Thank you! It is leadership and analysis of this caliber that has given Idaho State University a national reputation for...for...uh, what was that, again?

Finally, someone has the courage to say it as it is! Curriculum glut is suffocating so many of our departments that we are all scrambling to do more with less. Olson makes good sense: let's make some hard decisions about which programs we should fund and which we should let go so that we can play to our strengths instead of being stretched so thin that we let all of our students down.

I'm dying to hear a working definition of "unproductive programs."

Nice spin, but in practice the process that the author describes isn't one where new programs are created and obsolete ones are phased out to make way for new relevant ones. Rather, it is a process where the curricula and resources of once great public funded institutions land grant universities are reduced, dumbed-down and simplfied to resemble, well, an Idaho State and the Idaho States are degraded into glorified community colleges with an Ed.D or Ph.D. agriculture here or there. The best universities in our country (which, with the lack of state funding but continued state strictures, are a group composed more and more of only of private institutions) are not shedding their humanities and social sciences programs. I would at least applaud the provost for honesty- and perhaps agree with his reasing- if he would just come out and say what is unstated: that the students his institution is able to attract do not have the intellectual ability to benefit from such programs that are still quite popular among elite institutions or that his institution, due to disinvestment on the part of the state, no longer wishes or is able to aspire to be a real university.

In case anyone is curious about the actual conditions, the ISU German faculty consists of one full-time visiting instructor teaching four courses this semester, a total of 14 contact hours, who is paid at an hourly rate of $16.11 (all public information, I have no connection to ISU). Now, there's a compelling argument for streamlining the curriculum! With the kind of savings that could be realized my eliminating German - er, "Serbian" - you could probably buy some nice houseplants for the dean's office.

Dass ist eigentlich misst!

Curricula in any institution need to represent a balance among many perspectives: the business model of the institution, vocational needs of graduates (local, national, and global--depending on the aspirations of the institution), foundational assumptions about the educational goals of the institution, research/teaching tensions, and program quality. This article focuses, almost exclusively, on the business model, and suggests that the author works at level of bureaucracy where nonfinancial principles rarely matter. He scarcely alludes to issues beyond resource allocation, and weakens his case by his singleminded attention to just one vector.
Conversely, faculty members often behave as if resources were limitless (the author's primary point), but worse, as if the past relevance of their discipline somehow guarantees them a place at the trough. As a language teacher, I am appalled at the number of language programs--at all sorts of institutions--fail to make themselves relevant to the world as it is. From German programs that fail to make evident and interesting the relevance of the EU to their mission, to French programs that fail to engage in non-condescending ways with the entire Francophone world, etc. I'm sure the same holds true for philosophy, history, music...
It's up to administrators to build a business model that is sustainable. It's up to the faculty to bulid a curriculum that entices its adolescent audience to engage deeply with their respective disciplines, perhaps first by demonstrating its relevance to students' lives and to the contemporary world and then by maintaining a lively intellectual discourse that gradually swims deeper into the traditions of the discipline. If faculty members cannot do that, then they cannot expect to maintain a place at an institution that needs to teach, and not just do research.

This column was speaking logically up to a certain point... at which it states "The same dynamic is at play with other types of curricular streamlining; for example, reforming general-education requirements that are needlessly inflated." It seems that the author is inserting his bias against gen-ed. I am enthusiastic about gen-ed requirements and think their value merits a discussion elsewhere- not in an article about administrative accounting schemes.
MCole

Isn't this issue also related to a secondary issue -- which has to do with the flexibility of faculty members themselves to expand their teaching portfolios over time and to adapt and change their research and teaching interests over a thirty to forty year period of their careers? Particularly in any field with a regional focus (history, government, literature, languages) there will always be "hot" new regions and regions which were once hot but are not anymore. Presumably nobody wants to study "serbian" now, but they probably did in the late 1990's when Bosnia was in the news.

The problem thus becomes -- what do we do with faculty who were hired when one region was "hot" who are no longer generating interest in their courses? I'd argue that the best faculty in those situations are those who can find a way to adapt their knowledge to teach new courses that still appeal to students, future employers, etc.

