Lecturer layoffs could hit University of Michigan campus come fall
Students walk by the State Street entrance of the Literature, Science and the Arts Building March 19. The college is considering plans to layoff lecturers in order to meet savings goals.
Angela Cesere | AnnArbor.com
Layoffs could be on the way for the largest college at the University of Michigan's Ann Arbor campus.
Departments in the College of Literature, Science and the Arts are considering scenarios that would include laying off members of the lecturers' union to meet savings goals, officials confirmed.
Individual departments' savings plans could also include the consolidation of some classes and having tenure-track faculty teach more classes.
If implemented, scenarios like these would result in fewer lecturers being needed, U-M spokesman Rick Fitzgerald said.
There has been no final determination on layoffs.
"One of the challenges every unit (department) faces is how to maintain quality in these difficult economic times," Fitzgerald said.
Joseph Walls, a spokesman for the Lecturers' Employee Organization, said officials confirmed at a March meeting that at least four areas, including the Residential College, the physics and psychology departments, as well as the Spanish program within the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, are considering laying off lecturers as part of their plans to achieve savings targets set by U-M. The LEO and university officials have been meeting weekly with the goal of hashing out a new three-year contract by May.
Layoff rumors have persisted throughout the LEO's negotiation process, Walls said. And while lecturer layoffs are part of the normal ebb and flow of things - depending on the university's needs by semester - he said this is different.
"What we're talking about here is not laying off because a class doesn't make (a minimum number of students), but laying them off as a cost reduction measure," Walls said. The group is also anticipating larger numbers of lecturers to be let go in the fall than in the past semesters, he said.
Each year since 2007, the university has asked its numerous units - including schools, colleges, museums, libraries, centers and institutes - to come up with scenarios reduce costs by 1, 3 or 5 percent as part of U-M's regular budget planning process, Provost Teresa Sullivan said. The LSA's plan for the next three years is unique; its 70-plus departments have each been asked to make plans to trim 2 percent from their budgets a year, beginning with the 2010-2011 school year.
The LEO represents about 1,400 full- and part-time lecturers and other non-tenure faculty who primarily teach undergraduate students. About 900 members are on Ann Arbor's campus, with the rest in Dearborn or Flint.
Other units outside of the LSA are considering layoffs to meet different savings scenarios, said Sullivan, who declined to add further details. The provost's office does not give orders to lay people off, Sullivan added.
The U-M Board of Regents will vote on its budget for next school year in June.
U-M organized five task forces in the fall of 2009 to explore ways to save and make money, with final reports due this spring. One of those task forces is charged with exploring administrative support staff areas for savings.
But U-M will hire more faculty. A $30 million, five-year initiative began in 2008 to hire 100 additional tenure-track faculty to keep classes sizes low and to compete with elite private schools.
The $5 billion a year operation that includes U-M Ann Arbor and the U-M Health System employs 38,900 people. Human resources account for 70 percent of U-M's total costs.
Juliana Keeping covers higher education for AnnArbor.com. Reach her at julianakeeping@annarbor.com or 734-623-2528. Follow Juliana Keeping on Twitter
Comments
DaRyan
Mon, Mar 22, 2010 : 4:22 p.m.
Actually, the profits of Honda, Toyota, GM and Ford go to the shareholders in the form of dividends, since they are public companies. The remainder is reinvested in operations. And, I'm waiting for those of you who claim that faculty at U-of-M drive foreign cars to provide the survey data. Since I've lived here, I've never seen faculty drive cars with "I'm a U-of-M faculty member" painted on the sides. So you don't know what they drive, do you? And by the way, what is a foreign car? I drive a Honda. (No, I'm not connected to the university, either.) It was assembled in the U.S. and contains domestic parts, though the engine and I believe the transmission were imported from Japan and the U.K. respectively. Ford Fusion cars, at least those made a few years ago, were being assembled in Mexico, along with several popular SUVs. Which product would you buy to support American workers?
stunhsif
Mon, Mar 22, 2010 : 8:08 a.m.
