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:

Dear Colleagues:

Attached and at the link listed at the end of this communication, please find the Report of the Ad Hoc Committee to Review the Needs and Structure of UW-Madison’s Research Enterprise.  In the fall semester, the UC appointed a blue ribbon faculty governance committee in response to the administration’s announcement last summer of its plan to restructure the institution’s research enterprise.  That action prompted a series of town hall meetings at which the provost presented the administration’s justification for its proposed restructuring.  Subsequently, the Faculty Senate, by a near unanimous vote, adopted a resolution opposing “any action to implement such a plan, e.g., through the creation of a new vice chancellor for research or changes in the functions of the Graduate School, until the administration provides a fully developed written plan in response to the University Committee’s ad hoc committee report and recommendations, which has been reviewed and approved by the University Committee and the Faculty Senate with appropriate opportunity for comment by all members of the faculty.”

The University Committee looks forward to looks forward to a constructive dialogue with the chancellor and the provost in developing a plan that can be presented to the Faculty Senate.

The University Committee

Here is the link to the document.

If the delayed release means that the report gives a more thorough, nuanced, and defensible analysis of the need for restructuring of the Graduate School then would have been possible by December 31, then we are of course all for it, and we thank the provost and chancellor for not using the delay as an excuse to forge ahead with their plan without the input from both the the ASEC and UC white papers.

We have not yet had time to read the report and are at this time simply posting the above communication, and the link to the report, without editorial comment.

- the Editors.

[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).

The press release from PROFS can be viewed here.

Distinguished panelists include Kevin Reilly, President of the University of Wisconsin System; Andrew Reschovsky, professor at the La Follette School of Public Affairs; and Noel Radomski, director of the Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education (WISCAPE).

From the press release:

Financing of higher education has changed significantly over the past several decades. Shrinking state support and sharply increased costs have forced campuses to chart new courses for survival. Are our only alternatives hyper-inflationary tuition increases and bigger classes?

“The financing of public higher education has changed dramatically and continues to change. How great universities – UW-Madison, in particular – continue to respond to those changes is among the most important issues we face on campus and nationally,” says Joe Salmons, president of PROFS. “This forum will launch an important conversation for faculty, the university community and our state.”

According to Prof. Salmons, this first forum, which will concentrate on  identifying and explaining the current fiscal challenges, will consist of approximately 15 minute presentations by each of the three panelists, with additional time for questions by the audience.  Future planned forums in the series will dissect proposed solutions.

The campus community and Wisconsin citizens alike have an enormous stake in sustaining the educational, outreach, and research missions of the University, all of which are major drivers of long-term economic stability and prosperity in the state.

We urge everyone to attend this forum.

- the Editors

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.

And this is where we face a potential bottleneck: the number of regular contributors to this site can still be counted on one hand, and all of us have, well, day jobs as busy faculty or academic staff. Over the past 2-3 weeks, there has been a flurry of new developments crying out for commentary by informed members of the campus community — collective bargaining, State financing of the University System, “smart” furloughs, to name just a few.   But, frankly, we’ve been too busy to do them justice. And we’d rather post nothing at all than try to fill up our virtual pages with off-the-cuff, poorly substantiated opinions or rumors, let alone pointless replication of what can already be read elsewhere.

Hence, our major goal for 2010: to build a base of at least a dozen regular contributors, each representing a unique (but well-informed) perspective on campus affairs.

If each regular contributor committed to submitting one short op-ed or news piece per month, that would distribute the load to tolerable levels and still guarantee an average of at least three such contributions per week, which we think would be the minimum necessary to sustain and grow our visibility and influence.

The appeal

If you believe that this site occupies a useful niche among information sources relevant to UW-Madison affairs, and if you would like to see it become even more relevant and influential in coming months, please consider whether

• you have a useful perspective on any aspect of campus life, especially those aspects not already well-covered by Wisconsin Week, the city papers, or the two student dailies, and
• you could imagine committing to one short op-ed piece, news item, or other commentary per month, on average.

If your answer to both questions is ‘yes’, then please register your interest by emailing the Moderator. You may post any given contribution in your own name or anonymously as appropriate.  Also, we will not select our regular contributors based on their advocacy of a particular point of view, only based on whether they are in a position to add substantively to our understanding of important campus issues.

