming school year. With salaries accounting for the lion’s share of budgets, job losses are the inevitable result, school leaders say. That’s led to a range of actions to reduce head counts on campus, including layoffs, buyout offers, the cancellation of teaching contracts and hiring freezes.
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Posted in Budgets & Funding
Tagged Budgets & Funding, Canada, class size, Job cuts, staff cuts
World University News: IRAN: Iranian-American academic detained in Tehran
On 9 July 2009 Dr Kian Tajbakhsh, a prominent Iranian-American social scientist, was arrested at his home by Tehran authorities. The agents did not provide any legal justification for the arrest and took him to an undisclosed location.
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Posted in Government
Tagged detentions, Iran
World University News: NIGERIA: Supreme court reinstates sacked academics
The Supreme Court of Nigeria has ruled the dismissal of five lecturers of the Federal University of Ilorin was invalid. The court will decide next month on a similar case affecting a further 44 academics who were also sacked eight years ago for taking part in a national strike organised by the Academic Staff Union. The verdict was hailed by lawyers and civil society organisations as a triumph of the rule of law and due process.
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Posted in Faculty, Legal issues, Unions
Tagged Federal U of Ilorin, Nigeria, terminations, Unions
World University News: AUSTRALIA: Top university slashes 220 jobs
The global financial crisis has struck one of Australia’s leading universities with Melbourne University’s shock announcement last week that 220 full-time equivalent academic and administrative staff positions would be cut following a A$30 million (US$25 million) decline in investment returns.
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Posted in Budgets & Funding
Tagged Australia, Job cuts, Melbourne U
UH Manoa announces actions following inappropriate comments by Coach McMackin
At a news conference this afternoon, University of Hawai’i at Mânoa Chancellor Virginia S. Hinshaw and Athletics Director Jim Donovan today announced the following actions based on inappropriate comments made by Coach Greg McMackin at the WAC conference in Salt Lake City yesterday.
Idaho Statesman: Hawaii coach uses gay slur in reference to Notre Dame, then apologizes
SALT LAKE CITY — Hawaii football coach Greg McMackin said Thursday at the WAC media football preview that Notre Dame did “this little faggot dance” at a banquet the night before last year’s Hawaii Bowl. Click here to hear what McMackin said. (WARNING, EXPLICIT LANGUAGE)
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Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Athletics, bias, gay slurs, suspensions, U of Hawaii
Inside Higher Ed: For-Profit, For God
“The Bible does not say money is the root of all evil,” says Gregory K. Hollifield, assistant professor and chair of the Department of Bible and Theology at Crichton College, in Tennessee. “What scripture says is love of money is the root of all evil.”
That’s an important distinction at Crichton, which is converting from nonprofit to for-profit status but with the intent of maintaining its Christian mission, even emphasizing it — certainly from a marketing standpoint.
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Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Christian college, Corporate University, Crichton College, For-profit colleges
The Chronicle: Jury Orders Boston U. Graduate Student to Pay $675,000 for Illegal Downloads
A federal jury on Friday ordered a Boston University graduate student to pay four music companies $675,000, one day after the student, Joel Tenenbaum, admitted in court that he had downloaded and distributed more than two dozen songs that did not belong to him.
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Posted in Open access
Tagged Legal issues, Open access, RIAA, Students
The Chronicle: Board Chairman Quits at U. of Illinois Amid Scandal Over Favoritism in Admissions
Three days after an investigative commission called on all politically appointed trustees of the University of Illinois to quit, the board chairman announced his resignation today, amid a scandal over the admission of politically connected applicants who were unqualified academically. According to the Chicago Tribune, which has uncovered a host of examples of students getting admitted because of who they knew, not what they knew, the board chairman, Niranjan Shah, sought advantages for both relatives and friends. His resignation comes days before the investigative panel is expected to release a final report on the affair.
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Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Admissions, resignations, Scandal, trustees, U of Illinois
The Brownsville Herald: ‘Gross academic fraud’ at UTB-TSC rocked Office of Distance Education
A two-month UTB-TSC police investigation found school employees in 2008 had committed “gross academic fraud” after student employees and regular staff used their positions to steal test answers, according to a UTB police report obtained by The Brownsville Herald.
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Posted in Academics
Tagged Academic fraud, academic misconduct, U of Texas at Brownsville
CAUT: CAUT statement on Carleton University’s dismissal of Dr. Hassan Diab
(July 29, 2009) The Canadian Association of University Teachers condemns in the strongest possible terms the Carleton University administration’s unjust termination of the contract of Dr. Hassan Diab. The university’s actions show a blatant disregard of the principles of natural justice and due process, the legal right of an accused to the presumption of innocence, and the responsibility of a university to protect its autonomy from inappropriate outside pressure.