And probably the universities themselves should be more cautious about stocking up on experts on the hot new field in the wake of current developments without thinking about what this will do to their universities in twenty or thirty years when these same fields are no longer hot.

If you don't like the message, attack the messenger (or in this case, the messenger's institution).

As long as public institutions receive tax-payer money, we're accountable for how that money's spent. In our service area, we have NO DEMAND for German, Anthropology, Sociology or Philosophy majors yet we continue to offer undergrad courses with an enrollment of less than 10 students per section (and multiple sections, no less). Talk about inefficiency.

Looking at program costs per student or per major is relevant. Looking at that only is to take too narrow a focus. Perhaps one can teach effectively World History I to a class of 60 students. I doubt that one can teach effectively Spanish I or Drawing I to much more that a class of 20 students. So the History department subsidizes Foreign Language or Art. A provost makes as much as two or three faculty members. Should we complain that the work of those faculty members (the tuition dollars students in their couirses generate) is subsidizing the provost?

One criteria is to ask who is teaching the central courses in a program, instead of simply calculating cost per student (which has its uses, but also its limits as a criteria). Are the senior faculty sharing the intro courses? Or are these courses being farmed out to adjunct and junior faculty so that senior faculty can teach small seminars in their specialty? My department came back from the brink by defining a core and having the core faculty teach it.

RE gen-req: I went to a college with no gen req. At age 18 I thought this was great. Looking back - bad idea. Wish I had some of those distribution course's knowledge. The young are _young_.

The calculation might be a little more complicated in practice but the basic point is correct. Those who wish to save Serbian programs need to make the case to students that they need to take courses in Serbian.

On the other hand, offering majors in a variety of areas might allow the university to recruit students who would not otherwise attend the university. Then those students take courses in history, economics, math, and physics. Some of the tuition revenue from those courses needs to be counted against the cost of running the Serbian major.

One other point I was going to make is that, at least for public universities, it needs to be asked whether the major being cut is available at another public university within the state. Public universities cannot make decisions only on the basis of tuition revenue.

There are serious factual problems with this article.

The author lists several languages and says that "student demand for those programs is ebbing nationally." I can't speak for the other languages, but student demand for Italian is GROWING nationally (see the MLA statistics for proof).

And this underscores the most basic problem: he cites the Humanities as examples of underperforming programs. No, the Humanities teach more students than other fields. There is indeed student demand for the Humanities.

I was faced, in the past, with a similar situation--I had a Philosophy program that had very few majors. Instead of eliminating it, I worked with them to find a way to make their intro course also satisfy a general education requirement. This improved their enrollments in that class substantially, and many of the students taking this class enjoyed it, and went on to take more Philosphy. End result: we maintained the Philosphy program, improved enrollments in it, and lowered costs (since I didn't need to hire as many people to teach general education, since Philosophy qualified).

Similar solutions can be found for almost any low-enrollment programs--find a way to get students to "sample" them, make the courses attractive, and students will want more. Simply axing the programs or arguing that the status quo needs to prevail forever are not good arguments.

“. . . and that it meets the work force needs of the state and the nation - that is, that graduates would have a reasonable expectation of securing employment with the degree.” This is the key statement in the article, and the author proceeds to ignore it.

Basing curriculum decisions on popularity is not necessarily the best choice. Sure, general education is important and every discipline has it place. But, does the state or nation have an declared, or at least implied, plan for economic sustainability or growth? The public institutions should be supporting this plan by offering the appropriate educational experience, whether it is what the students want or not. If the program does not fit the plan it should be dropped.

So, if the state has plans for developing trade with Serbia and dropping its connections to the Spanish-speaking world - Spanish should be dropped and Serbian expanded.

I suspect most prospective Spanish students will still attend the same university, and just select another major (maybe Serbian).

Has any school in recent memory closed its athletic programs?

I'm not sure why Philosophy keeps being listed as a program with few majors in these discussions (at least by some people here). Nationally, philosophy majors have been increasing over the last 30 years. Here is a discussion of this in the NY Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/education/06philosophy.html

Many schools have discontinued expensive athletic programs, like football. A cursory search of the archives here at CHE would turn up many examples.

