Category Archives: Governance

#FAUBC introduces mystery dean into #UBC crisis of administration #caut #highered #bced

Posted on August 22, 2015 by | Comments Off on #FAUBC introduces mystery dean into #UBC crisis of administration #caut #highered #bced

Curiously, when the Faculty Association of UBC called for the resignation of the Chair of the Board of Governors, it came short of calling for the resignation of the Dean who is cozying up to the Chair.

Specifically, the Chair of the Board also sits on a Faculty Advisory Council, and we are advised has been in communication with a Dean over internal operational and academic issues. This arrangement circumvents the formal organizational bicameral structure of the university…

Who is this mystery Dean? Why did the FAUBC fail to request her or his resignation along with the Chair of BoG? It takes two or three to tango here, as they say. Why hasn’t this Dean stepped forward to offer a resignation, having circumvented or transgressed faculty governance to ostensibly acquire capital or resources for her or his career and Faculty?

Just as the FAUBC bemoans the “absence of an informed explanation since the August 7th resignation” of President Gupta, it clouds communication with its members by raising the spectre of a mystery Dean. Exactly who is the mystery Dean?

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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Administration, Corruption, Faculty, Governance, Unions

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Hiring freeze on #UBC middle managers requested & rejected #highered #caut #bced #ubcnews

Posted on August 20, 2015 by | 1 comment

Over the past year, UBC instituted a series of austerity measures, including a hiring freeze, in various faculties to correct deficits. As a result, some academic units have been downsized or stagnant. For instance, the Department of Curriculum and Pedagogy has had only three tenure track faculty searches in six years, a stagnation that has done serious damage to faculty renewal and in effect, academic integrity.

Comparatively, the appointment of assistant and associate deans in the Faculty outpaced tenure track appointments in this Department. With the at whim appointment of directors added to the mix, the appointment of middle managers outpaced tenure track appointments by 3:1.

It has been frustrating and troubling that the University’s hiring chills and freezes are wink wink (i.e., preferential and selective). Hence, a request made in June to the Provost, pro tem to implement a hiring freeze on middle managers to curb the administrative bloat across the University system, Okanagan and Vancouver, was rejected out of hand. A hiring freeze on these middle managers would create a form of parity that might suggest the senior administrators acknowledge the mess they’re in.

Under the old and still current regime at UBC, a hiring freeze on middle managers was a pipe dream and dismissed with no discussion. But now, with the crisis of administration exposed by the resignation of President Gupta, it’s due time President Piper to put a check and balance on these at whim admin hires.

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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Administration, Budgets & Funding, Faculty, Governance, Working conditions

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How not to run a university (Prologue + Trilogy)

Posted on August 20, 2015 by | Comments Off on How not to run a university (Prologue + Trilogy)

Here are links to E. Wayne Ross’ commentaries on the ongoing leadership crisis at the University of British Columbia. All the commentaries have appeared on his blog and several have also appeared in the Vancouver Observer:

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Posted in Academic freedom, Academics, Accountability, Administration, Bullying & Mobbing, Commentary, Corporate University, Free speech, Governance

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#FAUBC calls for #UBC Chair of BoG resignation #highered

Posted on August 19, 2015 by | Comments Off on #FAUBC calls for #UBC Chair of BoG resignation #highered
FAUBC, August 19, 2015– The events at UBC following the unexplained resignation of Professor Arvind Gupta as President have been exceptional. Fallout from the resignation created the unprecedented situation in which the Chair of the Board of Governors is alleged to have compromised the academic freedom of a UBC faculty member. Academic administrators are also implicated in allegations surrounding this incident. Since these allegations came to our attention last Wednesday, we have been working hard to maintain the integrity of the normal labour relations processes we use at UBC to resolve our grievances. While these processes have been working well as we investigate the roles that various academic administrators have played in this case, established procedures have been compromised as they pertain to the alleged actions of the Chair.The concerns leading to this conclusion focus on the fact that the University itself has sidestepped standard protocols for handling grievances. More specifically, the Chair of the Board of Governors, the Board’s chief spokesperson, gave public, personal testimony related to the case in a University media release. We were shocked that this happened in a formal University media release posted on a University website. (This media release seems to have been removed from news.ubc.ca late Tuesday evening. We have a downloaded copy.) Mr. Montalbano has confused personal interests with the University’s interests.

As a result of this communication, we had earlier in the day decided to call for Mr. Montalbano to step aside during an investigation of the allegations against him.

By late afternoon, we became aware Mr. Montalbano was giving a series of interviews on radio and television, entirely in contradiction to the August 17th press release signed by Provost pro tem Anji Redish and Interim President Martha Piper in which it was affirmed that: “it would entirely be inappropriate to comment further on the allegations until this process has been concluded.”

And, yet, Mr. Montalbano was doing precisely this in his capacity as Chair of UBC’s Board of Governors.Finding a sound and proper process inside the University or with the Board for investigation of the concerns around Mr. Montalbano’s behaviours no longer seemed a viable option.While the University has publicly said that a grievance involving Mr. Montalbano could be managed under our usual collective agreement processes, this no longer seemed possible. Mr. Montalbano is a government appointee, not a University employee, so establishing and implementing a fair process to investigate the Chair of the Board of Governors given that Chair’s dominating presence in and apparent mobilization of the entire system in his own interest seemed challenging, to say the least.

