Spring Election: Secretary and Treasurer
The chapter is soliciting nominations for the upcoming April election of the Treasurer and Secretary. The term of office for these positions will be two years. You may nominate yourself or someone else for either position. Only chapter members are allowed to hold office or participate in chapter elections.
Nominations are due by 5 p.m. on Wednesday, March 24, 2010. If you would like to nominate someone, please send your nomination to Jennifer Holz (Past President, Chair of the Nominations and Elections Committee) at jh16@uakron.edu or drjenniferholz@yahoo.com, or phone 330-972-8790.
All active Akron AAUP chapter members will be receiving an electronic ballot for these two important leadership positions after nominations close and before the end of this month.
The Nominations and Elections Committee is Jennifer Holz (Past President, Chair), Dave Witt (Chapter Member), and John Reeves (Chapter Member).
Joint Statement on Contract Negotiations - January 8, 2010
The Administration of The University of Akron and the Akron Chapter of the American Association of University Professors reached tentative agreements on all issues pertaining to contract negotiations. The tentative agreements now must be ratified by the University’s Board of Trustees and by the membership of the Akron-AAUP. The timetable for ratification is being established.
For the Akron-AAUP, the chapter membership will vote shortly after informational meetings held on January 13th and 14th for the chapter membership.
Both parties recommend ratification to their respective constituents.
"Cream o' the Crop" by The Ad Hoc Post-Tenure Under-Appreciated Band
UA's Misguided 'Landscape for Earning'
By Walter L. Hixson
Excerpt from The Akron Beaon Journal Commentary, Sunday December 20.
"The university is supposed to be a center of learning, a special place in which ideas are exchanged, knowledge is passed on, and new generations prepare to face the future.
Unfortunately, in recent years the University of Akron has drifted further and further away from its core mission, as the percentage of its budget devoted to the academic side has declined in deference to profligate spending on administration and a dizzying array of building projects and ''corporate synergies....'
"...The University of Akron is a public institution and it ought to be governed responsibly and for the public interest rather than the private interest. A state university should not be managed in the style of AIG or Lehman Brothers, where those at the top reward themselves while the financial structure collapses around them to the detriment of employees and the community.
We at Akron-AAUP are currently enmeshed in troubled contract talks with the UA administration, but we are not just negotiating out of self-interest. We believe the stakes are much higher — we are trying to preserve the core mission of our university."
Read the entire Commentary piece online at Ohio.com or HERE.
The 2% Solution
The Akron Beacon Journal's print edition Saturday, Dec 19 referred to the 2% payment offer as an increase to base salary.
This is incorrect.
The online edition and the print edition repeatedly refer to the 2% payment as a "bonus."
This is incorrect.
Akron-AAUP did not turn down a raise, an increase to base salary, a bonus, "free-money" or anthing remotely similar. Akron-AAUP rejected a flawed and terribly insufficient compensation offer which does nothing at all to solve long-term problems of salary inequities. We continue to be willing to negotiate a fair and reasonable deal, but it takes 2 willing participants to do so.
DEC 16: Negotiations End With No Agreement
The University's proposal is a one-time payment instead of a salary increase. It is not a bonus.
You can be sure, however, that Akron-AAUP will endeavor to hold President Proenza to his public pledge today to instruct the UA chief financial officer to "begin" planning a budget "built around an increase to base salaries." MORE HERE
Dec 16: University moves forward with plans for a new law building
"Trustees agreed to spend $540,000 on design fees for a new building to be built across from the current one at University Avenue and Wolf Ledges Parkway....
The university would pay for the $23.6 million building through $10 million in donations and..."
Story By Carol Biliczky
Beacon Journal staff writer.
Read the entire piece here at Ohio.com
December 15, 2009
The Collective Bargaining Agreement expired this morning at 12:01 a.m.
December 15, 2009
We share this bit of news with you, as well as this, without comment.
December 11, 2009
The University has hired another executive search firm to find a new football coach.
From the ABJ at Ohio.com:
"The university hired Parker Executive Search in Atlanta to sift through the candidates and nine were invited to Atlanta. Obviously, one of them was Ianello."
"Ianello has a first-year budget for assistant coaches of $800,000, Wistrcill said."
Dec 7:" it should not have come to this..."
"University of Akron trustee Jack Morrison Jr. long overstayed his welcome"
From the Cleveland Plain Dealer, editorial board, December 7, 2009
"It should not have come to this.
After University of Akron Trustee Jack Morrison Jr. was convicted of two misdemeanor ethics charges, he should have resigned quietly to avoid further embarrassment to the school.
Instead, Morrison dug in his heels..."
