Re: [Pen-l] Will Higher Education Be the Next Bubble to Burst?

[Jim Devine <jdevine03@xxxxxxxxx>]

Carl Dassbach wrote:
> I haven't set about to collect data so much is anecdotal.  In my university,  the administration has gown over 300% in the last 10 years while the faculty  has grown maybe 20%.  The number of vice-prezs has increased from 3 to 7
all extremely well paid and our president's salary is among the highest 10%
of salaries for university presidents in the country.  <

That's happening at my university, too. A lot of it has to do with the
overhead needed for insurance, legal stuff, personnel management,
fund-raising, etc. Also, corporate culture has infiltrated. Our
Academic Vice Prez is now called the Chief Academic Officer
(pronounced "cow").

> Most of our building are 60/70s institutional red brick but the 2 newest building are roofed or sheathed in copper with granite, marble or slate facades.  The new buildings  have wood and tile, the old ones have linoleum floors (but the University is  gradually upgrading them.)  <

Part of this happens because they can't get donors to shell out if
they can't be paying for a newer, better, fancier, etc. building. The
Larry Flynt Library can't look like an institutional red brick
tenement if you want Larry's money.

> We routinely spend large amounts of money for a  new logo and to have someone invent a new motto, our latest - "Create the future."  <

My favorite college motto is the one of the college in "Animal House":
Learning is Good.

Our logo is stupid: LMU (vertical bar) LA. They spent money on that,
when they could have a contest with student entrants.

> We hire image consultants.  The largest part of the administration is "Marketing" and things like the registrar and data processing services are part of marketing. Our marketing budget is huge and we send recruiter all over the country as well as all over the world to recruit students.  We have a Division 1 hockey team that has not had a winning season in many years but they still travel all over the country.  <

I hate that stuff too.

> We have started programs like biomedical engineering out of nothing and spent a great deal of money to seed the program and recruit faculty but have very few majors.  <

I think that may be a good thing.

-- 
Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own
way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.
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