Dr. Diab has been accused of being involved in a bombing of a synagogue in Paris nearly three decades ago and is currently on bail awaiting an extradition hearing. The conditions of his bail permit him to work as an academic. The Carleton University administration was aware of Dr. Diab’s situation when he was hired to teach an introductory sociology class. However, after media reports of his employment at Carleton appeared this week and B’nai Brith issued a statement condemning the University for engaging him, the Carleton administration terminated his contract the next day, in the midst of a class he was teaching.
Carleton University’s actions represent a serious violation of basic rights and procedures. CAUT calls upon the university administration to immediately reinstate Dr. Diab.
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Posted in Faculty
Tagged Canada, Carleton U, Hassan Diab, Termination
Palo Alto Daily News: Former SLAC worker hoped to beat ‘bad karma’ by destroying research
A former SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory employee hoped to reverse her “bad karma” by destroying what amounted to $500,000 worth of research at the facility earlier this month, according to a criminal complaint and affidavit released by the FBI on Tuesday.
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Posted in Uncategorized
Press-Democrat: SSU foundation’s private land loans
Acting with little oversight, SSU nonprofit invested tens of millions of donors’ dollars in private loans for more than a decade; now critics are asking why
When Ruben Armiñana arrived as president at Sonoma State University in 1992, the SSU Academic Foundation was a tiny organization that helped professors apply for federal grants.
A year later, Armiñana ordered the foundation be transformed into a fund-raising machine, ending its role managing academic grants and turning it into a vehicle that would ultimately be used to pursue his vision of building a $110 million music center on campus.
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Posted in Administration
Tagged foundations, Sonoma State U
Chicago Tribune: University of Illinois trustee resigns over admissions scandal
Trustee Lawrence Eppley urges other board members to quit
A University of Illinois trustee’s resignation Tuesday made him the first casualty of the school’s high-profile admissions scandal, though fellow board members and those investigating abuses suggested that others are likely to fall.
Trustee Lawrence Eppley quit in a two-page letter to Gov. Pat Quinn that implored his fellow board members to step down along with him. He also urged administrators at the Urbana-Champaign campus to take responsibility for their actions in order to help the university regain the state’s trust.
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Posted in Administration, Ethics, Governance
Tagged Admissions, Scandal, U of Illinois
Canadian Press: Man wanted in France teaching at Carleton
Hassan Diab, who denies involvement in a fatal Paris synagogue bombing, returns to job while awaiting extradition hearing
An Ottawa university professor accused of playing a role in a deadly Paris bombing nearly three decades ago and currently awaiting an extradition hearing is back teaching at Carleton University.
Hassan Diab, 55, is teaching a part-time introduction to sociology summer course every Tuesday and Thursday for a few weeks, according to the university.
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Posted in Legal issues
Tagged bombings, Carlton U, extradition, Faculty, France, Ontario
Inside Higher Ed: Return of the Professor
Stephen D. Marlowe, the Edison Community College professor whose recent contract-violating layoff outraged faculty members, has been reinstated. Despite the victory, Marlowe and local union leaders express lingering dissatisfaction with the leadership of Kenneth A. Yowell, the institution’s president.
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Posted in Faculty
Tagged Edison Community College, Faculty, reinstatement, Termination
The Chronicle: France’s Professors Vow to Continue Fight Against Reform Efforts
Spray-painted banners fluttering in the windows of a central Paris building proclaim that “universities are not an enterprise” and “knowledge is not merchandise.”
A shadowy figure on a Metro platform darts forward to affix rainbow-tinted stickers to a departing train, protesting against government higher-education reforms and warning that they will cost institutions their independence.
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Posted in Protests
Tagged educational reform, Faculty, France, Protests
Daily 49er: Students unite against fee hikes, layoffs
CSU faculty and students formed a rally Tuesday to give ‘shame’ to the CSU board of trustees
Protesters shouted “Shame on you!” and other slogans at trustees as they entered the chancellor’s office in Long Beach on Tuesday.
Ainsley Sanchez wiped the sweat off her forehead and punched her fists in the air as she marched and chanted alongside students, faculty members and parents who showed up Tuesday to protest outside California State University Chancellor Charles Reed’s office.
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Posted in Protests
Tagged California, California State U, fee hikes, Layoffs, Organizing, Protests, Students
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U. of California Cuts: a Faculty Member’s Dispatch From the Front Lines
The Chronicle: U. of California Cuts: a Faculty Member’s Dispatch From the Front Lines
By Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom
Budget cuts at the University of California have generated a lot of attention, especially after a plan of across-the-board salary cuts, combined with mandatory furlough days, was recently announced. How will such drastic financial measures threaten the strengths of that system and other large public universities? Are certain fields of study in the humanities and social sciences especially vulnerable to state cuts because those areas of inquiry—even when dealing with topics of broad importance—rarely get large infusions of national, foundation, or corporate monies of the sort that routinely support work done in areas such as engineering and medicine?
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Posted in Budgets & Funding
Tagged Budget cuts, Budgets & Funding, Commentary, U of California