Sifting and Winnowing

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.