Indeed, even though we had initiated our usual informal processes with the University in a way that made it clear that there were serious allegations against Mr. Montalbano, Mr. Montalbano did not step aside as Chair pending the conclusion of a full investigation.

We have lost confidence that there can be an internal investigation process uninfluenced by Mr. Montalbano, either within our usual labour relations processes or through a Board-driven process.

Consequently, we are calling for Mr. Montalbano’s immediate resignation as Chair of the Board of Governors. He has shown an inability to allow proper procedures to proceed and has used his office as Chair of the Board to engage personally and publicly with the issues under investigation. This behaviour is ill judged and threatens the integrity of ongoing processes.

We did not take this decision to request Mr. Montalbano’s resignation lightly. His handling of Professor Gupta’s resignation and his mismanagement of subsequent events are now compounded by breaches of standard protocols, and lead us to believe that his resignation will be in the best interests of the University and the public.

Please read our letter carefully.

Sincerely,
Mark Mac Lean
President

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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Corporate University, Critical University Studies, Faculty, Governance

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#USask VP resigns in wake of #academicfreedom scandal #edstudies #ubc #caut #aaup

Posted on May 20, 2014 by | Comments Off on #USask VP resigns in wake of #academicfreedom scandal #edstudies #ubc #caut #aaup

CBC News, May 20, 2014–Turmoil at the University of Saskatchewan is intensifying with the sudden resignation of the provost and academic vice-president Brett Fairbairn.

Word of Fairbairn’s resignation came half an hour before an emergency board of governors meeting, which started at 8 p.m. CST Monday.

In a written statement, Fairbairn said stepping down was “the best contribution I can now offer [the university] under present circumstances”.

Fairbairn is the official who wrote last Wednesday to Robert Buckingham, the head of the School of Public Health, firing him as both the school’s executive director and tenured professor, and ordering him off campus.

Demands for more departures

The move touched off an uproar over threats to academic freedom. The firing came after Buckingham openly voiced concerns about the impact on his school of the cost-cutting plan TransformUS.

Buckingham subsequently had his tenure restored, but not his administrative job.

Fairbairn’s resignation touched off a flurry of tweets, with some calling for more departures.

“That’s one down”, said one tweet. “President next?” said another.

‘A deepening controversy, if not crisis’– Minister of Advanced Education, Rob Norris

The province’s minister of advanced education, Rob Norris, spoke at the closed-door board meeting.

He emerged after about an hour, and spoke to the media before leaving for his constituency office.

Norris said he spoke to the board about his continuing concerns “regarding compliance with the University of Saskatchewan Act, and also what I see and what we see as a deepening controversy — if not crisis — regarding the national reputation and international reputation of the University of Saskatchewan.

“That reputational damage that continues is of very deep concern to us,” Norris added.

One section of the act requires senior administration to report to the board before the dismissal of suspension of individuals, “so there are real questions about the substance of that kind of report process, especially given, and in light of the reversal that took place, and some of the commentary around that reversal,” Norris explained.

He left it to the board to consider whether it had breached the act or not.

No violations, board chair says

Around midnight, board chair Susan Milburn emerged, and told reporters both the board and the administration have complied with the legislation.

Just before Milburn came out to speak, she released a written statement saying: “Tonight, we discussed the leadership of the university in depth. We do not want to act in haste and therefore we have not made any final decisions, other than to maintain our strong commitment to financial sustainability and renewal. We will conclude our due diligence before a decision is rendered on university leadership.”

Asked if the board is looking for any other resignations or dismissals, Milburn said, “We don’t want to make any hasty decisions.”

She confirmed the board has received outside legal advice, and that it will discuss the matter further when it meets again next Monday and Tuesday.

Faculty association condemns ‘veto’

One item not discussed Monday night was the demand by the faculty association to rescind a board decision giving the university president a “veto” on tenure decisions.

Faculty association chair Doug Chivers says that violates their collective agreement, which states it’s up to the board of governors to approve recommendations on tenure.

And, he said, that view has been upheld in a judicial review.

Milburn said the association’s demand was not on the agenda for Monday night’s meeting.

When asked about the faculty’s concern, Norris called it a ‘very serious allegation,’ and said his department is looking into it.

Read More: CBC News

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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Administration, Employment rights, Ethics, Governance, Students, Unions, Working conditions

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#CAUT begins censure of #UBC for course copyright policy #highered #bced #bcpoli #yteubc #criticaled

Posted on March 20, 2014 by | Comments Off on #CAUT begins censure of #UBC for course copyright policy #highered #bced #bcpoli #yteubc #criticaled
Faculty Association of UBC, March 20,  2014– At its meeting on March 14 & 15, the CAUT Academic Freedom and Tenure Committee considered UBC’s Policy 81 and all of the associated documentation.  Following that consideration, the committee voted unanimously to recommend to the CAUT Executive that it bring a motion to CAUT Council in early May to begin the censure process of the UBC Administration. If they approve the recommendation, the Executive would bring a motion to Council that “CAUT will censure the UBC Administration at its November 2014 Council meeting unless the University ends the policy that the University may use, revise, and allow other UBC Instructors to use and revise a faculty member’s teaching materials, unless the faculty member specifically prohibits such use.”
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Posted in Academic freedom, Administration, Corporate University, Employment rights, Faculty, Governance, Intellectual property, Legal issues, Protests, Shared governance, Students, Technology, Working conditions

