The WCSU chapter of the AAUP has announced a rally and picket line on Friday November 19th to coincide with CSCU President Cheng’s visit to campus. AAUP members are urging students to attend and get involved, but many students are unfamiliar with the controversy. To help catch new students up to speed, The Echo is providing a brief overview of the long running conflict and introductions for the major players ahead of our planned coverage.

Who is the AAUP?

The AAUP is the American Association of University Professors, essentially a labor union for faculty. Like other unions, they bargain collectively on behalf of their members for better conditions, better compensation, and the political interests of its membership. In this case, the WCSU and Connecticut State Universities chapters bargain with the university and the governing organizations at the state level over professors’ contracts.

As an entity, the AAUP represents professors, not students. However, AAUP members are quick to point out that faculty working conditions are students’ learning conditions. Several of the AAUP’s main objections to current proposals include larger class sizes, requirements office hours, offerings of class sections, and the review process for course and degree programs.

Who is President Cheng, and what is the Board of Regents?

If we imagine President Clark (the President of WCSU, from whom you’ve received emails) as akin to governor of our little state of WCSU, President Cheng is the POTUS. President Cheng is appointed by the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities Board of Regents, which as the name implies, governs all Connecticut state universities and community colleges.

But what exactly does ‘govern’ mean in this context, and to whom are the regents accountable? That question is difficult to answer, partly because of the tangle of state legislation, committees, and negotiations, and partly because the precise answer is itself at issue with this ongoing debate.

The Board of Regents (BOR) receives money from the state budget to supplement tuition, and its members are appointed alternately by the state legislature, and the governor. Many board members are themselves former legislators or gubernatorial staffers, a source of some contention among professors. The BOR is also advised by a faculty advising committee, composed of university faculty from across state universities, and a student advisory committee elected by student government, as well as a handful of other state and elected officials, but these advisors do not have voting rights at BOR meetings.

What are the BOR’s proposals? 

The answer depends on how much time you have, and which sources you trust. There are thousands, if not tens of thousands, of pages of reports, charts, amendments, updates, proposals, and counter-proposals available online as part of the public record to read about it yourself. You can also get a surface level idea of the controversy by plugging “CT BOR” into google and reading the first few Op-Eds that come up.

The short version, however, is that the BOR is anxious to cut expenses wherever possible. This includes larger class sizes and longer working hours for professors, but also subtler measures such as standardizing courses offered across universities to cut down on sections, eliminating low-completion degree programs, and capping new hiring. The BOR says these measures will allow them to avoid raising tuition, however the AAUP argues that they strike at the value at the heart of higher education in the first place.

It helps in understanding the current contract controversy to have a passing familiarity with BOR plans for the university system as a whole over the past few years. Most notable is the “Students First” plan, which promised to simultaneously expand student services and cut back on costs by integrating the community colleges into a single entity and transforming college presidents into CEOs. Reading over the documentation for this plan and the objections to it paints a picture of the CSCU system as akin to a business with profits to be maximized, something the AAUP says is dangerous for students and professors, and at odds with the BOR’s mission.

Why should I care?

Aside from the civic virtue of being an engaged citizen, these changes have the potential to affect students in numerous ways. Most obviously, class sizes, office hours, and everything about when, where, and how classes are offered, is on the table. Below the surface, moreover, is a much larger debate on the future shape of higher education in Connecticut, which is no less important to current students’ future degrees.

In the case of the Students First plan, experts warned that the proposed reorganization would result in the community colleges becoming de-accredited, potentially meaning students’ degrees would no longer be recognized. If such reorganizations were to be pushed on the 4-year universities, as the AAUP warns they will be next, it could impact whether or not current students are able to graduate and work in their field of study. Even if nothing so dramatic occurs, it is easy to see how reorganization may impact how future employers perceive the value of students’ degrees.

At a larger level, the policies decided on now will affect not only current, but future students, and thus the direction of the state for years into the future. Everyone who is planning to live anywhere in a community with workers and professionals graduating from Connecticut colleges and universities has a stake in the current debate.