@Jake C, Your arrogance precedes you my friend. GM and Ford and for that matter Chrysler do not import parts from China for use in their vehicles as you stated as fact, though they do assemble vehicles in Mexico. RussellR is pointing out that the profits from US assemdbled foreign vehicles ( Mazda-Honda-Toyota-BMW-Mercedes-Hyundai etc) do go back to the countries of origin. The choice of buying US based vehicles versus foreign is of course a personal choice. As a taxpayer who has no choice in supporting the University of Michigan,I am forced too, it does upset me that the vast majority of vehicles driven by profs are foreign. It would seem to make some sense that these folks would support the people that pay their salaries, to do otherwise is very short sighted and arrogant to a cetain degree.
Anonymous Due to Bigotry
Mon, Mar 22, 2010 : 2:52 a.m.
Universities would be great if it weren't for all the students.
Adela G.
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 11:26 p.m.
Lecturers are not "junior teachers." They are teachers who are not on the tenure track doing research and publishing. There are lecturers at UM who have been teaching every semester for many years. Many of them teach the big introductory classes that help freshmen develop an interest in a subject that leads to a choice of major and career. Many lecturers receive excellent student evaluations. They are dedicated teachers who sit on honors thesis committees, supervise independent study, and write letters of recommendation for students. Someone should ask the UM students themselves what they think about the prospect of losing their lecturers to save money.
ChuckL
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 7:10 p.m.
Kafkaland, you're wrong when you criticize phdeez for pointing out the trade-off "between quality teaching or quality research". It is well known that some of the best tenure track professors who also happen to be highly rated instructors often risk being denied tenure due to the "publish or perish" culture at UofM. The fact is, most undergrads at UofM will not go on to be researchers and will find jobs in private industry; these students would benefit hugely from contact with adjunct professors who have a wealth of practical industry experience. Dumping hard working, loyal instructors on the street in one of the worst economies in 80 years all in the name of "not slipping into mediocrity" is grotesque. This is not how you treat your people! Are you saying it is so critical to hire more tenure track, the U can't afford to wait for non-tenure track instructors to leave without replacement? I seriously doubt it! UofM has no business chasing after elite private research institutions like Harvard, Princeton and Yale; UofM is a public university and should act like one. Quality is taking care of all your stakeholders in a fair, equitable and transparent manner, not just the well connected, stuck-up arrogant ones who have a bloated sense of entitlement.
Griffen
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 5:46 p.m.
@ russellr, you are attempting to compare apples and oranges! University of Michigan is in the service sector, whereas automobiles are manufacturing. UM depends on state to subsidize costs as well as various private endowments as well as alumni. As a former adjunct instructor, I can attest to in4mation's comment that once senior faculty retires, they are often replaced by adjuncts (if at all). Education is big business in A2 and I suspect that this trend will continue until students notice that they're being short changed. L.S.A. has always been known as laugh, sing, and play... it prepares you for graduate school and that's about it. Even at SI, we had a drought of qualified faculty which is one of the reasons the program has a such a poor reputation. Good luck. All I can say is thank goodness I got mine.
MyOpinion
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 3:37 p.m.
Faculty research money does not come from tuition money. It mostly comes from federal and to a smaller extent industry research dollars. Students do benefit from the higher level faculty in upper level classes and/or research projects. Some of the more mundane entry level classes at UM are better handled by community colleges - not necessarily by UM's LEO or UM faculty. The classes are cheaper and the speaker is usually a native-English speaker. Foreign car comment is pure conjecture. There may be a higher proportion of foreign cars in Ann Arbor than in the state of Michigan, but to attribute this to UM faculty is too strong. And, it has little connection to the teaching by said faculty, which is what this article is about.
Jake C
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 2:48 p.m.
