Treacy: This is just another chapter in what I call the LEANING AND
MEANING of America. We have started to experience a lot of rapid
change due to large drops in transportation costs along with cuts
in information costs. It has hit every sector in our society
with varying degrees of impact causing a great deal of unease.
We have seen the collapse of the EVIL EMPIRE, which could not
hide the fact that the FSU( Former Soviet Union in World Bank
speak) was going into the crapper. George Bush got whacked by
this because he thought the recession was caused by Saddam when it
was just the market reacting to expectations about what was going
to happen to Defense Spending. He listened to the CIA who needed
the evil empire!
We have seen one industry after another, Steel, coal, autoes,
restructure in the face of more competition and rapid acceptance
of techologic change. This in turn has lead to questioning about
lots of other U.S. INSTITUTIONS. On the leaning and meaning list
are M.D.s and other medical care providers who had grown fat from
feeding off the BIG TUNA programs.
We have also in the era of more and cheaper information started
to gain increased evidence that many of our educational
institutions have not been doing the job they claimed to be doing.
Witness the fact that a school district outside Pittsburg has
hired a for profit firm to run one of their elementry schools.
Wisconsin has a voucher law tied up in court but private sources
have funded scholarships for ghetto kids in parocial schools.
To suggest that our universities are bastions of efficiency in
this mileau is not likely to win much public sympathy. We have
seen too many sections run by green, none English speaking G.A.s
and administrative structures that have Asst. Deans writing memos
to other Asst. Deans etc. We also have failed to recognize the
fact that computers have had great impacts on libraries and on
secretarial staffs.
I recently had a chat with my Dean who told me another department
wanted another secretary. The large number of scholarly papers
was advanced as the reason for this need. I laughed that our
Department had twice the number of faculty who had turned out four
times the number of papers with the same number of secretaries.
The difference is that everyone uses a computer in our
department, the local network, the wide area network. I told him
that I would make an offer to supply some computers and an
invitation to enter the 21 century to this chairman.
Some places will restructure well and others will do it badly. I
like being able to search our card catologue, the Journal of
Economic Literture, and listing of all other state universities
from this machine. To wring your hands and say any changes are
bad is to invite righteous credulity from the tax payers.
In time the cycle will swing back to one of optimism and crying
Chicken Little wails of gloom and doom will not delay this process.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] COPYRIGHTED
On Fri, 1 Sep 1995, John B Exdell wrote:
> I sent this message a week ago and it didn't get through when the PEN
> list crashed. I am very eager for response, as there is a faculty
> meeting here coming up next Thursday.
>
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> Date: Fri, 25 Aug 1995 16:43:33 -0500 (CDT)
> From: John B Exdell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: university reform
>
> The administration at Kansas State University is asking the faculty to
> begin a dialogue on major changes in university governance, faculty
> workloads, post-tenure review, and other matters. The starting point
> for this discussion is an article by William Plater, dead of faculties at
> Purdue, entitled "Future Work," published in the May/June issue of
> _Change_. We're told that this essay is circulating among university
> administrators around the nation, and having a major influence on their
> strategic planning.
>
> There is much in this essay that is disturbing, and I am asking for help in
> framing a response. Plater claims: (1) There are major social and
> technological forces that are putting our universities in crisis, and
> that major changes in internal organization and mission are now
> required. (2) University faculty, even though working hard, are not
> using their time well, and the university is no longer efficiently
> meeting public needs. (3) Faculty research can no longer determined by
> the interests of the individual faculty member, but must now be related
> to the instituional mission and externally determined public purposes.
> (E.g., "As an English professor, I might prefer to pursue my interests in
> the application of social theory to the intrpretation of contemporary
> literature, but my university has the right to ask me to also pursue
> other topics that better match its misssion.") (4) Post-tenure review is
> unavoidable. (5) Faculty governance is inconsistent with the efficient
> use of faculty time to meet the mission of the university. And much
> more. Not everything in this article is wrong or sinister, but there is
> a lot to worry about.
>
> I need some resources helpful in analyzing this agenda and fashioning a
> response to it. Specifically, I need some analysis of the social and
> economic forces that are affecting university budgets and diminishing
> public support. I also need some good analysis of the interests that are
> pushing this "reform" agenda. I am not interested in defending the
> status quo. It would be very helpful therefore to get some references to
> good progressive critiques of the university that can be used in
> proposing an alternative vision. I would of course also appreciate
> commentary on this subject, if this has not already occurred on PEN.
>
>