(If you can’t commit to being a regular contributor yourself, think of someone you know whose knowledge and insight could be helpful to understanding complex issue on campus, and ask them to consider contributing.)

Summing up: regular contributions from across the campus community are vital if this site is to survive and live up to its stated mission.  We thank you in advance for your support.

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

Links to all relevant articles in the press, including some recent national coverage, are collected here in chronological order for the convenience of readers.

Grad school to reform
by Kyle Mianulli (Badger Herald), published Monday, October 12th, 2009

In response to what University of Wisconsin Chancellor Biddy Martin called the “single greatest complaint” she has received thus far as … view story »

Talk now, restructure later
by Badger Herald Editorial Board, published Tuesday, October 13th, 2009

Last semester, Chancellor Biddy Martin set forth a proposal to reshape the undergraduate experience at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The plan was ambitious, controversial … view story »

UW graduate school proposal would separate dean’s roles
by Ryan Hebel (Daily Cardinal), published Tuesday, October 13th, 2009

UW-Madison provost Paul DeLuca is looking to restructure UW-Madison’s graduate school, but some faculty and staff are concerned about the proposal’s budget, specifics and transparency…. view story »

Grad school restructuring: Why it is far from simple
by Signe Brewster (Badger Herald), published Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

University of Wisconsin officials recently unveiled a plan to restructure the graduate school after significant … view story »

Grad school talks persist
by Kyle Mianulli (Badger Herald), published Thursday, October 15th, 2009

Faculty and administrators voiced concern over the cost and effectiveness of implementing … view story

Questions remain in grad school restructuring
by Lydia Statz (Daily Cardinal), published Sunday, October 18th, 2009

UW-Madison officials continue to debate Provost Paul DeLuca’s plan to restructure the graduate school, and will hold another town hall meeting Friday for further discussion. DeLuca proposed the restructuring to help the school comply with complex federal and safety regulations, but many professors and administrative officials have raised concerns over the cost and effectiveness of the plan…. view story »

UW cash 3rd in nation: Research spending increases while grad proposal sparks talk
by Kyle Mianulli (Badger Herald), published Monday, October 19, 2009

The University of Wisconsin announced another jump in research expenditures this year — as well as the earning of another top three national ranking for research institutions —amid contentious talks about the proposal to significantly restructure the graduate program … view story

UW proposes lofty new position to oversee research
by Deborah Ziff (Wisconsin State Journal), published Thursday, October 22, 2009

UW-Madison leaders say they need to create a new position to handle the university’s vast research enterprise, sparked in part by run-down animal facilities that could have cost the school millions in federal funding…. view story

Faculty to look at grad reform
Resolution under consideration would oppose DeLuca plan
By Kyle Mianulli (Badger Herald), published Friday, October 23, 2009

The University of Wisconsin Faculty Senate will consider a resolution to formally oppose Provost Paul DeLuca Jr.’s plan to significantly restructure the graduate school and research enterprise, according to a document obtained by The Badger Herald. … view story

Grad school reform poorly presented but worthwhile
By Qi Gu (Daily Cardinal), published Sunday, October 25, 2009

Grad-school reform has recently become the talk of Madison. Front-page stories and town-hall series have thrust provost Paul DeLuca’s proposal into the public eye. Currently Martin Cadwallader, dean of the grad school, is in charge of both graduate education and university research. DeLuca’s plan would add a vice chancellor to take up the research part. While this appears to be a feasible idea, the provost failed to justify it to the entire UW-Madison community.
… view story

Grad school reform still faces criticism
By Ryan Hebel (Daily Cardinal), published Sunday, October 25, 2009

UW-Madison faculty, staff and students continued to scrutinize Provost Paul DeLuca’s graduate school restructuring proposal at his fifth and final town hall meeting Friday, while Chancellor Biddy Martin offered several reassurances.
… view story

Restructuring town hall draws hundreds
By Kyle Mianulli (Badger Herald), published Monday, October 26, 2009

The last of five town hall meetings for the proposed restructuring of the graduate school brought hundreds of faculty and community members to the Humanities building Friday.
… view story

