Rao's sidestep
University President Michael Rao's interview Thursday with Central Michigan Life included remarks aimed to ease concerns about the recent faculty contract.
This would be well and good, but Rao's remarks did not answer the appropriate question.
When asked whether the latest faculty contract was fair, Rao cited economic woes, including rumblings of a possible state funding callback from Gov. Jennifer Granholm, as justification for lower pay and benefits.
The university cannot responsibly spend money it is unsure it will have. But no faculty members make this claim.
The question is whether CMU should reshuffle its resources to better compensate faculty. This is distinct from asking CMU to spend resources it does not have. The question is what proportion of actual resources should be committed to faculty.
An increase or decrease in state funding, and in overall revenue, is relevant only insofar as it sheds light on the amount of money that follows from that proportion. But citing state economic woes assumes the university's priorities, its financial commitments, are appropriate. It sidesteps the problem.
Reshuffling priorities does not require an influx of state funding. It requires critically evaluating the university's agenda. Faculty are perturbed because the university has provided a poor contract while committing $15 million to a medical school (as a start), at least $5 million to renovations to the Bovee University Center, and $165,000 to pristine copper gutters on Warriner Hall, to name a few of its glamorous projects.
A reshuffling of priorities would place those funds into better contracts for more faculty. Of course, it would be unreasonable to demand that the university - on top of all its projects - better compensate faculty. That would require additional funding, but again that is not what faculty are demanding. They are requesting the university cut back elsewhere so that they can get a better deal.
Rao's other objection - that much of the university's funds are committed to larger projects - seems weak. The university cannot reshuffle all its funds, but it can set less grandiose goals and stop stretching its funds so thin. This requires a vision shift, and it is within Rao's powers to do this.
If Rao is concerned about affronting donors, then donors should be told their funds will go to ensuring top-notch faculty at CMU. This is not as glamorous, and it will not look as good on brochures.
But it is what students need. It is what the university needs.