As one of the few people who apparently is admitting to actually *graduating* from the University of Michigan, I would just like to say that I nearly always learned the *most* from the professors that have been here the *longest*. Sorry, but I didn't choose to attend UM because they have the cheapest teaching staff. Anyone can stand in front of a lecture hall with a PowerPoint template, regurgitate facts from a textbook, and hand out some multiple-choice exams twice a semester. In many cases, I'd rather not show up for those lectures at all, and would prefer to just take some exams online to show that I can repeat some facts on-demand. But not very many professors can actually *connect* with students and get them to reevaluate the way they view the world and their own lives. And isn't that why people go to college? Otherwise, we would just to to a Vo-Tec school and learn how to fix plumbing or rebuild an engine, which probably pays better than the average liberal arts degree today. @russellr: Congratulations on having the Most Irrelevant Post of the Day! Buying a Michigan-assembled Mazda means U of M is a bad University? What an amazing leap of logic! Let me know when Ford and GM stop importing parts from China and assembling vehicles in Mexico.
Kafkaland
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 1:58 p.m.
@phdeez: The coice that you present "between quality teaching or quality research" is a false one. Education at a major research university is much more than just taking classroom courses. It is about being on the team that builds and races solar cars, finding anthropologically important evidence in Africa, and so on. This kind of teaching and learning, in very small groups with internationally recognized faculty prepares students for outstanding achievements tomorrow and, not he least, gets them into top graduate and professional schools. This is why bright and ambitious students enroll at UM, instead of going to a more classroom-focused university. In fact most UM students participate in that kind of activities, and that's very often what they remember most fondly when they think back to their time at UM. This kind of instruction requires top-notch research faculty and is quite a bit more expensive than classroom instruction. That's where a substantial portion of the tuition is going - and not towards research per se, which is paid for by mostly federal grants and indirectly by the "overhead" on federal grants that pays for building infrastructure, utilities, seed funds for new projects or faculty, etc. If the people of Michigan want to make this kind of instruction go away in order to reduce tuition at UM or free up what state funding Um receives, they are certainly free to do so through the elected Board of Regents. I would consider this foolish, though, as it would leave Michigan kids who want that kind of education with only one option: to leave the state. For those who aren't up for what UM is offering - there are plenty of other instututions already in the state who can handle their needs, at much lower cost. And the $300M that UM receives from the state annually are already a bargain: the tuition break for in-state students is already worth more than that, then there is roughly $1B in federal research dollars that UM brings in; and don't believe Google would be in town if we had instead of UM Grand Valley State here.
phdeez
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 11:44 a.m.
Some of the comments have implied that lecturers are "babies" in the teaching field or may be "mediocre" compared to tenured or tenure-track faculty. Let's get a few things straight. First of all, lecturers have the same credentials as other faculty and are often better teachers. The difference is that, recently, major universities have been hiring more lecturers instead of tenure-track positions in order to save money. Of course tenure-track professors publish more books and conduct more research. Why? Because they are paid to. Lecturers teach more and make much less. So, as some have commented, the choice is between quality teaching or quality research. And at the UofM teaching is, for the most part, secondary, so it makes sense that they would cut the lecturers. It has nothing to do with improving the quality of instruction. As universities become more and more like corporations, expect their hiring/firing practices to follow suit.
ChuckL
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 11:43 a.m.
How appropriate someone with the tag "Kafkaland" would state the following, "It is of course sad to see some hard-working lecturers getting laid off - it is contrary to a sense of social justice that many of us feel - but when we have the coice of building a faculty of the highest caliber for the future, or risking a slow decline into mediocrity, I'd take the former any minute." Let me be very clear, the University of Michigan is an institution which is owned by the people of the State of Michigan to serve the needs of the people of the State of Michigan. How is the snob appeal of keeping up with Standford benefiting the people of Michigan? Debling's post is far more insightful; it is a deceitful practice to divert tuition dollars away from undergraduate instruction to support research activities undergraduates will almost never benefit from at the same time tuition will be increased at twice the rate of inflation year after year. UofM is run by a bunch of stuck-up, arrogant elitists who are so busy gorging on the largess, they just can't be bothered with being constrained by the needs of the plebs. The only thing I think UofM is world class in is dumping large turds on their stakeholders whenever the opportunity arises. I hope the LEO and undergrads get wise to this theft of resources and strike immediately. How arrogant; raise tuition, room and board on undergrads and their families while cutting back on undergraduate resources!
debling
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 10:21 a.m.