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#UBC passes course copyright policy with minimal consultation #bced #bcpoli #highered #caut

Posted on February 26, 2014 by | Comments Off on #UBC passes course copyright policy with minimal consultation #bced #bcpoli #highered #caut

The University of British Columbia’s Board of Governors passed a new “Use of Teaching Materials” policy on February 26 with minimal consultation with the Faculty Association of UBC (FAUBC). Unless faculty members indicate on course materials that their use is protected or unless they file “a prescribed Use of Teaching Materials form” form each course each time its offered, the University now claims the right to use the materials as administrators see fit:

…if a UBC Instructor makes his/her Teaching Materials available for use by others, unless that UBC Instructor places restrictions upon the Teaching Materials he/she shares in accordance with Section 2, UBC may, through its Faculties, Departments and individual Instructors, use, revise, and allow other UBC Instructors to use and revise the Teaching Materials to facilitate ongoing offerings of Credit Courses. The contribution of all UBC Instructors to the development of such Teaching Materials will be acknowledged in accordance with accepted scholarly standards unless the UBC Instructors advise UBC, at any time, that they do not wish such acknowledgement.

FAUBC President Nancy Langton cautioned faculty members:

If you share your teaching materials without taking any additional steps, you will be deemed to have given permission for anyone in the UBC teaching community to use and revise your materials at will. This deemed consent is irrevocable. It is not clear what the policy means when it refers to “sharing” teaching materials. This may include situations such as if someone asks to see your syllabus, or a case you wrote, or you post your materials on a public website.

In addition, you will have to ask UBC to “relinquish the rights” it will apparently acquire through Policy 81 prior to trying to publish your teaching materials. Although you will still technically own the copyright, this a hollow right if others may use and/or revise your material without your explicit agreement or permission.  Generally, under the Copyright Act, only a copyright owner can use, revise, or reproduce a copyrighted work or give others permission to do so.  We do not believe that Policy 81 is fully compatible with your rights as copyright owners under the Copyright Act.

The Association very much supports the notion of sharing teaching materials, and many of us do that. But traditionally, letting someone see your syllabus (or case, etc.) has not been equivalent to granting that person the legal right to use and revise the material as they see fit. Under the new policy, that’s what this will mean.

While the policy was being developed, the Association advised the University that the only acceptable version of Policy 81 is one that would involve opting into the policy, rather than opting out. Under an opt-in policy, members who want to share their teaching materials for others to use and revise without the copyright owner’s permission could mark them as such. The University refused this compromise. Instead, if you do not opt-out, your deemed consent to the use and revision of your teaching material is irrevocable.

The Association advises you that, given Policy 81, if you do not wish others to have the right to use, revise and/or reproduce your teaching materials, it is important that you mark anything that you do share in a manner that indicates that the material is for reference only.

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Posted in Academic freedom, Administration, BC Education, Employment rights, Governance, Intellectual property, Technology, Working conditions

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Overuse and Abuse of Adjunct Faculty #highered #adjunct #edstudies #criticaled #ubc #bced #bcpoli

Posted on February 10, 2014 by | Comments Off on Overuse and Abuse of Adjunct Faculty #highered #adjunct #edstudies #criticaled #ubc #bced #bcpoli

Richard Moser, Chronicle of Higher Education, January 13, 2014– The increasing exploitation of contingent faculty members is one dimension of an employment strategy sometimes called the “two-tiered” or “multitiered” labor system.

This new labor system is firmly established in higher education and constitutes a threat to the teaching profession. If left unchecked, it will undermine the university’s status as an institution of higher learning because the overuse of adjuncts and their lowly status and compensation institutionalize disincentives to quality education, threaten academic freedom and shared governance, and disqualify the campus as an exemplar of democratic values. These developments in academic labor are the most troubling expressions of the so-called corporatization of higher education.

“Corporatization” is the name sometimes given to what has happened to higher education over the last 30 years. Corporatization is the reorganization of our great national resources, including higher education, in accordance with a shortsighted business model. Three decades of decline in public funding for higher education opened the door for increasing corporate influence, and since then the work of the university has been redirected to suit the corporate vision.

The most striking symptoms of corporatization shift costs and risks downward and direct capital and authority upward. Rising tuition and debt loads for students limit access to education for working-class students. The faculty and many other campus workers suffer lower compensation as the number of managers, and their pay, rises sharply. Campus management concentrates resources on areas where wealth is created, and new ideas and technologies developed at public cost become the entitlement of the corporate sector. The privatization and outsourcing of university functions and jobs from food service to bookstores to instruction enrich a few businessmen and create more low-wage nonunion jobs. Increasingly authoritarian governance practices have become the “new normal.”