Read the entire article at Cleveland.com
Dec 2: Ohio Senate Votes to remove Morrison
Without fanfare or discussion, the Ohio Senate moved quickly this afternoon to remove Jack Morrison Jr. from the University of Akron board of trustees...No one stood to argue for or against Morrison and the roll was taken. The vote was 30-3.
Story by Dennis J. Willard, Akron Beacon Journal staff writer. Read the entire article here at Ohio.com.
December 2, 2009
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 2--Akron-AAUP called today for an immediate freeze on all administrative hiring as well as a halt to the use of external search firms—including the impending decision on whether to hire such a firm to search for a new football coach.
At a time when the University of Akron confronts a financial crisis, has raised student tuition and fees, and claims that it cannot maintain competitive staff and faculty salaries, wasteful spending on corporate search firms should come to an immediate halt. In addition, evidence shows that while UA has compressed compensation for faculty and staff administrative salaries have proliferated (see accompanying release).
Akron-AAUP will attempt to obtain a full accounting but it is safe to say that the University has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on search firms when simple advertisements and networking would suffice. In several cases these firms have not produced successful candidates for positions in upper administration.
According to the Beacon-Journal (November 30), UA Athletic Director Tom Wistrcill is currently considering hiring of a search firm to find a replacement for J.D. Brookhart, who was fired with $250,000 remaining on his contract for next year. According to the Beacon-Journal article, “A search firm, such as Eastman and Beaudine, which was involved in the Wistrcill hiring, generally charges a fee equal to 25 percent to the first year’s salary and bonus.”
UA thus might easily pay such a firm $100,000, which would be a foolish waste of money in the current economic climate. ESPN and all major sports media have announced the Brookhart firing—prospective coaches know of the opening and Wistrcill should have the competence to find and recommend a capable coach to President Luis Proenza without resort to the same corporate search firm that recommended him.
The time for profligate spending on upper administration and excesses such as external search firms is over, especially as the University claims it must raise student tuition and fees and that it cannot afford to offer faculty salaries that are competitive with comparable institutions.
Meanwhile, the ranks and salaries of upper administration have proliferated in the past few years. See the accompanying release, “Landscape for Earning? UA’s Profligate Spending on Administrative Salaries.”
Akron-AAUP calls on all UA students and the Faculty Senate to support this call for a freeze on administrative hiring as well as hiring of corporate search firms. Please express your views to President Proenza—proenza@uakron.edu.
Printable copy here.
The UA Administration's "Landscape For Earning"
For a printable copy of this graph click here.
Profligate spending: administrative salaries
While the University insists that it just doesn’t have the money to offer faculty or staff
competitive salaries, data analysis shows that money is always readily available for
administrative salaries.
Contrary to the muchvaunted “landscape for learning,” UA has provided rather a landscape for earning—as long as you are an administrator. As the graph below attests, Administrative salaries have proliferated since the last faculty contract was signed (as indeed they have during the last decade).
The salaries for the president, provost, deans, vice presidents, and other administrators soared from a total of $3.3 million in FY 2005 to $5.6 million in the current fiscal year. UA faculty members and staff should ask whether the University has almost doubled its investment in faculty and staff over the same period of time.
This record of selfaggrandizement of administrators has not only shortchanged faculty and staff but students as well. While the University has increased spending on administration, an audit of UA finances shows that from 2002 to 2008 it simultaneously decreased from 35 percent to 32 percent the revenues devoted to the academic side.
Before the faculty accepts the argument that UA is too poor to pay competitive salaries, and before students accept that their tuition needs to continue to rise, the UA administration needs to explain why their own ranks and compensation have risen at such an extraordinary pace. Isn’t it time for the UA administration to declare a freeze and reduction of administrative spending while turning its attention back to the academic side of this university?
Along with modest pay increases, AkronAAUP is negotiating for minimum per rank salaries for faculty members. It is sobering to contemplate that the amount of revenue required to meet this request could nearly be supplied by combining the amount being paid to the departed chief financial officer John Case ($242,000 annual salary) with the $250,000 that will be paid to football coach J.D. Brookhart, who was fired with a year left on his contract.
UA’s topdown corporate style of management has benefited a handful of administrators at the expense of the multitude of students, faculty, and staff. It is a sorry record of misguided priorities that should not be tolerated at a public institution.
For a printable copy of this communication click here.
From the ABJ on a Faculty Strike
Excerpt from the Akron Beacon Journal on Ohio.com November 17.
UA Faculty Willing to Strike
The Akron chapter of the American Association of University Professors warned its members Monday that a work stoppage could occur if negotiations with the administration don't move along.
