A zillion things to do at work – tried out a new way to do screen captures, after the method I’ve been using created a recording with weird dropouts, and took forever to upload, email, email, email, meetings, meetings, meetings…
Our evil governor (as my mechanic calls him) is being eviler than ever. He wants to cut $300 million from the University, AND continue a tuition freeze, AND this is after 2 years when the University was forced to spend down its reserves. The legislature has been really good at portraying the University as the bad guys. Obviously, we’re the ones that cause students to go into debt, charging such high tuition and not teaching enough sections of classes, so that students can’t graduate on time. Gee, it couldn’t be that the state government is not funding higher education, doesn’t value education at any level, so the burden of paying for college has been shifted to students and parents.
The governor’s been calling his budget effectively “Act 10 for the UW System,”; that it will remove “limitations like shared governance”. Cut funding, and decouple the University from state government; make it a separate public authority. Which would give the University the flexibility to make up for the loss of funding – just like municipalities and other state agencies were given freedom by Act 10, which prevented public employees from unionizing.
But what scares me even more is that he wants to amend and repeal chapter 36 of the Wisconsin State Statutes.
edited UW System mission statement
Chapter 36 allows for shared governance.
The faculty of each institution, subject to the responsibilities and powers of the board, the president and the chancellor of such institution, shall be vested with responsibility for the immediate governance of such institution and shall actively participate in institutional policy development. As such, the faculty shall have the primary responsibility for academic and educational activities and faculty personnel matters. The faculty of each institution shall have the right to determine their own faculty organizational structure and to select representatives to participate in institutional governance.
The academic staff members of each institution, subject to the responsibilities and powers of the board, the president and the chancellor and faculty of the institution, shall be active participants in the immediate governance of and policy development for the institution. The academic staff members have the primary responsibility for the formulation and review, and shall be represented in the development, of all policies and procedures concerning academic staff members, including academic staff personnel matters. The academic staff members of each institution shall have the right to organize themselves in a manner they determine and to select their representatives to participate in institutional governance.
The students of each institution or campus subject to the responsibilities and powers of the board, the president, the chancellor and the faculty shall be active participants in the immediate governance of and policy development for such institutions. As such, students shall have primary responsibility for the formulation and review of policies concerning student life, services and interests. Students in consultation with the chancellor and subject to the final confirmation of the board shall have the responsibility for the disposition of those student fees which constitute substantial support for campus student activities. The students of each institution or campus shall have the right to organize themselves in a manner they determine and to select their representatives to participate in institutional governance.
My position is defined in there as well, and it also says something about my sick leave benefits. The Board of Regents says that anything that is repealed from chapter 36 will be pulled out, and popped into Board of Regents policy, but I don’t find that all that comforting – something that was a statute is now a policy? Sounds a lot squishier to me.
And ugh, I’ve been trying to pick thru the 1800+ pages of the budget bill, Assembly 21. 36.09 that allows for shared governance is repealed. There’s also a provision in the state statutes that highway construction has to allot funding for bike- and pedestrian-ways – that exceeds what the federal government decrees – so of course that is repealed, too. Why should Wisconsin to continue to be the best at things they were always the best at before? Jim Baughman says, Don’t turn the UW into just another university.
It’s standard political procedure – hide stuff in the budget bill that can have real consequences and hope no one will notice.
I came home and made pasta – sweet potato, kale, caramelized onions (with a dab leftover that I made into dip), goat cheese and parsley. And busted up no-boil lasagna noodles. The kind of pasta that’s called old rags – irregular edges of fresh pasta sheets, or lasagna.
old rags pasta with sweet potato, kale & goat cheese
Lea sent me this crazy necklace with a picture jasper pendant that looks like a house. In thanks for the cookie boxes I send them – they’re never getting off the list now.
Beyond that, it’s winter. It’s cold and my skin’s too dry, and I’m probably eating too much, and not drinking enough water, and not getting enough exercise – although today I did walk a lot with my snow boots on. And, maybe we’ll be marching again soon at the Capitol – but somehow, I don’t think so this time.