Read More: Chronicle of Higher Ed

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Posted in Academic freedom, Academics, Accountability, Adjuncts & Sessionals, Administration, Advocacy, BC Education, Contingent labor, Corporate University, Critical University Studies, Economics, Employment rights, Equity, Ethics, Governance, Job market, Organizing, Solidarity, Student Movement, Students, Working conditions

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Academic job market decimated, crashing #highered #edstudies #criticaled #caut #aaup #bced #bcpoli

Posted on February 10, 2014 by | 1 comment

Oftentimes, the academic job market for full-time (FT) faculty is inversely related to economic recessions. Not anymore. In this prolonged Great Recession, turned Great Depression II in parts of North America and across the world, youth have been particularly hard hit, more pronounced by race. The most common description for this current economy for youth is “a precipitous decline in employment and a corresponding increase in unemployment.” In Canada and the US, unemployment rates for the 16-19 year olds exceeds 25%. At the same time, one of the most common descriptions for postsecondary enrollment and participation in Canada and the US is “tremendous growth at the undergraduate level… the number of graduate students has grown significantly faster than the number of undergraduate students over the last 30 years.” With “school-to-work” and “youth employment” oxymoronic, corporate academia and the education industry are capitalizing on masses of students returning to desperately secure advanced credentials in hard times, but no longer does this matter to the professoriate.

If higher education enrollment has been significant, increases in online or e-learning enrollment have been phenomenal. Postsecondary institutions in North America commonly realized 100% increases in online course enrollment from the early 2000s to the present with the percentage of total registrations increasing to 25% for some universities. In Canada, this translates to about 250,000 postsecondary students currently taking online courses but has not translated into FT faculty appointments. More pointedly, it has eroded the FT faculty job market and fueled the part-time (PT) job economy of higher education. About 50% of all faculty in North America are PT but this seems to jump to about 85%-90% for those teaching online courses. For example, in the University of British Columbia’s (UBC) Master of Educational Technology (MET), where there are nearly 1,000 registrations per year, 85% of all sections are taught by PT faculty. In its decade of existence, not a single FT faculty member has been hired for this revenue generating program. Mirroring trends across North America, support staff doubling as adjunct or sessional teach about 45% of MET courses in addition to their 8:30-4:30 job functions in the service units. These indicators are of a larger scope of trends in the automation of intellectual work.

Given these practices across Canada, in the field of Education for example, there has been a precipitous decline in employment of FT faculty, which corresponds with the precipitous decline in employment of youth (Figure 1). Education is fairly reflective of the overall academic job market for doctorates in Canada. Except for short-term trends in certain disciplines, the market for PhDs is bleak. Trends and an expansion of the Great Recession predict that the market will worsen for graduates looking for FT academic jobs in all disciplines. A postdoctoral appointment market is very unlikely to materialize at any scale to offset trends. For instance, Education at UBC currently employs just a handful (i.e., 4-5) of postdocs.

To put it in mild, simple terms: Universities changed their priorities and values by devaluing academic budget lines. Now in inverse relationship to the increases in revenue realized by universities through the 2000s, academic budgets were progressively reduced from 40% or more to just around 20% for many of these institutions. One indicator of this trend is the expansion of adjunct labor or PT academics. In some colleges or faculties, such as Education at UBC, the number of PT faculty, which approached twice that of FT in 2008, teach from 33% to 85% of all sections, depending on the program.

Another indicator is the displacement of tenure track research faculty by non-tenure track, teaching-intensive positions. For example, in Education at UBC, about 18 of the last 25 FT faculty hires were for non-tenure track teaching-intensive positions (i.e., 10 courses per year for Instructor, Lecturer, etc.). This was partially to offset a trend of PT faculty hires pushing Education well over its faculty salary budget (e.g., 240 PT appointments in 2008). Measures in North America have been so draconian that the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) was compelled to report in 2010 that “the tenure system has all but collapsed…. the proportion of teaching-intensive to research-intensive appointments has risen sharply. However, the majority of teaching-intensive positions have been shunted outside of the tenure system.” What is faculty governance, other than an oligarchy, with a handful of faculty governing or to govern?

Read More: Petrina, S. & Ross, E. W. (2014). Critical University Studies: Workplace, Milestones, Crossroads, Respect, Truth. Workplace, 23, 62-71.

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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Adjuncts & Sessionals, Administration, BC Education, Contingent labor, Corporate University, Critical University Studies, Economics, Employment rights, Equity, Faculty, Governance, Job market, Organizing, Research, Solidarity, Student Movement, Students, Technology, Working conditions

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Equity, Governance, Economics and Critical University Studies #criticaled #edstudies #ubc #bced #yteubc

Posted on February 10, 2014 by | Comments Off on Equity, Governance, Economics and Critical University Studies #criticaled #edstudies #ubc #bced #yteubc

Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor
Equity, Governance, Economics and Critical University Studies
No 23 (2014)

As we state in our Commentary, “This Issue marks a couple of milestones and crossroads for Workplace. We are celebrating fifteen years of dynamic, insightful, if not inciting, critical university studies (CUS). Perhaps more than anything, and perhaps closer to the ground than any CUS publication of this era, Workplace documents changes, crossroads, and the hard won struggles to maintain academic dignity, freedom, justice, and integrity in this volatile occupation we call higher education.” Workplace and Critical Education are published by the Institute for Critical Education Studies (ICES).

