Connecticut’s public colleges and universities lost more than 200 professors last week as thousands of state workers took advantage of an early-retirement incentive, the Hartford Courant reported, and administrators now are scrambling to plug the holes in their course schedules for the fall. Complicating their task, the state still has not set its budget for the new fiscal year.

The state’s 12 community colleges, which lost more than 70 faculty members, are concerned that they may have to cap enrollments, just as record numbers of potential new students are turning to them for training.

The University of Connecticut also lost more than 70 professors, through the retirement program. Jeremy Teitelbaum, dean of its College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, told the newspaper that while each department was making its own plans, most would probably meet course demand this fall by employing...

This article on professorial fashion caught my eye. As much as most of us hate to admit that fashion plays a role in our professional lives (we echo Henry David Thoreau’s lament in Walden: “The head monkey at Paris puts on a traveller’s cap, and all the monkeys in America do the same”), the reality is that there are trends and expectations aplenty even in academe.

This got me thinking about the amount of fashion posing that goes on in any profession; higher education certainly is not immune to this, from the grungy Marxist to the cuff-linked development officer to the seersucker-clad law professor to the presidential wannabe’s who wear those trendy rimless glasses. Most campuses have more than a few poseurs in their communities; likewise, we have enough free spirits to keep things interesting (I have fond memories of colleagues who have worn the occasional kilt and bathrobe around...

Exchanging e-mail messages about sensitive, politically connected hires is a big risk, as college chiefs at North Carolina State University and now Northwest Florida State College have learned the hard way.

James R. Richburg was fired in April as president of the two-year college over an alleged $6-million political boondoggle. He and a former state lawmaker, Rep. Ray Sansom, are accused of falsely securing state money to build an aircraft hangar for a friend and major political donor. They both face felony misconduct charges.

While in the Legislature, Mr. Sansom helped steer $35-million in state money to the college. In what critics call a quid pro quo, Northwest Florida State last year hired him as vice president for external affairs, a part-time job with a $110,000 annual salary.

Mr. Sansom had an unusually hands-on role in his job’s creation: He drafted his own contract. In an...

Harvard University Press, one of the most prestigious scholarly publishers, has done away with seven positions as the university as a whole faces hard times. The lost jobs include three in marketing, one in sales, one in design, and two in editorial, according to William P. Sisler, the press’s director. The editorial layoffs did not include acquisitions editors, Mr. Sisler said, “and did not affect the composition of the list.”

The layoffs are part of a broader, institution-wide purge of jobs at Harvard, which eliminated 275 positions in late June, with more downsizing to come. The poor economy played a part in the layoffs at the press, but Mr. Sisler said that his shop had been rethinking its strategies and structure before the downturn.

“Even before the economy really began to tank last fall, we were already engaged in planning for the changed and changing publishing environment,”...

Considering the turbulent financial times, it’s understandable that many universities are freezing faculty and administrative pay. What’s less understandable is why some of them are putting the kibosh on pay raises for grant-supported postdoctoral fellows, FemaleScienceProfessor writes in her latest post. She points out that not only does it make no financial sense to freeze the pay of externally supported postdocs, but it’s, well, downright unethical:

In fact, universities benefit financially from postdoctoral scholars because postdoctoral salaries may be part of the indirect cost calculation of a grant. Postdocs in the sciences bring money to a university. Freezing salaries of postdocs or other soft-money researchers is a money losing policy. …

I can’t think of a good reason why grant-funded salaries can’t be paid as budgeted in the grants. If the money exists in a grant...

The Jones Theatre at Washington State University is getting a $500,000 face-lift this summer. A construction crew has already ripped out its 500 orange and blue seats and is replacing them with new ones covered in a wine-colored fabric. The theater’s walls are being painted a light beige, and a new set of black velour curtains will grace the stage.

But some professors are worried that the theater will remain dark. That’s because the department of theater and dance is one of three academic programs slated for elimination because of budget cuts at Washington State. Officials say they must slash a total of $54-million from the university’s budget over the next two years. The 11 tenured and tenure-track professors who work in the three programs are also on the chopping block.

Administrators are calling the eliminations “vertical cuts.” Instead of slicing costs equally across the board as...

More than 20,000 academic employees in the University of Wisconsin system have collective-bargaining rights now that the state’s new budget has been signed into law. Those covered include tenured and tenure-track faculty members, part-time and full-time lecturers, and adjuncts, among others. The law, long sought by the Wisconsin chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, paves the way for the federation to begin organizing campaigns.

The fiscal year that begins on July 1 for most colleges is expected to bring a wave of layoffs, as institutions grapple with declining state contributions, a falloff in donations, and other budget pressures.

Eliminating jobs can create a number of legal pitfalls, including potential lawsuits for breach of contract or discrimination. If handled poorly, layoffs can even damage a university’s reputation.

Legal and human-resource specialists emphasize that the time to set plans and policies for reducing the work force is when times are good. Waiting until the last minute to change your procedures and guidelines can create even greater risks for legal stumbles and lawsuits. Here are some crucial questions and answers that legal experts say colleges should keep in mind before they consider downsizing. …

Read more.

Greensboro College has many of the intimate hallmarks of a small, private, liberal-arts college.

Professors give their cellphone numbers to students and routinely provide extra help to those who need it. Classes at the North Carolina institution average 14 people. And one of the students featured on the college Web site is a biology major who plays on the tennis and volleyball teams and says she is grateful that professors are willing to work around her hectic schedule. The college motto is “You belong here!”

But in mid-April, faculty and staff members got some news that cast a pall on the close-knit campus. At a hastily arranged meeting in the chapel where worship services are held every week, President Craven E. Williams announced layoffs and a temporary, across-the-board pay cut of 20 percent for salaried employees. In addition, sabbaticals were shelved and many benefits were cut...

College professors have a well-known affinity for comic strips, but I have a feeling that this recent Wizard of Id strip won’t be going up on office doors or into PowerPoint slides on too many campuses.

When I saw it, it made me think about a colleague who told me that a relative of his, who is a farmer, once observed that he worked more during most days than a professor did in an entire semester (professors only teach 12 hours per semester, right?).

One of the problems we face as a profession is the perception that thinking is not legitimate work. It’s hard to compare jobs that include visible, sweaty, physical labor to reading, writing, and reflecting. I have to say, however, that writing a book is just as tedious and exhausting as any job I’ve ever had (and I’ve had some very physical jobs throughout my life, including four years as a dry cleaner’s assistant in a steam-heat...