In an effort to refocus spending, the Chicago City Colleges will lay off 225 “non-instructional” employees and eliminate 86 unfilled positions. The cuts, which include a reduction in travel costs and executive credit cards, will allow a greater portion of the seven-campus system’s $139-million capital budget to go toward technology and training for its 115,000 students. Mayor Richard Daley, who announced the layoffs at a news conference on Thursday, said the system could also look into other revenue sources, including public-private partnerships and tax-increment financing.
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9 Responses to Chicago City Colleges Will Lay Off 225 Employees
physicsprof - July 30, 2010 at 3:38 pm
No surprise considering the city is broke. I just wonder when Chicagoans will finally lay off that joke of a mayor.
chuwenyiwutu - July 31, 2010 at 8:38 pm
so what will happend to these 225 people?
happydean - August 1, 2010 at 5:27 am
So, ‘executive’ credit cards at a public community college? The system with many outstanding faculty suffers from administrative bloat, incompetence and not a little viciousness. Sad memories of my time there.
haohtt - August 2, 2010 at 9:11 am
A few years ago, it was proposed that full-time community college instructors in Chicago follow the rest of the country in teaching five classes per semester, rather than four. Of course, this was Chicago, so the faculty went on strike and the administration caved. How could anyone possibly be surprised that the City Colleges of Chicago are in financial trouble?
drgsiu - August 7, 2010 at 9:13 pm
haohtt sounds like an idiot…why should any CC professional teach 15 hours a semester and what has this to do with the fact that the politicos in the (so called) State of Ill refuses to pass a budget. Grow up.MATH PROF
advi8964 - October 22, 2010 at 5:16 pm
The important thing here is that who decides on who is to be fired. The real helpful administrators or professionals, or perhaps the non-well connected ones to the political powers? This has nothing to do with teaching 5 or 4 courses, 15 hours or so. Sadly, there is too much ignorance on thinking that faculty only do teaching without designing lesson plans, grading, and investing time outside those 15 teaching hours in finding better ways to improve our students success rates. Faculty are not business workers that can close their offices and go home until the next “business schedule”. We bring our work at home (class preparation, grading, and new ideas to implement in our next day lesson plans). I hope any politician or business person can understand that being in the field of education is a never ending process, that’s why educators are very important and better considered at “more developed” societies. In conclusion, no one can buy education and this is our first mistake in our “money-ruled” idea of world. I am very sad to notice that many valuable long time workers are being laid off while others totally useless will remain doing nothing as usual.
hms3683 - October 24, 2010 at 10:31 pm
Interesting that advi8964 wrote this on 10/22 at 5:16 p.m. I was one of the first to go on the same day at around 10:00 a.m. And I like to think that I was one of the useful ones who designed the lesson plans, helped get grading scales straight, and in rough situations, worked from my home to help out teachers with their particular set of problems. It’s a great lesson to CCC students that a career of being where you are supposed to be, getting done what you are supposed to do, and spending your time and money to attend conferences on your vacations so that you can be the best at what you do, will get you an opportunity to face the hatchet carriers from district office.
The city college structure is a top-down hierarchy where people at the top declare who goes without giving people opportunity to plan or negotiate. As I left, I saw friends cry. I saw the same tear in the eye of the woman who read my separation paper to me. I saw in each of them a sense of powerlessness. It was a simple matter of folks near the top being told to remove people from their positions or be themselves removed. Those who did the separating had no freedom to do otherwise. A structure so unfree does not belong in academia. At this point I am separated from CCC. I don’t know whether I’ll survive. But at this moment, when I consider how obedient to the higher powers those who seek to help must be, separation looks a lot like liberation.
john_m_rector - November 20, 2010 at 4:42 am
In any layoffs or re-engineering or reinvention efforts, however you name it, unions must concede and give up some of its deadwood or “not open to change” workers before anyone else in any educational for profit or nonprofit institution. Unfortunately, they are the last ones to go because of their powerful negotiating power and deep pockets. Result: The educational institution is left with highly incompetent deadwood and lazy personnel who does not care about servicing the students and instructors who actually make the “educational institution”.
Hired guns or hired consulting firms who plan these layoffs also does not really care about the long-lasting impact of their hasty decisions. They don’t know how to apply the “balance scorecard” concept where all stakeholders must be taken into account. They only care about cutting costs beyond what they promised to the institutional leaders who hired them. Example: what will happen if you are left with low-morale or layoff survivors who will be looking for jobs somewhere else? Answer, they will be unproductive and will not have time to service the customers or students of the institution because they will take days off looking for jobs. Worst, they will use all their sick days while looking for jobs somewhere else. Balance scorecard score: Employee survivors 0%, Student Customers 30%, Politically-connected and appointed leaders with bonus options 60% and high-level Administrators who are survivors of layoffs 10%.
The solution instead of layoffs: Make everyone working for educational institutions become Independent Contractors/Sole Proprietors so that they will take ownership of their expertise. That means, a Computer Instructor will coordinate with the facilities coordinator of the school to assign to him or her a room where he/she can service the students. He or she will be in charge of Marketing his/her classes to prospective students; collect the money directly from the students once they are registered or collect the money directly from the Federal or State government who are in charge of financial aid; service and teach the students; and coordinate with the Records Administrator in assigning grades and transcript credits. This is full ownership of a process and you don’t need to pay reengineering consultants or politically appointed leaders. Everyone becomes entrepreneur resulting in low unemployment, less payroll tax for the institution and no unemployment tax paid by the institution.
I don’t know why our country’s leaders have not thought about this solution!
havel - February 4, 2011 at 2:59 pm
I spoke to a faculty member at city colleges who informed me that two college presidents have been misusing/abusing their executive credit cards privileges. What I undestand is that district office ia aware of who they are. My question is; are these two president going to be layed-off or fired?