Commentary

  • Critical University Studies: Workplace, Milestones, Crossroads, Respect, Truth
    • Stephen Petrina & E. Wayne Ross

Articles

  • Differences in Black Faculty Rank in 4-Year Texas Public Universities: A Multi-Year Analysis
    • Brandolyn E Jones & John R Slate
  • Academic Work Revised: From Dichotomies to a Typology
    • Elias Pekkola
  • No Free Set of Steak Knives: One Long, Unfinished Struggle to Build Education College Faculty Governance
    • Ishmael Munene & Guy B Senese
  • Year One as an Education Activist
    • Shaun Johnson
  • Rethinking Economics Education: Challenges and Opportunities
    • Sandra Ximena Delgado-Betancourth
  • Review of Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think
    • C. A. Bowers
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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Adjuncts & Sessionals, Administration, BC Education, Budgets & Funding, Contingent labor, Critical University Studies, Diversity, Economics, Employment rights, Equity, Ethics, Free speech, Governance, Job market, Organizing, Publications, Research, Solidarity, Student Movement, Students, Technology, Working conditions

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Canadian universities sacrifice principles in pursuing collaborations #bced #bcpoli #education

Posted on November 20, 2013 by | Comments Off on Canadian universities sacrifice principles in pursuing collaborations #bced #bcpoli #education

CAUT, November 20, 2013– In their drive to attract new revenues by collaborating with corporations, donors, and governments, Canadian universities are entering into agreements that place unacceptable limits on academic freedom and sacrifice fundamental academic principles, according to a report released today by the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT).

Open for Business: On What Terms examines twelve research and program collaboration agreements between universities, corporations, donors and governments to determine if universities have protected their academic integrity.

“Our findings should raise alarm bells on campuses across the country,” said CAUT executive director James Turk. “In the majority of the agreements we reviewed, universities have agreed to terms that violate basic academic values.”

According to Turk, seven of the twelve agreements provide no specific protection for academic freedom, and only one requires the disclosure of conflicts of interest. Only five of the agreements give academic staff the unrestricted right to publish their research findings and just half provide that the university maintains control over academic matters affecting staff and students.

“Universities have allowed private donor and corporate partners to take on roles that should be played by academic staff,” stated Turk. “They have signed agreements that side-step traditional university decision-making processes and undermine academic freedom.”

The report concludes by recommending a set of guiding principles for university collaborations to better protect academic integrity and the public interest.

“Collaborations can be beneficial to faculty, students, institutions, and the public, but only if they are set up properly,” Turk added.  “Universities owe it to the academic community and to the public to do more to safeguard the independence and integrity of teaching and research.”

The research and program collaborations examined in the report were:

  • Alberta Ingenuity Centre for In-Situ Energy (AICISE)
  • Centre for Oil Sands Innovation (COSI)
  • Consortium for Heavy Oil Research by University Scientists (CHORUS)
  • Consortium for Research and Innovation in Aerospace in Quebec (CRIAQ)
  • Enbridge Centre for Corporate Sustainability
  • Mineral Deposit Research Unit (MDRU)
  • Vancouver Prostate Centre
  • Balsillie School of International Affairs
  • Munk School of Global Affairs
  • Partnership: University of Ontario Institute of Technology/Durham College/Ontario Power Generation
  • Partnership: University of Toronto/Pierre Lassonde—Goldcorp Inc.
  • Partnership: Western University/Cassels Brock & Blackwell LLP

Copies of the report are available on-line.

The Canadian Association of University Teachers is the national voice of more than 68,000 academic and general staff at over 120 universities and colleges across the country.

– See more at: CAUT

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Posted in Academic freedom, Administration, Economics, Faculty, Free speech, Governance, Intellectual property, Legal issues, Politics, Students, Working conditions

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UBC Sauder Business admin, still no accountability? #ubc #ubcsauderschool #mba #bcpoli #bced #yteubc

Posted on November 16, 2013 by | Comments Off on UBC Sauder Business admin, still no accountability? #ubc #ubcsauderschool #mba #bcpoli #bced #yteubc

Call this and this research, call it evaluative opinion, call the facts, facts. Perhaps cheer-fully, perhaps not, UBC campus waits for accountability over the Sauder rape cheer.

Thus far, President Toope’s Measures fail to effect any form of accountability at the top. For example, the last measure, “[Dean] Helsley announced that the Sauder School of Business will no longer support the CUS FROSH events,” is meaningless, if according to a.nony.mouse in the Ubyssey comments section, “the CUS is its own entity and operates separately from the administration, something that has also been made clear in all investigative documents to date.”

I guess it is plausible that former Dean Muzyka micro-managed the students for over a decade and once he left, the repressed returned and they went wild, so to speak. But I don’t buy this narrative.

Instead, I stand with Nathan in the Ubyssey comments, “there is some fault on the part of the administration.” There may be, as Harbinder says, a “culture of shallowness” and as I say a “culture of entitlement.” For the record, I’ve worked with excellent students and faculty from Sauder, but evidently something (or someone) is failing at the top.