AAUP President Walter Hixson advised fellow faculty that the University of Akron administration is trying to undo some of the advances made in the union's first contract four years ago.
Read the entire story here on Ohio.com
UA lawyer to recommend scrapping new DNA rule
By Carol Biliczky
Beacon Journal staff writer
The University of Akron appears to be backing way from a controversial policy that would have required prospective employees to provide DNA samples.
UA general counsel Ted Mallo advised Harvey Sterns, chairman of the Faculty Senate, by letter this week that he would recommend trustees eliminate the reference to DNA in their hiring policy.
Read the entire story here at Ohio.com
DNA AT UA
The university's new, intrusive and unnecessary employment policy
Excerpt from the November 3rd Akron Beacon Journal editorial page at Ohio.com
"In attempting to be in the forefront, the university has put at risk its image, likely diminishing its ability to attract top academic talent. The board's adoption of such a far-reaching policy without a more thorough examination of legal issues is disturbing, doubly so given its silence on the ethics scandal surrounding one of its own, Jack Morrison Jr.
The policy should be repealed."
Read the entire piece here.
Want a job in Akron? hand over your DNA
Excerpts From the CBS News Blog.
Story posted by Declan McCullagh
"It's not unusual for employers to conduct criminal background checks during the hiring process. But the University of Akron has taken this to a surprising new level."
"The new policy, which says a "DNA sample for purpose of a federal criminal background check" may be collected, took the campus by surprise after it was announced last week. An adjunct faculty member has resigned in protest and is contemplating a lawsuit, and the local chapter of the American Association of University Professors says that genetic testing violates a collective bargaining agreement. "
"A spokeswoman for the University of Akron, Laura Massie, said in e-mail: "...and, as you also know, employment is completely by choice. Nobody has to submit to one; you're always free to try to find other employment..."
Read the entire post here.
Who's Covering UA's DNA 'Innovation' ?
CBS NEWS: Want A Job In Akron? Hand Over Your DNA
Inside Higher Ed: DNA Swab for Your Job
Abe Zaidan, Journalist (Washington Post, Akron Beacon Journal)
Jonathan Turley, Professor of Law, George Washington University.
Akron Beacon Journal, ACLU criticizes UA call for DNA
Ohio ACLU: New UA Policy Violates Privacy and Wastes Resources
WCPN 90.3: U. Of Akron Adjunct Prof Protests DNA Sample Requirement
The Atlantic magazine online: Resume, Cover Letter, DNA
WLTX online: from Columbia, South Carolina
Foolishness in Akron: David H. Kaye, Distinguished Professor, School of Law, Penn State
ABJ editorial: The university's new, intrusive and unnecessary employment policy
UA Adding Administrators faster than teachers
From the Akron Beacon Journal, October 2, 2009.
(AAUP Note: As if to prove the point, Scott Borgemenke, UA's spokesperson for this story, was hired in March of 2009 to fill the position of associate vice-president of strategy and finance; a position which did not previously exist!)
"The University of Akron is adding administrators at a much higher rate than that of faculty members, according to the faculty union..."
"That was one highlight in a study of the university's finances the UA chapter of the American Association of University Professors released Friday..."
"Scott Borgemenke, interim chief financial officer, said those numbers don't tell the whole story..."
"Borgemenke said he had no ready figures on hand about the percentage of money UA spends on faculty and administrators..."
Read the article on the Akron Beacon Journal web site, Ohio.com, here.
aKRON bEACON jOURNAL eDITORIAL: sEPT 14, 2009
Selective Trustees
"Ten months have passed since state Chancellor Eric Fingerhut asked Jack Morrison to resign his trustee position in view of an Ohio Ethics Commission report. In July, Morrison was convicted of violating state ethics law..."
Read the editorial on the ABJ home page here.
UA official gets 10-Month Paid Leave: ABJ 9/9/2009
A top-ranking administrator at the University of Akron was charged last week with driving under the influence of alcohol and granted a fully paid, 10-month administrative leave by UA on Wednesday.
Read the entire story here.
ABJ Editorial on the Morrison verdict: 7/31/2009
The Morrison Conviction: violating the state ethics law isn't a small thing
"The conviction of Jack Morrison Jr. on two state ethics law violations involved far more than ''a technical violation of failing to report income.'' Neither was the trial, which concluded on Wednesday, ''a colossal waste of taxpayer money,'' to borrow again the words of the attorney who represented Morrison. The bipartisan Ohio Ethics Commission found merit in bringing the case. The presiding judge acknowledged as much."
Read the entire piece here.