It's all about money. We worship Mammon. Nothing has value anymore if it can't be bought and sold for a high profit.

18. 11261897 - December 02, 2010 at 10:47 amReport Abuse
Has any school in recent memory closed its athletic programs?

Yes, the University of California just cut five varsity athletic programs including ones that they were very competitive in. Stanford has also recently made some significant reductions and may need to make more. Schools all over, from East Carolina University to James Madison University to the University of Nebraska, have cut athletic teams. Very few, Western Washington and Hofstra come to mind, have cut football, and have come under tremendous pressure from students and alumni after doing so.

We live in a time of unprecedented economic turmoil and it's very difficult for public institutions to continue to offer every program that historically has been offered while losing 10% to 30% of their state funding and raising tuition (which upsets students, parents, and legislators). Does every public university in a given state need to offer every language? No. The same is true in a number of other academic disciplines. We've come to a new normal and that normal calls for a close inspection of every program, athletic and academic. After completing those inspections there will be some tough decisions to make but if we don't make them, others will do it for us.

Years ago, during another budget crunch, our state legislature required universities to cut "unproductive" programs and majors. Our Phi-Rel dept offered both philosophy and religion majors, but there had been only about one religion graduate every 2-4 years; so we eliminated the religion major. It didn't save a cent, because all the religion courses continued to be offered, were popular, and had good enrollments; but hardly anyone chose religion as a MAJOR! Now students ask, why can't I major in religion? Both religion and philosophy enrollments are higher than ever (both meet gen ed requirements).

Go figure.

At our institution we're going through the same discussion in an essentially non-productive way. Our PhD is on the 'reconfiguration' list because it has been deemed important to the mission of the institution, yet it graduates fewer than an arbitrary number per year.There are no additional costs to offering the degree and a lot of potential costs to dumping it - our PhD students take the same courses as MA students, but shoulder the greater burden in terms of supporting our undergraduate teaching and certainly add to the reputation of the institution by their success in garnering national and international grants for their dissertation research, etc. So we've spent the last four or five weeks having desperate meetings, trying to figure our a way to comply with the administration's demands, to the detriment of our research and teaching agendas, and certainly with an ill effect on our graduate students!

@12068801: "Our PhD students take the same courses as MA students"? Is your PhD merely a long MA with a dissertation?

It's certainly true that most universities can no longer afford to be all things to all people. In one sense, the economic crisis has opened a window of opportunity for institutional leaders. This can be a time to make previously unpopular cuts, and to engage the campus community in a collaborative strategic planning and prioritization effort.

Bob Dickeson, Larry Goldstein, Lucie Lapovsky, and Pat Sanaghan address the issue in detail in Academic Impressions' Higher Ed Impact:
http://www.academicimpressions.com/hei_resources/1010-diagnostic.pdf?&q=6971v274891yT

Your description of the language department would have been perfect if you had switched the roles of the Spanish and Serbian faculty. The Spanish faculty at my institution only come in two days a week when they teach and refuse to give overrides, whereas the other languages teach classes of 35 to 40 students. Faculty in other languages teach overloads each semester (with no compensation), and Spanish faculty never do. So, administrators should look at local programs.

This happens because administrators constantly add tenure track lines in Spanish, even though the demand for Spanish is high mostly only at the gen ed level, where students are taught by adjuncts. If you look at the ratio of majors to faculty in Spanish compared to other languages, it's overwhelming. In other languages, faculty pick up ever more work as their colleagues are down-sized, working 60-70 hour weeks so that students are not impacted.

Tenured faculty are typically hired for their specialty in a subject. That is the subject they will be teaching in. The university that hires such professors is obligated to allow them to teach such courses.

Political, social, and economic winds may shift educational priorities about from time to time. But asking a professor to stop teaching in the discipline they were initially hired to teach in is outrageous. Thank god for tenure protection in such instances.