The facts speak: In the fact-finding report, curiously, the words “administration” and “administrator” do not appear while “student/s” appears 46 times. There were no facts to find on administrators or administration?

If it is plausible that of the 11 Assistant and Associate Deans + Dean Helsley, none have responsibilities for “students” in their portfolio, then the President’s Office has failed. That’s a fact of administrative bloat: Between 1999 and 2013, this Faculty’s administrators at that level more than doubled. Yes, Sauder has Dean Muzyka to thank. And increasing tuition and fees have that to factor in. Yet none of these 12 now have any responsibilities for students? I don’t buy that. So is the buck or loonie passed back to the Sauder Dean’s Office?

Similarly, someone or something is failing at the top if of the 12 senior administrators none have curriculum in their portfolio. I find it incomprehensible that it has taken this cheer, a fact-finding report, campus outrage, and nearly 2014 for Sauder to finally get around to, announced on 1 November by Dean Helsley, “Implementing changes in the curriculum to enhance themes of social justice, ethics, gender and cultural sensitivity, and their role in corporate social responsibility and the creation of a civil society”?

A top business school finally getting around to this? In this economy and world? There are 12 senior administrators and none have curriculum and courses in their portfolio? What exactly are they doing? Not all can be running around consulting, like Bob Sutton, teaching CEOs how not to be assholes.

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Posted in Academic freedom, Accountability, Administration, Campus Life, Commentary, Environment, Equity, Ethics, Governance, Research, Students, Working conditions

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Decolonizing initiatives to accompany police presence at #UBC #yteubc #idlenomore #bced #occupyeducation

Posted on November 8, 2013 by | Comments Off on Decolonizing initiatives to accompany police presence at #UBC #yteubc #idlenomore #bced #occupyeducation

Wei Laii, The Ubyssey, November 6, 2013– As a student who had studied at UBC, I am very displeased with the lack of new educational initiatives in response to the six reported cases of sexual assault against young women on the UBC campus.

I do not need armed officers with a saviour complex to harass me about how I can make their jobs easier and become more grateful by policing myself. I resist slut profiling, racial profiling and all other tactics informed by colonial oppression.

Granted, not all officers have been resistant to practicing anti-oppressive solidarity and responsibility. However, we need to look to recent news and examine our police force as an institution with an organizational culture of colonial oppressive values — including but not limited to gender policing, systemic sexual assault against indigenous women and the colonial construction of their bodies such acts require, and insidious systemic misogyny within the RCMP.

It’s important to acknowledge that we need a lot more than increased arrests, criminalization and demonization of perpetrators of violence. An increased police presence alone does not ensure students’ feelings and realities of safety, physical, emotional and cultural. At best, police presence is a bandage solution that makes some students feel safer, others less safe and retraumatized, and it may deter public acts of physical violence.

In our society, systems of oppression include but are not limited to white settler colonialism, ableism, Eurocentricism, heterosexism, cissexism and hegemonic masculinities.

In the cases of UBC Vancouver and UBC Okanagan, the operation of some of these systems on both campuses have been documented in “Implementing Inclusion,” a report released by UBC in May 2013. The report presents “the substance of concerns voiced to [UBC] during the consultation process that pertain to the lived experiences of students, alumni, staff and faculty at both campuses” and includes concerns about race and ethnicity, gender and transgender and disability. If not to become a place of advocacy in the world, UBC must at least become a place of good mind, by dealing with oppression in its own backyard where students are suffering and ill.

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Posted in Accountability, Administration, BC Education, Campus Life, Environment, Equity, Ethics, Governance, Human Rights, Idle No More, Protests, Student Movement, Students, Working conditions

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UBC Sauder admin should step up #ubcsauderschool #mba #bcpoli #bced #ubc #yteubc

Posted on November 7, 2013 by | Comments Off on UBC Sauder admin should step up #ubcsauderschool #mba #bcpoli #bced #ubc #yteubc

Ubyssey Staff, The Ubyssey, November 6, 2013– Sauder School of Business dean Robert Helsley said at a press conference on Monday that he was still hopeful his students would fund the remaining $200,000 of the $250,000 commitment he coerced from the CUS leadership and told the the media about on Sept. 18 — before anyone had a chance to vote on whether to put the quarter of a million dollars toward unclear goals.

Since students just voted down the funding by a margin of three to one, this seems unlikely. And it’s understandable why they rejected the referendum: it’s a vague commitment to a vague and unnecessary position that was conceived only to placate the local and national media who pounced on Sauder after The Ubyssey broke the CUS FROSH rape cheer story.

This crude public relations stunt has failed. Stop trying to make fetch happen, Robert.

Anything Sauder does in response to the chant and the cultural problems it points to should be a well thought out and meaningful contribution to changing the atmosphere around sexual violence on campus and in the business school. The proposed curriculum changes Helsley has announced will require followup, but they seem like a good start.

Sauder also said they will bridge the gap in funding between what the CUS can pledge over their objection of their members — $50,000 this year, $100,000 over the next two years if they choose — and how much it would cost to hire a new counsellor, or whatever the money was planned to go toward. We’ll see.

“We’re looking for some leadership,” Helsley told the media.

Us too. Perhaps it’s time to look in the mirror, Bob.

