The mess that is the ideologically-motivated restructuring of the Faculty of Arts and Science continues apace. FAS teaches 70 percent of Queen’s students; it was long the source of the reputation for excellence that was seen to accrue to a Queen’s education. Disparaged by a populist provincial government that has refused to provide adequate funding, the humanities, social and basic sciences that are the bread and butter of FAS are under threat here at Queen’s, where even the Dean does not seem to be their champion. Despite frequently acknowledging its inequities, senior administrators have refused to alter the dysfunctional budget model that privileges smaller professional faculties with uncapped tuition rates and the potential to attract wealthy donors who want to attach their names to applied and hopefully non-controversial research and teaching. The financial burden placed on FAS means that programs are being condensed and reorganized, disciplinary hierarchies are being reinforced, and the labour, energy and care of committed staff are being eliminated. Whenever this restructuring process reaches its conclusion, FAS will be much diminished.
1. QCAA has learned that at least 14 people have been laid off already this week in the Faculty of Arts and Science – and the word is that there are or will be others. Have we heard anything concrete from the Dean? Has anyone in the Dean’s office said how many people will be losing their jobs or how many staff members have not had their contracts renewed? How many people working here now will not be here next month? How many positions have been or will be eliminated during the process of restructuring FAS? How many fewer people will be available in the fall to do the necessary work? Which work is going to be left undone? Instead of clear information, we got a letter full of platitudes sent by the Dean yesterday at 4:18 pm:
“Throughout our efforts to reduce our budget deficit we have committed to doing whatever we could to minimize impacts on our people. Whether that was offering the Voluntary Exit Incentive (VEI), not filling vacant positions, or moving employees that would likely be impacted by a layoff into vacant necessary roles rather than hiring externally, this has been our focus.
“These measures significantly reduced the number of positions that would be subject to potential layoffs, as a majority of position reductions were done through voluntary means. Still, the Faculty continues to face a large structural operating budget deficit wherein our expenditures exceed our revenues, and our financial situation remains serious. As a result, today we have taken the difficult step to reduce our workforce further through layoffs.”
Nothing following these paragraphs provides any concrete information. For all the money this university has spent on consultants, one might think they could have solicited advice – we do have a School of Business and a program in Industrial Relations – on best practices for restructuring and layoffs, particularly in terms of communication.
The email has the appearance of being sent to each of us individually (“Dear Mary Louise…”), with wording so vague that a number of people took the email as a layoff notice sent specifically to them, which is not surprising given the context of tension and fear that has been the norm in FAS for months now.
Interestingly, the kinds of restructuring moves undertaken in FAS – for instance, the centralization of financial services, the ‘hubbing’ of departments – are not unique to Queen’s. They are precisely the kind of processes recommended by higher education consultants like Nous. Last fall, when we learned that Nous was coming to Queen’s, I reached out to members of a professional organization to which I belong and received the following from a colleague in New Zealand. As at Queen’s, the changes that the colleague mentions were conducted before Nous got to work to ‘tidy things up’:
In brief, in 2015, University Management embarked on a full review of its administrative and operating systems, resulting in a complete change and most significantly centralisation of services. This was not just about efficiency, it was about transforming the power structure of the university. Administrative or General staff that used to be hired by their departments and became part of the “team” or “family,” were centrally hired and shared via a pool system – they no longer reported to academics, not even a Dean or Head of Department, but rather to a “Manager” who then reported to several others above them to the Chief Operating Officer – not a Vice Chancellor or academic leader. Since the full implementation of the “new and improved” system in 2017, University Management has spent over $60 million on “consultants” (and using the Official Information Act, we know that contrary to what the management reports, this is not for architects and engineers responsible for new buildings) and in the past 5 years the number of “Managers” earning over $100,000 per year has increased by 92% and rising. The ratio of Administration/Management staff to Academic staff is [now] amongst the highest in the world.
The critical point here: the restructuring was not just about efficiency – it was about “transforming the power structure of the university.” And, we might add, the structure and purpose of higher education itself. We will have more to say on the expansion of the administration at Queen’s in future posts. But for those who may not have seen it, this document is a helpful overview on the cost of senior administration at Queen’s.
How much money will actually be saved by the loss of 14 (or more?) staff positions and the elimination of positions that people on contract had filled? By how much will these lost jobs reduce the $37 million deficit that the university has ascribed to FAS, a deficit that could have been more evenly borne across the institution? It would take a lot of grade 4, 5 and 6 frontline positions to result in any significant savings. These layoffs are devastating for the people and departments/units involved, and yet, they do nearly nothing to address the artificially created FAS-specific “structural deficit.” Hence the suggestion that this process of restriction is not about money but about using a financial ‘crisis’ to wreak havoc on and weaken the position of the Faculty of Arts and Science at Queen’s.
1. For QCAA comment on this week’s layoffs, see this blog post from today and this blog post from earlier in the week. There is also some interesting discussion of the Dean’s letter and restructuring at Queen’s in this thread on Reddit.
2. Those who work with QCAA are frequently contacted by people who want to share information, stories, complaints, or strategy suggestions. Given the current threat of layoffs, program cuts, and fear of retribution, they often ask us to keep their information and concerns anonymous and/or quiet. In an effort to make sharing information easier and less risky, we have launched a short survey to help us get a better picture of what has been going on around the university. We would like to learn more about the impacts of staffing cuts in FAS and across campus on those who have been forced out of the university and those left to carry on with increased workloads. We are also interested in learning about the impacts on programs and services. You can read more about the survey here. Please share this link with others who may be interested, especially those who may no longer have access to their Queen’s email addresses.
3. For more context on the university’s budget and its uneven harms and benefits, QCAA recently published comments on the long-awaited Huron Consulting report on the Queen’s budget model, which the university had been sitting on for two years. That we can actually read the report now is likely due to constant requests in Senate and other public forums and to a freedom of information request submitted by QUFA. Surely getting information in a public institution should not be so hard! Spoiler alert: Even Huron Consulting, which has facilitated some major university restructuring in the US, called out Queen’s for lack of transparency, inequities, and its practice of budgeting for operations in isolation from other funds (like donor funding and research revenue). The consultants write, “Integrating an all-funds view into budget models and resource decision-making processes can help the University understand the comprehensive resource portfolio at their disposal.” We have been making similar arguments for months.
4. And, finally, if the message it conveys about the shallowness of both vision and leadership were not so dismal, we could be ending on a humorous note with this post on the Strategy Session for Senior Leaders (if there were ever a term that had lost all meaning….) that features references to frogs and ping pong balls.
Queen's Coalition Against Austerity 