UA trustee found guilty of 2 ethics violations
Akron Beacon Journal, 7/29/2009
Story By Carol Biliczky, Beacon Journal staff writer
University of Akron Trustee Jack Morrison Jr. was found guilty today of two counts of ethics violations for failing to disclose income from his son on financial statements.
Read the entire article on the Beacon Journal's web site here.
UA Vice-President on Part-time/Adjunct faculty
As reported in Inside Higher Ed, UA's own A. G. Monaco, VP for Human Resources, made quite a splash at the recent College and University Professional Association - Human Resources (CUPA-HR) annual conference. In an article titled Call to Arms for Adjuncts...From an Administrator (10/14/08), Monaco is quoted as saying that universities, in effect, immorally take advantage of their adjunct or part-time faculty, possibly at their peril. According to Monaco, the abuse (low wages, no benefits, etc.) could lead adjunct or part-time faculty to unionize, which he says would be quite bad. While Monaco seems to be encouraging universities to do the right thing, he also is quoted as saying that he knows how to "brutalize" part-time faculty if asked to do so.
While Ohio's collective bargaining statute (ORC 4117) does not permit graduate assistants or part-time faculty to seek collective bargaining under that statute, Monaco's comments do suggest some action. Now that he is the VP for Human Resources, part-time faculty might consider asking the university to provide some of the pay and benefits parity, with full-time faculty, that Monaco suggests is only fair. With no contractual obligations to stop him, it should be clear sailing for Monaco to do what he says is the morally right thing.
From the November 2008 Akron-AAUP Newsletter
Akron-AAUP’s lawyer is “Ohio Super Lawyer”:
We thought our members might like to know that our own lawyer, Eben “Sandy” McNair, has been on the list of “Ohio Super Lawyers” every year since 2004, one year after the start of this prestigious list. The objective of the Super Lawyers selection process is to create a credible, comprehensive and diverse listing of outstanding attorneys that can be used as a resource to assist attorneys and consumers in the search for legal counsel. No other legal publisher goes through the unique multi-step process that Super Lawyers employs to find evidence of peer recognition and professional achievement. We already knew Sandy was the best; it is gratifying to see that he is nationally recognized. For more information on the list: http://www.superlawyers.com/index.html
University of Akron Hires Longtime GOP Consultant
Akron Beacon Journal 4/15/2009
"University of Akron trustees have hired a longtime Republican consultant to fill a newly created position: associate vice president of strategy and finance.
Scott Borgemenke, 43, was named to the new post March 25 at a salary of $142,000. He started his new job March 30."
Read the entire article at Ohio.com, the Akron Beacon Journal web site, here.
Clueless on Campus: a UA lesson in how not to win enough friends at the Statehouse
Akron Beacon Journal 4/17/2009
"...Ohio already has many university officials with six-figure salaries, not to mention the nation's highest paid university president, Gordon Gee at Ohio State, at more than $800,000 a year..."
Read the entire article at Ohio.com, the Akron Beacon Journal web site, here.
UA Pact Costing $25,000 Unusual in State: Cleveland State Says Consultant Not Needed
Akron Beacon Journal 4/11/2009
"The University of Akron is paying a consultant $25,000 a year to improve the executive and leadership skills of President Luis Proenza and other top managers.
Frank T. Grosser of FTGExecutive Group Inc. in Deerfield, Ill., provides customized coaching under the terms of an agreement that might be the only one of its kind among state universities in Ohio.
The agreement was first signed in April 2004 and has been renewed yearly."
Read the entire article at Ohio.com, the Akron Beacon Journal web site, here.
Administration Spending:From the May 2009 Akron-AAUP Newsletter
"...University of Akron trustees have created yet another new vice president position, at a cost of $142,000...(Scott) Borgemenke's broad job description calls for him to develop 'innovative solutions to challenging problems' in budgeting and financing. Borgemenke is commuting from his home in Dublin, a Columbus suburb."
"...Simultaneous with the President’s $85,000 bonus, the new $142,000 VP position, the $25,000-plus-expenses consultant, and so on, the administration has asked all departments to plan to cut 10% from their operating budgets. Many departments have no fat to cut, and so any budget cuts will negatively impact their missions. "
"...While Akron-AAUP can understand the need for budget cuts if state funding is severely reduced, we would expect such cuts to be shared by the administration. But the administration’s recent spending habits seem to indicate that there is plenty of money available for their priorities. This summer, economist Rudy Fichtenbaum of Wright State University will once again go over the university’s audited financial statements with a fine toothed comb, to analyze exactly where all the money is going. Rudy performed this service for us during negotiations for our last contract, and it was very revealing. We will publicize the results of this investigation in the Fall."