I do agree that faculty should be (somewhat) flexible in teaching assignments as their institution evolves. Such flexibility should be confined to teaching courses...
- in the instructor's specialty
- at equivalent levels and ratios (e.g. remain teaching 30-50% upper divisional or majors vs. diverting to 100% gen-ed)

Ultimately, the universities best poised to handle educational matters are those which have strong faculty governance. "Curricular glut" (if it exists) has to be recognized and reconciled by faculty. The role of senior administration should be minimized to bare essentials (e.g. total budget, mission statement goals, accreditation, etc.).

The foreign language fix is easy. Require two foreign languages, just as we require two sciences most places. With the idioten we admit to college nowadays, "demand" should be the last thing we worry about.

Why on earth does the Chronicle publish this kind of philistine nonsense? Between the appeal to nonsensical bureaucratic ideals like "streamlining," the proudly displayed anti-intellectualism, and the fundamental misunderstanding of what universities are for cloaked as student-as-consumer-centricity, this could only have come from a totally clueless administrator-manager of the worst kind. How about publishing something by a person whose career _isn't_ dedicated to firing and de-benefiting faculty, de-contenting curricula, and slashing and burning through the scant institutional support left to higher education in false dedication to efficiency?

Here's the solution for every cash-strapped, state-defunded institution in the country: if you really want to mimic corporate America, "streamline" academic middle-management (i.e., admins, deans, and dean-lets of all shapes and sizes) by about 90%.

In other news, what happened Gary? You used to be cool.

Thank you, Gary, for this thoughtful and rational discussion of the truly difficult choices universities must make. In this time of diminished resources and increased expectations, we cannot do everything and we must focus on programs which benefit the largest number of students.

"a national petition is being circulated that expresses 'concern and dismay' over the elimination of the language programs (but not, apparently, over closing the classics and theater programs..."

Am I the only one dismayed to discover that a provost doesn't know a classics program IS a language program?

My institution has calculated that having PhD students teach as GTAs does NOT benefit the institution financially (factoring in tuition waivers plus stipends); in fact, it is the most expensive way to staff classes, save for the most senior faculty members. The cheapest way to get the most students taught is--drum roll--with term faculty. This begs the question (meant the correct way) of whether this is how/why we should make hiring/admitting decisions, but before you assume using TAs is the cheapest way to teach, have some accounting maven cost it out for you. Bet you it isn't.

At our regional public university, the GTA's make $4,000 a semester, teaching 4 four classes each. I think adjuncts at community college make more than that...

@becauseisaidso:

Same here. Graduate programs are expensive. They might lead to more research grants, a better reputation, and the ability to recruit better faculty, but graduate student teaching is not a way to lower costs.

Four courses a semester for $4000? I bet that's good teaching and the graduate students are doing well academically. Yet factor in the cost of running the graduate program and it's still not as good a deal as you make it sound, however much cheaper it might be compared to most graduate stipends.

Well, it doesn't mitigate Olson's general point, but we could fix his "Serbian" problem thus:
1. combine the Serbian program with the Croatian program, and call it the Serbocroatian program, since the two "languages" are really the same language and generally known to disinterested linguists as Serbocroatian,

2. Combine the Serbocroatian program with the Russian Program as the Slavic Languages vishyprogram and more them from ISU at Pocatello to U of Idaho at, wait for it,

Moscow.

Zdravo, prijeteni

Provost Olson's argument is predicated on an erroneous assumption. Enrollment in language courses is not "ebbing" nationally. On the contrary, as surveys from the Modern Language Association have consistently shown over decades, student interest in language learning and programs remains strong (including in German, which Olson singles out--it remains the third most highly enrolled language, after Spanish and French). He might have done some fact checking.

Of equal concern is his narrow vision of academic leadership which, at least in this piece, involves number crunching exclusively. Of course budget considerations are important, but they are hardly the sole topic for department chairs, deans or even provosts. If one values the education of students, and if one recognizes the importance of multiple components in an education, then an academic leader worth her or his salt ought to articulate those desiderata and develop creative strategies to improve education in any sectors that are lagging--whether it is a matter of numeracy, science for non-majors, composition, or second language acquisition. All college students ought to have access to liberal arts learning environments, and academic leaders ought to defend that goal, not just sound retreat.

