Honest and Empty

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“There will always be some leaders who choose to manage for the short term … particularly when they hold the highly liquid equity stakes that the leadership of private-sector institutions sometimes receive as part of their compensation. This isn’t a theoretical issue; it has happened.”

Andrew Rossen, quoted in ‘Change.edu’ and the Problem With For-Profits by Robert M. Shireman

I work in the proprietary sector, and I think that Rossen is correct. You cannot offer huge salaries and bonuses for short=term profitability and expect executives and managers to think long-term. In such a situation, as Shireman rightly points out, “The temptations to do ill are unrelenting.” Interestingly, Shireman calls Rosen’s ideas both “refreshingly honest” and “empty.” It’s hard to disagree.

What I don’t like about Shireman, though,  and other critics of the for-profit sector, is that they do not go far enough. This is a systemic problem of neoliberalism’s relentless market religion. It’s certainly true that our sector of the education system needs strong regulation.  At this point in history, though, it should be obvious that the entire system, profit or not, needs similar reforms.

Posted in: Economics, Professional, Writing

“Our working conditions are student’s learning conditions”

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I often fell like a curmudgeon, trolling around and finding stories about things like the crazy Hench-woman, Lisa Troyer, who resigned after it was suspect– and then more or less demonstrated– that she had sent anonymous email in an attempt to manipulate the faculty governing process.  A recent UI Faculty Senate resolution called Troyer’s actions part of  ‘”a broad pattern of surveillance and intrusion into legitimate faculty governance deliberations” (“UI senate unanimous in criticism of Hogan“).

That’s bourgeois professor speak for “systemic corruption.”  As an anecdote for cynicism, then, I try to do some reading about positive things, trends that seem to be moving education in a good direction.  I liked “The Time is Now: Report from the New Faculty Majority Summit” for its wonderfully strident call for action. I wish the author would focus more or organizing and less on lobbying and accreditation but I cannot disagree with Bessette‘s call to begin to make university labor exploitation more publicly visible.

Also reassuring is that certain segments of the university system– the small liberal arts colleges–seem to be reinventing “an institutional history of activism” for social justice (“Social Justice Revival“).  There’s no  doubt that this trend has a lot to do with the fierce competition for students, a competition sharpened by recession, but it’s still a welcome trend.  What we need, of course, is a movement that would put these pieces together. A just labor policy ought to be the start of any social justice program at any university.

Posted in: Autobiographical, Professional, Writing

Troyer Falls on her Sword

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I am fascinated by the ongoing story offering tantalizing hints that the University of Illinois President Michael Hogan’s chief of staff was operating as a kind of  stealthy hatchet woman for the administration (“U. of I. investigating whether president’s chief of staff was behind anonymous emails“). “I am concerned that this could bespeak a major problem in the ethical dimensions of the university,” the piece quotes Senates Conference Chair Donald Chambers, “and we find that very troubling…” No doubt.

The president is new to the job and he brought with him his Chief of Staff,  Lisa Troyer, who cost the taxpayers a little more than $200,000  a year. (The former president, apparently, had a budget entourage and no need of a chief of staff.)  Ironically, email sent from Ms. Troyer’s computer emphasized the importance of “”integrity and transparency” in disputes over university policy. I hope that the news media does its job; we need to know if this has been Hogan’s Modus Operandi in former positions.

Posted in: Professional

Pots and Kettles

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As someone who works in the for-profit higher education, I am often dismayed at what happens in my little corner of the economy. I think our industry emerged in an economic culture that was far too unregulated and far too greedy. I think we need more regulation and I think that our industry doesn’t need to be so narrowly focused on short-term profits. We share all the problems of modern U.S. capitalism, in other words.

I am also often dismayed at the way problems in the for-profit sector seem to be used as cover for the more profound problems in the public sector.  These problems are dwarfed by the exploitation of adjunct labor, bloated  administrative salaries, the weakening of tenure, the corruptions of big college sports, and the rise of student debt, to name only a few, that have characterized the public sector for the last three or four decades.

These problems in the public sector are more profound because they set the standard for the culture at large.  For-profit schools will come and go– that’s the nature of a market– but without a democratic, service oriented public university system we might not have a democracy or a functioning economy at all. I think, too,  that the for-profit sector will not flourish without profound reform in the public sector.

Posted in: Autobiographical, Economics, Professional, Writing