Read More: The Ubyssey

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Posted in Academic freedom, Administration, Ethics, Faculty, Governance, Politics, Protests, Students

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An accountability cheer for UBC #ubcsauderschool #mba #bcpoli #bced #ubc #yteubc

Posted on November 7, 2013 by | 1 comment

The Ubyssey, November 6, 2013

All together now: A.D.M.I.N.!

A is for we like Accountability!
D is for it will be Deferred!
M is for the Money that runs the show!
I is always for I point the other way when the heat is on!

All together now!

UBC President Stephen Toope and Sauder School of Business dean Robert Helsley, how accountable is it to let two student executives of the Commerce Undergraduate Society (CUS) take the fall for the Sauder rape cheer?

At Saint Mary’s University, where a similar cheer took place, Student Union president Jared Perry said, “I tender my resignation.”

At UBC, Enzo Woo and Gillian Ong, president and VP engagement of the CUS respectively, resigned.

All together now: A.D.M.I.N.!

A is for we like Accountability!
D is for it will be Deferred!

A month and a rushed fact-finding report later, the administration at UBC remains entrenched solely in damage control. Curiously, the words “administration” and “administrator” do not appear in the fact-finding report [“student/s” appears 46 times].

Protect the brand! Especially now. Especially for commerce. No resignations, no accountability.

However, amidst the smoking guns and smoking pipes of politics back east, UBC’s rape chant is still making headlines.

On Oct. 31, the CUS rejected a referendum to approve a $200,000 allocation for student counselling and education on sexual abuse and violence.

Still talking but not walking, Helsley issued yet another statement that he was predictably “deeply disappointed.” Why? Maybe because it is time for Helsley to walk and for Toope to walk the talk.

From all optics, it is the students who are taking care of business — resigning, reflecting, self-governing, voting and regrouping. Students have realized that lines were crossed and are dealing with it. Given the rejection of the referendum, are the students simply saying they are dealing with their own behaviour?

Administrators, figure out what your role is for oversight of students in the 21st century. Enough of remaining “deeply disappointed” that students are not assuming your accountability.

There is an apparent culture of entitlement within Commerce. That may be why neither the president’s office nor the Sauder dean’s office have tendered resignations, cut salaries or revoked budget lines. We dare not conclude that atrocious chants originate or thrive within these cultures, yet one may draw conclusions that a culture of entitlement hurts accountability at the top in times like these.

This entitlement is apparent when faculty contracts are negotiated, with Sauder’s breakaway faculty association independently bargaining for bigger pieces of the pie for themselves; when the Sauder chief is appointed to oversee the University’s budget; and when its bloated administrative lines are sacred.

Yet to this moment in the throes of the rape chant controversy, not a single Commerce administrator has resigned, and the President has pulled not a single line.

Potentia ad Populum,

Stephen Petrina, professor

Read More: The Ubyssey

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Capilano University instructors & students protest program cuts

Posted on April 28, 2013 by | Comments Off on Capilano University instructors & students protest program cuts

Capilano University arts instructor Toni Latour stands with art students outside of the studio arts building at the North Vancouver campus. Photograph by: Mike Wakefield, NS NEWS

CBC News, April 27, 2013 — Students and faculty at Capilano University’s studio art program are using today’s graduation to protest the university’s decision to cut the program.

“This program is so amazing… teachers, everyone they encourage you, they push you through stuff, they push you to go beyond your limits,” said student Samineh Afrough.

At the graduation showcase, students covered their art with black shrouds and gathered several hundred signatures at the popular Go Craft fair.

On Friday, Capilano University announced that it is cutting several programs as the school faces an estimated $1.3 million shortfall in its upcoming budget.

The school would not specify which departments are being cut, but said it amounted to about 200 courses from about 10 programs, including the Studio Art, Textiles, Software Design, Computer Science and Commerce.

Under the proposed budget, students half-way through their programs will have the chance to finish. But after they graduate, the programs will be cut.

Interim Vice President, Academic and Provost Bill Gibson says it was a tough decision.

“Every program we offer should lead to a degree and at this point in time studio art did not lead to a degree,” said Gibson.

The final decision on program cuts is expected next month, but faculty say the decision came suddenly without consultation.

“I am appalled. It strikes me as being utterly senseless,” said Instructor Marcus Bowcott, who has been teaching Studio Art at Capilano for two decades.

Read More: CBC News

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Posted in Advocacy, BC Education, Budgets & Funding, Governance, Organizing, Politics, Protests, Solidarity, Student Movement, Students

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“Academic Theory behind Idle No More” @ National Post

Posted on January 12, 2013 by | Comments Off on “Academic Theory behind Idle No More” @ National Post

As if Idle No More can be reduced to academic theory, today’s National Post went a step further and reduced the academic theory to “indigenism.” Drawing on an analysis from University of Calgary professor an ex-advisor to the Harper government Tom Flanagan, the Post strikes a defensive tone from the start: “It is a realm in which it is uncontroversial to call Canada an illegitimate, racist, colonial power, or to claim its government is now engaged in the genocide of its native peoples, or that non-native Canadians, especially those of European descent, are “colonizers,” at best blind to their own bigotry and privilege.” Flanagan concludes that this is “standard fare among the academic left.” “That’s what’s driving Idle No More,” he says. “It’s not new. This whole vision was widely articulated during the hearings on the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples.” Read more: National Post.