Russell A. Berman
First Vice President, Modern Language Association

I think VP Berman and others have missed the author's point: this is not about language programs; it's about analyzing all our programs for viability, regardless of discipline.

@andrew54 - Certainly you don't mean to imply that a pack of professional academics managed to miss the larger point completely and descend into a morass of nitpicking and petty turf battles? I am shocked by this.

To everyone bagging on Idaho State- you are jerks and snobs.
To those bagging on Gary- you're worse.

To jjfoster- you, my friend, are hysterical.

Riddle me this Batman. You talk about Universities cutting programs that have smaller enrollments and preserving ones with over-enrollment where professors take on extra sections without compensation. How does one explain SUNY Geneseo's President Dahl's and Provost Long's decision to cut Communication Disorders and Science Program? This program has been named the "Gem of the College," with rising enrollments, professors who participate in at least 3 or more college-wide committees on average, WHILE teaching 4 courses per semester, as their colleagues in other departments refuse to teach over three course. In addition the program has 100% job placement, the highest consistent percentage of graduates who go onto graduate schools, PLUS the department provides over 5000 hours of clinical services to the community while the students themselves individually provide additional service to the college and community. Why would the administration, in all their wisdom cut such a program? One answer is that yes,there is a huge budget shortfall in NY state, but guess what happens to tuition monies in the SUNY system? It DOES NOT GO INTO THE SUNY system. The governor HIJACKS the money and uses it to plug other budget deficits. This creates deficits at an individual college level. Despite this, there is something else going on when it comes to individual program cuts. In the case of SUNY Geneseo, there is no transparency as to WHY the Communicative Disorders and Sciences Program was cut. It was NOT due to declining enrollments, faculty/staff/students not contributing to the university community. The cut at this school was surgical, and done by people who NEVER SET FOOT in the department to understand what the department was about. In this case, the cut may have been political or driven by ignorance. We cannot make sweeping statements about WHY decisions are made, and I caution readers not to take this article at face value, but to read between and beyond the lines.

The student studying Serbian--or any Less Commonly Taught Language (LCTL)--is much more likely to find language and area studies-related employment after graduation. There is a dearth of graduates proficient in Serbian and multiple US government agencies have identified Serbian-language competence as an area of critical need for national security. Additionally, few LCTLs are available at the secondary school level. How do administrators factor these needs into their equations?

I think using enrollment as a measuring stick for a program's viability is a dangerously bad idea. Then we'd end up with a ton of business classes and very little in the liberal arts. I agree that streamlining is necessary, but I certainly hope that the assessment for "unviable" programs goes beyond mere student demand. My former PhD program has been placed on the "cut" list at our University, but student and faculty are working hard to re-legitimate it to the provost and students. It's invigorated the program and brought them to a crucial reassessment of how they have been serving the University, undergraduates and graduates. That's good because I left that program because it was completely sucky. I hope that our schools don't all become student-demand-driven business schools.

Si hoc comprehendere potes, gratias age magistro Latinae. Si hoc comprehendere non potes, gratias age praeposito.

Wenn Sie diesen Satz verstehen koennen, sollen Sie Ihrem Deutsch Lehrer danken. Und wenn nicht, soll man sich bei einem, Fremdenhasser, wie dieser Oberhaupt der Universitaet, fuer Ihre Unwissenheit bedanken. Die Gedanken sind frei, aber man soll nicht frei von den Gedanken sein.

marcus - They cut those languages at my institution, so I can't understand you...

Translate google dot come is going to put Marcus out of business as well, I suppose - they offer an imprecise translation, but close enough you get the idea

"If you can understand this sentence, you should thank your German teacher. And if not, one should at one, xenophobe, as head of the University, thank you for your ignorance. The thoughts are free, but you should not be free from thoughts"

Of course, I could translated it to any language I want, but then again, who's job is it to make translations? The curious win:

Als je kunt begrijpen, gefeliciteerd, je erachter hoe het internet, een noodzakelijke vaardigheid te gebruiken voor mensen met en zonder dat diploma's van elke rang.

auf Deutsch, nicht Dutch, bitte.