I fully expected the UofM to do something like this. Fire the low cost employees that do the work and hire more fat cat adminstrators and hire more tenured faculty. This is once again proof that the University has lost touch with it's mission as a public institution. It's primary purpose it to teach undergraduates who live in the State of Michigan, not fatten the wallets of Professors and adminstrators looking to profit from patents and licensing activities. Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of research. But all research activities MUST BE SELF FUNDED! High priced Professors need to provide their own funding from industrial sources, licensing royalties or government grants to pay for their luxury buildings, fine offices, laboratories and student help. None of this should ever come from tuition paying students. If funding cannot be found, then the research is not worth doing, period. Let's not kid ourselves, the top faculty that Kafkaland refers to do not teach. They manage research budgets, apply for grants, travel to conferences around the word, work as consultants for extra money, file patents/receive licensing fees and start their own businesses using intellectual assets they discovered while working at the University. No time for teaching. That's for the junior people. Why should students fund through tuition the research activites of Professors that don't teach them? If they do teach the odd course, chances are they are pushing their latest textbook at $150 a pop.
russellr
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 9:14 a.m.
I would like to ad a thought. First of all when I go downtown or anywhere in Ann Arbor all I see is foreign cars! Most of the faculty drive foreign cars where the profits go back to other countries. Michigan used to be the motor capital of the world with hundreds of thousands of jobs. Look at it now. It is a trinkle down effect. Did the almighty U of M think it wouldn't hit them?? Just wait and see what it will do when you people keep on supporting foreign car companies. All I read now is to support local stores in Ann Arbor, How about supporting Michigan made cars and trucks, the money stays here not oversees. Wake up people in Ann Arbor, your job is next!!!!
Kafkaland
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 8:48 a.m.
Here we go again - commenters bashing senior faculty as having inflated salaries and doing little work. And nothing solid to back up those claims. UM is a top-tier research university, and what makes a research university great is the strength of their senior faculty. If you compare UM to Stanford, which is closest in academic profile to UM inasfar as it has the same strong liberal arts core and the full set of professional schools, what makes Standford stronger than UM by most metrics? I seriously doubt that it's the quality of the lecturers at Standford - I'd bet my bottom dollar that it's the presence of star faculty, including a plethora of Nobel laureates. And they command salaries that even the best-paid academic stars at UM can only dream of. In that vein, it makes perfect sense to exploit that UM has managed its finances very conservatively and is now in a position to continue hiring faculty, with an emphasis on highly promising mid-career people who are likely to become future stars and would ordinarily get offers from Harvard et al., but can now be attracted to UM at reasonable cost beacause palces like Harvard and Berkeley have a hiring freeze because of poor financial decisions in the past. It is of course sad to see some hard-working lecturers getting laid off - it is contrary to a sense of social justice that many of us feel - but when we have the coice of building a faculty of the highest caliber for the future, or risking a slow decline into mediocrity, I'd take the former any minute.
doctorbill
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 8:05 a.m.
Now is a good time to look at tenure. It seems that many tenured faculty have inflated salaries and do little work, but they can't be laid off. Instead, the nontenured, lower paid workers take the hit. UM should consider no longer granting tenure; perhaps long term (~ 5 year) contracts, but guaranteed lifetime employment should be gone.
Mike D.
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 8:03 a.m.
I know some will complain about cutting down on the junior teachers first, but it makes sense to me. This is, after all, HIGHER education. I'd rather have the more accomplished and experienced teachers forced to do more grunt work (discussions, grading, actually teaching classes, etc.) than lose them altogether in favor of babies.
trueblue72
Sun, Mar 21, 2010 : 7:29 a.m.
Interesting that the UM is focusing on those at the lower end of the pay scale to cut costs (while hiring more faculty). Has anyone looked at the inflated salaries of senior faculty and administrators? Why not some cost savings in that area?