A month ago, I traveled to a higher-educationconference in San Diego on government relations. I felt guilty about the trip because I knew that, within a few days, my university was going to announce a first round of employee layoffs.
The layoffs, of course, were related to our country's wretched economy. My public university has suffered two (maybe more by the time you read this) reductions of state-subsidy funds ordered by the governor. Our university investments have fallen by the millions. (Thank you, Lehman Brothers.) Donations from alumni and others are down. And some of our scholarship funds are "underwater." That is a new term (to me) meaning the fund is no longer earning enough money to be able to support granting a scholarship. All pretty depressing.
However, I was in sunny Southern California at a luxury hotel. Now understand, I did not sneak out of town to make the trip. The conference had been scheduled for months. Nonrefundable fees had been paid. And my university president knew about the trip and waved off my, admittedly, half-hearted suggestion that I cancel. In fact, that exchange with the president actually led to a discussion about if, and when, he might impose a campus travel ban.
There is little in the intricate world of a university that seems simpler than banning travel. The university would simply stop paying for mileage, airline tickets, hotels, tips, taxi rides, meals, and spa visits. (Just kidding about the last one.) However, in truth, the way that travel expenses are paid at a university is incredibly complex.
First, athletic departments get a pass. Teams play away games and coaches go on recruiting trips. Neither of those can change. But after sports, whether a division of the university can cut back on its travel costs comes down to, well, money. Let's examine the connection between travel and money office by office.
The development office (also known as fund raising or "institutional advancement") gets the next free pass. Those folks are permitted to travel anywhere to ask alumni, other donors, and foundations for money. The university president occasionally goes along. The trips are usually worthwhile, although less so in these difficult times. But perhaps that's all the more reason to make those trips.
Some would argue that it's just as important for the admissions people to be on the road. After all, if next year's freshman class takes a dive, the institution's financial problems will be worse. High schools are still graduating students, and every university has to get its fair share.
"Wait a minute," a provost might say, "what about my researchers?" Researchers have million-dollar federal grants and need to be able to travel to Washington to continue to curry favor with Congress and agency officials. The university would be insane to limit that travel.
The provost might add: "And what about my publishing faculty?" It is true that faculty members travel to make presentations at scholarly conferences around the country and abroad. Those presentations promote the university as well as enhance the reputation of faculty members. In this era of rankings, is it wise to limit efforts that demonstrate faculty quality?
And then there are government-relations administrators like me who spend days and days at the state capital (a six-hour round trip for me that brings more than $100 in mileage reimbursement), working on preserving our share of state instructional dollars as well as blocking unwelcome state legislation.
Nevertheless, on the trip in question, I was in San Diego, which, believe me, has very little in common with my state capital.
In the scheme of things, travel is a very small portion of a university budget. My institution has nearly an annual budget of $700-million. Our travel budget is — well, no one knows. Travel is not budgeted the same way as, say, computer purchases. That is partly because of the different sources available for travel. For example, many research grants have travel costs built into them. Our medical faculty members use their practice-plan money for travel. Some university administrators and faculty members have been traveling to China on regional economic-development grants provided by the local chamber of commerce, corporations, and governments. Part of my own office's travel money comes from our university foundation, which gives all of the institution's vice presidents an annual allowance to use as we deem appropriate (after consultation with the president).
Of course, the bottom-line question is, If no one traveled at all, would the university collapse? Would alumni stop sending checks? Would students stop enrolling? Would researchers stop being awarded grants? Would administrators rank a university lower because none of its faculty members presented papers at the Modern Language Association convention? Would the state stop appropriating subsidy money?
I am pretty certain my university would survive if no one traveled for a few months. But most universities live on such tenuous budgets that 100 fewer alumni checks, or 50 fewer new freshmen, or three fewer research grants, or even just a 1 percent drop in the state subsidy might spell disaster. So if some travel helps prevent any or all of those disasters from happening, it is probably well worth it to send some of us off to Beijing, Washington, or even San Diego. It just proves what Woody Allen famously said, "Ninety percent of life is just showing up."
San Diego, I will admit was great. I got some sun. I learned a couple of things at the conference. I made some new professional friends. I ate a great seafood dinner. The total cost was approximately $2,000 — or about .000029 percent of my university's budget. The conference next year is in Orlando. I plan to go again.
Unless things get really, really bad.
