Carleton (fwd)

[Moira Day]

Hi everyone,
        Sending another newspaper article to go with Kathy's, for those
who want to write. Note that the financial situation is being used as the
excuse for axing the programs as expensive and serving few students.
(Prof. Bohm's letter suggests that the actual statistics suggest
otherwise especially as regards expenses. Perhaps he would be amenable to
sharing some of them with potential letterwriters.) Also note - in line
with Harris' comments - what the university plans to pursue or emphasize
in place of the cut programs.
        Also, while the president doesn't actually suggest - in this
article at least - that professors could be hired back as sessionals, it
does seem to make the implicit assumption that professors are simply
overpaid sessional lecturers and their services to the university,
province and larger community are largely restricted to classroom duty -
at least when they're not frittering away the Ontario taxpayers' money by
extracting moonbeams from cucumbers.
        I think this impression needs some correction.

Moira

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 1997 09:59:54 -0600 (CST)
From: Norman Gee <Norman.Gee at ualberta.ca>
To: moiraday at duke.usask.ca
Subject: Carleton

 Story from Ottawa Sun at
http://www.canoe.ca/OttawaNews/22_n1.html


  Faculty and students in Carleton University's comparative literary
studies got a better read on the future of their
programs yesterday.
 So far there's no sign of a happy ending.
 University president Richard Van Loon confirmed yesterday severe cuts
could be looming in the school's graduate
language and literature programs as Carleton grapples with a projected
$5.8-million deficit next year.
 Those programs "have relatively few students in them and they cost a lot
to operate," Van Loon said during a press
conference.
 "In an institution which has a budgetary deficit, you have to look at
those issues."
 How deeply the cuts will go isn't expected to be announced until next
week, but Van Loon hinted the slashing might
include 30 layoffs.
 Some observers are already predicting the job losses will be much larger
-- perhaps double Van Loon's estimate, or
more.
 Caught in the middle of it all is the school's comparative literary
studies, which saw its admissions frozen last week.

 The move has outraged graduate students who are watching their studies
being chopped.
 "These people are terribly upset because they feel the school is deeming
their studies not worthy of continuing," said
Dave Ebner, editor-in-chief of the school newspaper The Charlatan.
 "If I were in (the program) I'd be upset too."
 The cuts come as part of the university's ongoing Steps to Renewal program
which calls for the school to focus on
such core strengths as hi-tech and communications studies.
 In the past decade the university has accumulated a debt topping $21 million.

Norman Gee, Ph.D, P.Chem
Faculty Service Officer
Laboratory Coordinator of General Chemistry
Department of Chemistry, University of Alberta
Edmonton, Alberta  CANADA  T6G 2G2
403.492.3438 FAX:403.492.8231 Norman.Gee at ualberta.ca
http://www.chem.ualberta.ca/~ngee/Chem10XLabs.html
http://www.acpo.on.ca/acpa/index.htm