Proposed UW-Madison shake-up prompts opposition
by Deborah Ziff (Wisconsin State Journal), published Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Some UW-Madison faculty members are opposing a plan that would shake up the university’s internal structure by creating a new office to oversee research…view story

Keep grad school restructuring talks open
By Erik Paulson (Badger Herald), published Thursday, October 29, 2009

I’ve been to two town hall meetings on reorganizing the research enterprise at UW, and like other commentators, I don’t get it. Not only do I not get how the changes are going to fix some of the problems we’re facing on running our research programs but I also don’t get why so much of the faculty is so fearful of this proposal…. view story

UW faculty bristle at plan for new office to oversee research
By Todd Finkelmeyer  (Capital Times), published Saturday, October 31, 2009

Hector DeLuca has seen his share of contentious campus issues since arriving at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for graduate school in 1951. There were the Vietnam War protests in the 1960s and the heated debates over merging UW-Madison and the Wisconsin State Universities into the University of Wisconsin System in the early 1970s….view story

DeLuca’s runaway train
by the Badger Herald Editorial Board, published Monday, November 2, 2009

Ever wonder why the word “railroading” came into use to describe a plan or idea being pushed ahead too quickly or forcefully? Just picture the scene in “Back to the Future Part III”, where Doc Brown’s tricked-out locomotive goes soaring over the edge of a cliff after the time machine disappears in flaming tire tracks…..view story

Faculty Senate delays grad school reform
by Jennifer Zettel (Badger Herald), published November 3, 2009

After voicing their opinions without restraint Monday, the Faculty Senate overwhelmingly passed a resolution to slow down implementation of Provost Paul DeLuca Jr.’s proposal to restructure the University of Wisconsin graduate school….view story

Faculty Senate approves resolution to oppose graduate school reform
by Ryan Hebel (Daily Cardinal), published November 3, 2009

UW-Madison’s Faculty Senate almost unanimously approved a resolution Monday opposing any action to restructure the graduate school until a thorough, shared governance process is completed….view story

Campus Connection: Martin apologizes to UW-Madison faculty
by Todd Finkelmeyer (Capital Times), published November 3, 2009

Biddy Martin apologized to the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Faculty Senate Monday evening for the way in which her administration rolled out a proposed reorganization of the Graduate School…view story

U. of Wisconsin Faculty Puts Brakes on Graduate-School Reorganization
by Peter Schmidt (Chronicle of Higher Education), published November 3, 2009

The Faculty Senate of the University of Wisconsin at Madison has voted overwhelmingly to urge the administration there to slow down a proposed reorganization of the institution’s Graduate School that would change how the campus handles research….view story

DeLuca and Martin no Harold Hill
by Zach Schuster (Badger Herald), published Wednesday, November 11, 2009

At the start of the musical “The Music Man,” riders on a train discuss salesman Harold Hill’s modus operandi. “Now he doesn’t know the territory. Doesn’t know the territory? What’s the fellow’s line? Never worries about his line.” This brief exchange helps explain why the Faculty Senate voted Thursday night to slow the process of restructuring of the graduate school’s research operations….view story

Restructuring no longer dire
by Kyle Mianulli (Badger Herald), published Sunday, January 17, 2010

Provost Paul DeLuca Jr. recently told the University of Wisconsin community that the graduate school program and connected research enterprise was in a state of crisis., but recent federal reviews suggest the situation is in fact less dire…..view story

Report says no need to restructure UW’s research enterprise
by Todd Finkelmeyer (Capital Times), published Friday, January 22, 2010

An ad hoc committee examining a proposal by the University of Wisconsin-Madison administration to restructure the university’s highly successful research enterprise released its final report to The Capital Times late Thursday night.  In a nutshell, the Academic Staff Ad Hoc Committee on the Research Enterprise found that while some changes could be made to make things run more smoothly, there is no evidence to support the administration’s contention that an organizational restructuring is the answer……view story

Graduate School restructuring may be unnecessary
by Lydia Statz (Daily Cardinal), published Monday, January 25, 2010

An academic staff committee released a report Wednesday stating their belief that the proposed restructuring of the graduate school is unnecessary.
The ad hoc committee was created to review a plan submitted by Provost Paul DeLuca that would create a new office to manage UW-Madison’s research operations. Currently, research grants and procedures are managed within the graduate school.
The report concluded that while some changes may be necessary, the proposed restructuring would not solve the current problems in the system.
…view story

Grad school not in doomsday scenario
By The Daily Cardinal Editorial Board, published Tuesday, February 2, 2010

The academic staff ad hoc committee recently released a report analyzing the current state of UW-Madison’s graduate school and the Administration’s restructuring proposal. Written by seven members of a world-class research institution, the report’s conclusion was fitting: Show us more evidence.
…view story

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.