Rather than begging a question of academic theories behind the movement, the Post would be much better off covering the movement behind the theories or asking whether theorists are now poised to invite and welcome the movement to the doorsteps and inside the halls of academia.

All of this begs the question of whether students, this year nationally, will have the politics such as that  demonstrated in force across Quebec from February through August to sustain their foothold on Idle No More. As Algonquin journalist Martin Lukacs wrote last year in “Quebec student protests mark ‘Maple spring’ in Canada,” “the fault-lines of the struggle over education — dividing those who preach it must be a commodity purchased by “consumers” for self-advancement, and those who would protect it as a right funded by the state for the collective good — has thus sparked a fundamental debate about the entire society’s future…. Little wonder students’ imagination was stirred by the past year of world rebellion. That inspiration has been distilled in the movement’s main slogan, “Printemps érable,” a clever play on words that literally means Maple Spring but sounds like Arab Spring.”

Indeed, the Quebec student association ASSÉ released a statement yesterday committing to solidarity with indigenous students and Idle No More: “We stand in solidarity with Idle No More. We stand in solidarity with Indigenous hunger strikers Theresa Spence, Emil Bell, Raymond Robinson, Aniesh Vollant and Janet Pilot from the Quebec Innu community of Uashat, and others whose names we have not yet learned.”

“If 2012 was the year of our Maple Spring, we are ready to greet the Native spring of 2013.”

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Posted in Academic freedom, Administration, Advocacy, Campus Life, Equity, Governance, Government, Human Rights, Idle No More, Media, Protests, Solidarity, Student Movement, Students

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New Issue of Workplace Launched

Posted on August 1, 2012 by | Comments Off on New Issue of Workplace Launched

Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor has just published Issue #20, “The New Academic Manners, Managers, and Spaces.”  This issue includes key conceptual and empirical analyses of

  • the creation and avoidance of unions in academic and business workplaces (Vincent Serravallo)
  • the new critiquette, impartial response to Bruno Latour and Jacques Ranciere’s critique of critique (Stephen Petrina)
  • the two-culture model of the modern university in full light of the crystal, neural university (Sean Sturm, Stephen Turner)
  • alternative narratives of accountability in response to neo-liberal practices of government (Sandra Mathison)
  • vertical versus horizontal structures of governance (Rune Kvist Olsen)
  • teachers in nomadic spaces and Deleuzian approaches to curricular practice (Tobey Steeves)

Workplace Issue #20 Table of Contents:

Parallel Practices of Union Avoidance in Business and Academia

The New Critiquette and Old Scholactivism: A Petit Critique of Academic Manners, Managers, Matters, and Freedom

Cardinal Newman in the Crystal Palace – The Idea of the University Today

Working Toward a Different Narrative of Accountability: A Report from British Columbia

The DemoCratic Workplace: Empowering People (demos) to Rule (cratos) Their Own Workplace

Bridges to Difference & Maps of Becoming: An Experiment with Teachers in Nomadic Spaces for Education in British Columbia

We invite you to review Issue #20 for articles and items of interest. Thanks for the continuing interest in Workplace (we welcome new manuscripts here and Critical Education),

Institute for Critical Education Studies (ICES)
Workplace Blog

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Posted in Academic freedom, BC Education, Employment rights, Governance, Government, K-12 issues, Solidarity, Strikes & Labor Disputes, Unions, Working conditions

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Visions of a Bologna-Type Agreement Across the Americas

Posted on October 22, 2010 by | Comments Off on Visions of a Bologna-Type Agreement Across the Americas

The Chronicle: A Common Higher-Education Framework for the Americas Is Envisioned, but Some Wonder Who Might Lose Out

Some 700 university representatives from 40 countries have gathered here this week to work toward the creation of a common higher-education space of the Americas, similar to the Bologna agreement in Europe. Yet few of those attending have a clear idea of what such a system would entail, and some even question whether it is really desirable.

Proponents argue that greater regional integration is both inevitable and necessary. “We have to build this space, not to copy Europe, but for our own survival,” said Raúl Arias Lovillo, president of the Inter-American Organization for Higher Education, one of three hosts of the first Conference of the Americas on International Education.

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SC keeps lone black trustee on university board

Posted on April 15, 2010 by | Comments Off on SC keeps lone black trustee on university board

The State: SC keeps lone black trustee on university board

COLUMBIA, S.C. — State lawmakers voted to retain the only black member of the University of South Carolina’s board of trustees Wednesday in a vote that drew attention to the board’s lack of diversity and threatened the school’s football recruiting.
Leah Moody, an attorney, was elected by an 80-77 vote to continue to represent York and Union counties. She defeated Alton Hyatt, a white pharmacist and lawyer who was considered a favorite last month before black lawmakers decried the prospect of losing Moody.

Read more: http://www.thestate.com/2010/04/14/1243066/legislators-could-elect-all-white.html#ixzz0lBQZbXfu

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Posted in Administration, Diversity, Governance

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