Newsletter #13 (4/19/2024)

How many people in FAS are going to be laid off? When?

How is the work going to get done after the layoffs happen?

1. The Faculty of Arts and Science Faculty Board is meeting today, Friday, April 19^th at 3:30 pm in Mac-Corry B201 or via Zoom. The agenda is available here. This meeting will see the required second vote on a motion from the floor that was passed in March. The motion addresses issues of timing and transparency around restructuring in FAS. A successful vote and strong presence at the meeting are one way for those of us who have not been consulted or informed about restructuring plans in FAS to demonstrate, transparently, our concern and anger at the continuing failure of the faculty office to communicate their actual plans – particularly regarding layoffs – with staff, faculty, and students.

2. The University has launched a new webpage: Queen’s University Balanced Budget Plan. “Addressing our financial challenges together, as one university.” It’s a tidy, bloodless plan, with no word of lay-offs or the kind of departmental restructuring that is rumoured to be imminent in FAS. This has had department heads so concerned that 17 of them signed a letter to the Dean in which the word ‘catastrophic’ was used to refer to the effect of the FAS plan on departments and programs. We might be in this together, but we certainly are not all having the same experience.

Members of QCAA continue to monitor the growth of the University’s investment funds and look forward to end of fiscal year reporting about how much they’ve grown and how the university has chosen to allocate any gains in value. You can find some information on the University’s investments here.

Recall that the financial report submitted to the Board of Trustees in March stated that “additional” investment income would be “allocated to the general capital reserve to fund priorities in support of the University’s academic and research mission.” In other words, it would not be used to support the operating budget or mitigate the deficit or save people’s jobs. QCAA’s comment on that report to the Board is available here.

3.  At this week’s Senate meeting the Provost announced that Bader College would be laying off 50 people at the end of the month. “Soon we have to turn our attention to the future of the Castle.” Indeed. While the total cost is not yet known, repairs to the Castle will apparently be in the 10s of millions of dollars, but Queen’s has “every intention of retaining the castle as an asset.” Yes, asset.

The Provost finally announced the members of the Strategic Implementation and Operations Task Force that was “created to guide budget reduction initiatives and facilitate integrated conversations across Queen’s.” Members include Provost Matthew Evans, Deputy Provost Teri Schearer, Vice-Provost and Dean of Student Affairs Ann Tierney, General Counsel Lon Knox, and Nick Mosey, who is on the task force as a representative of the Principal’s Office. According to the new Balanced Budget Plan webpage, this committee was supposed to have representation from central services and the faculties.

In his remarks on the budget the Provost said that contributions from shared services are why the deficit has fallen to $40 million. He emphasized the point that the responsibility of dealing with the FAS situation is “Widely shared across whole university.” The ‘we are all in this together’ rhetoric is now commonplace, and yet the threat of layoff is not hanging over everyone.

The Nous survey that is now underway is the second and final preliminary survey of the benchmarking process. After this, another Nous survey will be launched in November and then the contract has them returning annually for “3 or 4 years.”

A previous issue of this newsletter mentioned the fact that the University is reducing admission to FAS by 91 students in the upcoming year and assigning these seats instead to Applied Sciences, Commerce, and Health Sciences programs. At Senate, the Provost said that the seats were being transferred so they would bring in more revenue to the University, given that students in these programs pay higher tuition than students in Arts and Science.

Of course, this transfer will also mean that, with our current budget model, FAS will lose revenue and “its” deficit will increase. When asked at Senate what the benefit and loss would be of the seat transfers, the Provost invited Senators to do the math themselves. Here’s some of the math: Over four years, the cumulative loss to FAS, where tuition is $7400, would be about $6.8 million, with a loss of $2.7 million every year after that. Without knowing how many seats are going to which programs, or which Health Sciences programs we are talking about, we can’t calculate the benefit to the other programs. But, as an example, let’s say that if all 91 seats were to go to Applied Sciences, where tuition is $13,400, the benefit to Applied Sciences would be about $12.2 million after four years and almost $4.9 million a year after that. The benefit to Commerce, where tuition is $17,700 a year, would be greater. As someone said, FAS deserves a thank you note.

In response to a question about revisiting the budget model in order to avoid this kind of shell game, the Provost said that, yes, it needs to change, but “the time to change a model is not in the middle of a crisis.” It is not news that the budget model is detrimental to FAS. See this report on the budget model prepared for QUFA in 2017 for a detailed discussion. The Principal has been arguing that the budget model needs to change since the beginning of his first term before we were in this current crisis. When exactly might be the time to fix this?

From the Cyclical Program Review Committee Chair’s Report to Senate: “The chair observed a common finding in several recent review team reports and communicated this with Associate Deans (Teaching and Learning). Reviewers have noted a lack of transparency on budget model and processes, and a lack of understanding of the same among faculty members…The chair recommended in his communication with Associate Deans that faculties and schools explore ways to improve budget transparency and communication.”

Here is one last item from Senate. It’s not exactly related to the budget or austerity, but it’s good news worth sharing: God Save the King will no longer be played at convocation. That took decades, but eventually, things can get done here.

4. Last week, a CBC news story about Alberta Premier Danielle Smith’s proposal to vet federal research funding coming into the province to ensure that a “broad range of research and opinion is reflected at universities.” Within a couple of days, two University of Alberta PhD students had published an article in The Conversation providing data and analysis showing who actually does get the lion’s share of federal funding. Spoiler alert: it’s not the left-leaning sociologists or gender studies scholars whom the premier is likely trying to flag with her comments.

5. Yet another item from the we are not alone file. This time an article in the Guardian about Goldsmiths, University of London. It touches on government underfunding, financial decision-making, poor management, threats to the humanities and social sciences, and how universities are now positioned as central targets in political culture wars. See #4 above. The rhetoric might not be quite as sharp in Ontario, but the underfunding achieves the same end.

Thanks to the colleagues who provided copy and advice for the newsletter this week!