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.

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:

RESOLUTION FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS
REGARDING FURLOUGHS OF NON-STATE-FUNDED EMPLOYEES

Background

(1) Research programs at UW-Madison cover a wide range of fundamental and applied problems including energy-environmental challenges, national security concerns, and health issues facing our country and human society in general. For example, UW-Madison researchers are studying the H1N1 virus which poses a near-term threat of a deadly pandemic. Federal taxpayers have a right to expect a timely best effort from funded UW-Madison research teams.

(2) Furloughs of research personnel violate the spirit of more than a thousand Federal grants and contracts providing hundreds of millions of dollars of research funding. Research staff, faculty, and especially principal investigators committed to a best effort when these funds were accepted by UW-Madison. Furthermore, research funding is very competitive. Research funding decisions are based in part on the past performance of researchers.

(3) The University of California, in a state with worse budget problems than Wisconsin, exempted federally funded university employees from furloughs.

(4) Wisconsin state taxpayers will need to make up the lost revenue from income taxes that will not be collected due to furloughs of federally funded employees. This makes little sense in a time of economic distress.

(5) The Smart Furlough Bill proposed by Rep. Kelda Helen Roys would exempt from furloughs those positions (or portions thereof) that are not funded by state dollars.

Resolution

WHEREAS furloughs of federally funded university employees exacerbate the state budget problems through a reduction in state income tax revenue; and
WHEREAS furloughs of federally funded university employees unnecessarily harm the university’s research and service missions and damage the university’s reputation;
THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Faculty Senate strongly supports the Smart Furlough Bill currently pending in the Wisconsin legislature.

Their unambiguous conclusions:  “yes” to the first question, and “no” to the second.

Extensive documentation supporting their findings was provided as an appendix to the report.

Todd Finkelmeyer of the Capital Times has done a good job of summarizing the key conclusions of the committee, so we won’t attempt to duplicate his effort.

We still await the report of the University Committee’s own Ad Hoc Committee, due later this month.  But we will be surprised if it reaches a substantially different conclusion about the merits of the Graduate School restructuring proposal aggressively promoted by Provost Paul DeLuca last Fall with clear backing from Chancellor “Biddy” Martin.

The main remaining suspense concerns the administration’s response to both reports.  But Provost DeLuca has  recently been quoted by the Badger Herald as disavowing unilateral action by the administration, so we are considerably more optimistic now about the process moving forward from here than we were at the time of the Faculty Senate resolution vote last November

- Editors

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.

While that news would normally imply a disappointing prolongation of our suspense,  the same article also reported that “Paul DeLuca assured he would not pursue any plan to restructure without faculty consent.”   The article went on to say,

Moving forward, DeLuca has ensured he will take the time and trouble to carefully analyze pending ad hoc reports on his proposal and promised shared governance will “definitely be more of a factor in the next phase.”

In summation, DeLuca attributed the contentious proposal process last semester to what he called a “new kid on the block phenomenon.”

“I don’t intend to do anything dictatorialized, and we will just follow the best process we possibly can,” Paul DeLuca said.

Those of us on the faculty and staff who have been following the Graduate School restructuring issue since September and have been (mostly) alarmed by the process that triggered the Faculty Senate resolution vote on November 2  should be very relieved by, and supportive of, the provost’s latest statements.

As far as we can tell, it was never the intention of the critics of the process to block needed reforms or to try to preserve the status quo at all costs.  Rather, the voices we heard (some of which were published on this site) almost universally emphasized the need for a more deliberative process that pooled the experience and insights of all those affected by the existing problems and/or by the proposed solutions to those problems.  In short, their insistence was not on a particular outcome but rather on a reaffirmation of a proper role for shared governance and due process.   It appears that that is what Provost DeLuca has now committed himself to, and we welcome the fresh start on this important topic.