February 22nd, 2010
As reported here and elsewhere, the Academic Staff Executive Committee (ASEC) Ad Hoc Committee on the Research Enterprise already released its report back on January 22.
We had been waiting with bated breath for the counterpart committee appointed by the faculty’s University Committee (UC) to release its own findings on the same issue. This report was originally due by the end of 2009, but this deadline could not be met.
The following message has just now (2:50 pm today) been broadcast by the University Committee: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Graduate School, Restructuring proposal, Shared governance, The UW-Madison Campus | No Comments »
February 19th, 2010
How will we pay for public higher education in Wisconsin and at UW-Madison in the years to come? Metaphorically speaking, we have entered a dark fiscal tunnel of unknown length, and that glimmer of light up ahead just might be an oncoming train. According to former UW System President Kathryn Lyall (pers. comm.),
[T]his is the overarching policy issue of the decade (century?) and we need all members of the university community, as well as those in the wider public, to understand the inexorable trends that are driving the university’s future and what it can expect to do for the state in the future.
Three separate campus organizations — PROFS, UFAS, and CAPE — have come together to jointly sponsor the first of a planned series of public forums on the subject, to be held Tuesday, February 23, 4:00-5:30 pm at the Memorial Union (check Today in the Union to confirm the room location; tentatively the Wisconsin Inn). Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in College costs, State-University Relations, The UW-Madison Campus, The University Budget, The University System | No Comments »
February 12th, 2010
The first few weeks of the Spring semester have seen significant growth in the readership of S&W — 1,200 unique visitors and almost 20,000 hits in the month of January alone, most of which occurred after the start of the semester. S&W is being followed on Twitter by most of the local media, and we know for a fact that some important media coverage of campus-related issues was prompted by our first drawing attention to those issues here. Also, we note that whenever articles have been posted on topics of widespread interest, such as new developments in the Graduate School restructuring controversy or the animal lab citations, readership has briefly surged to 2-3 times the “background” level.
So, for the moment at least, we are no longer struggling to raise our profile. The readership is there. All that is needed to sustain and further build that readership is a steady supply of content that is (a) highly relevant to our readers and (b) not available elsewhere. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
February 7th, 2010
S&W recommends the following article from Jack O’Meara of PROFS — it goes beyond some of what we’ve seen in the regular press about the Regents’ recent initiatives: Regents Plan Next Steps for Growth Agenda.
Generally speaking, we’re finding that the PROFS website is an excellent source of information and commentary about campus issues. Not only do we recommend bookmarking the site, but we strongly encourage faculty who are not that familiar with PROFS to read more about PROFS here and consider joining.
- the Editors
Posted in State-University Relations, The University System | 1 Comment »
February 2nd, 2010
(Last updated Feb. 2, 2010)
Links to all relevant articles in the press, including some recent national coverage, are collected here in chronological order for the convenience of readers.
Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Graduate School, Restructuring proposal, The UW-Madison Campus | 3 Comments »
January 25th, 2010
The Chronicle of Higher Education made brief mention of the Capital Times article on the report from the Academic Staff Executive Committee (ASEC) Ad Hoc committee on the Research Enterprise. (Unfortunately, the Chronicle misattributed the report to the faculty, which has not yet issued its report on the same subject.)
Of greater interest than the Chronicle posting itself is one reader’s response, a short excerpt of which follows:
The real story here is not the restructuring of research supporting systems but the broader issue of disintegrating research administration infrastructures at Wisconsin, and indeed across the United States. Offices that manage sponsored programs (grants, contracts, research fellowships, etc.) universally have had flat budgets for the past decade, and yet this period saw an unprecedented growth in research funding (e.g., doubling of NIH grants) as well as a torrent of new regulatory requirements governing all aspects of research (electronic submission of proposals, research subjects, animal care, conflict of interest, export controls, accounting, reporting, auditing, technology transfer, etc.).
(continue reading comments)
From our vantage point at S&W at least, this is indeed a new perspective on the restructuring issue. We hope more readers will weigh in.
Posted in Restructuring proposal, Shared governance, State-University Relations, The UW-Madison Campus, The University Budget | No Comments »
January 22nd, 2010
For those S&W readers who missed it as well, it has just come to our attention (almost a week late) that the director of the Research Animal Resources Center, Eric Sandgren, offered his perspective on the news coverage of the recent citations in this guest editorial published on Jan. 16 by the online edition of the Wisconsin State Journal.
The original press reports were here and here.
For those seeking additional perspectives, we continue to recommend the lively (and lengthy) exchange that took place in the first week of January in the comments section of this post on the Sconz as well as these letters from the administration.
And in a late addendum to this post, we now have Todd Finkelmeyer’s (Capital Times) report, USDA returns but finds no issues with UW animal research.
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »
January 22nd, 2010
At their February 1 meeting, the Faculty Senate will vote on a resolution brought by the Department of Physics. The resolution voices strong support for the “Smart Furlough Bill” (AB 551) introduced by Rep. Kelda Helen Roys. For those not already familiar with it, the Badger Herald reported on the bill in early November, and PROFS has expressed strong support (we were unable to find any coverage of the bill by the Wisconsin State Journal or the Capital Times).
We encourage S&W readers to become familiar with the “Smart Furlough Bill” and to post comments here. In addition, those on the faculty should communicate their views on the resolution to their Faculty Senator(s).
The full text of the resolution is reproduced here: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Compensation, State-University Relations, The University System | No Comments »
January 22nd, 2010
The first shoe has dropped. The Academic Staff Ad Hoc Committee on the Research Enterprise has returned its white paper. Their charge was “[t]o assess whether the present UW-Madison Research Enterprise structure is capable of addressing current and future issues, or whether an alternative organizational structure such as that proposed by the Chancellor and the Provost is needed.”
Their unambiguous conclusions: “yes” to the first question, and “no” to the second. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Restructuring proposal, Shared governance, The UW-Madison Campus | No Comments »
January 19th, 2010
Many of us have been waiting with bated breath for (a) the reports of the faculty and academic staff ad hoc committees on Provost Paul DeLuca’s proposal to divest the Graduate School of research functions, and (b) the administration’s response to those reports.
The reports were originally due at the end of last month. The Badger Herald now reports that the due dates have been pushed back to January 21 in the case of the ASEC report and to the end of the month for the University Committee report. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Graduate School, Restructuring proposal, Shared governance, The UW-Madison Campus, Uncategorized | No Comments »