Professor Tells All: UD’s Budget Cuts, Unredacted Document
NOTE: Redacted and unredacted documents are paired together at the bottom of the article
Kerry Kadel | Editor-in-Chief
OCTOBER 25, 2024
PROF: Most of my colleagues were worried about talking to the school paper, because they’re worried about getting fired, and I’m just kind of like, “I don’t care.” You know, ramifications of [things] that are important, so, yeah. So, I think the first thing I want to give you is this…”
He gives me a green manilla folder labeled “Quiz #1” in their handwriting. I opened it to see a report titled “Weather this Storm: UD Faculty Reacts to News of Impending Layoffs”. “University of Dayton Faculty Board” is typed underneath with “October 2024” listed as its date.
PROF: Do you normally go to senate meetings?
ME: I don’t, but I was emailed by a […] Joel Pruce?
Joel Pruce is an Associate Professor of the Political Science Department, who had reached out to me on Wednesday, October 16, 2024, proposing a story idea to Flyer News that would be “something of interest to the campus community.” He is also the Chair of the Faculty Board.
PROF: Oh, yeah, okay. Good. [He] invited you?
ME: Yeah, he put [senate meeting] on my radar, and we had a phone call [about the topic of budget cuts].
PROF: So, I’ll tell you what’s in [the unredacted document], this is for your own reading, and this is the primary reason I wanted to send this to you because I think this is immensely important for students to know. The Faculty Board is a group of faculty that writes on behalf of the collective consciousness of faculty across campus. This is a report that was mentioned at the meeting you went to. It was mentioned briefly, Joel was one of the two fellows that presented the report, if you remember the two […] but this is the report itself. The reason I’m giving you this one, this is the original, fully authored report before it was redacted at the pressure of the provost [Darlene Weaver]. The one presented at the meeting was the edited one for PR purposes, among other things for politicking between the faculty and the provost and president. This is definitely worth reading closely, it captures the mood of the faculty on campus. The report comes from a survey sent to every faculty member on campus. Around a third of faculty responded, which is a really good turn out. [It] will spell out how faculty feel about [the] current situations at the school.
This is where I asked if I was hearing the Professor correctly, that what they had given me was the unredacted, original report of the findings when it came to the faculty responding to the layoffs.
PROF: The redacted one has some similar sections, but the most important things were cut. The cutting of those things were very controversial and it was done through pressure from [the] president and provost.
PROF: [Unredacted report] is pretty hot off the press, it was formulated three weeks ago, and I’m actually hoping to send it to the Cincinnati Enquirer and Dayton Daily News. I haven’t gotten a response yet from the Daily News. I guess you know about the major cuts happening?
ME: Yes, stepping back onto campus […] a few of my friends and I said that we’re glad to be seniors, because it seems that UD is going [downhill]. Once I stepped back onto campus, I heard everything about budget cuts.
PROF: [It’s] just huge, catastrophic cuts, and I can speak to a few of them. I outlined four [questions] that the cuts affect. Two of them are covered in the report in more detail, but the way this affects the university is the massive layoffs, which is probably what students know most about–actually, I’ve learned that students hear different parts about the cuts. In my classes, students have heard about the layoffs.
ME: I’ve only heard about firings.
PROF: Actually yesterday, the lecturers of my department were fired […] I mean, their contracts end in April, but they were fired now. That’s the first tier of the effect. Essentially, every lecturer on campus–a professor with a title that’s not linked to tenure–has announced that they will most likely be fired this year.
From the meeting with President Spina, I had asked if anyone had been fired around Oct 24, 2024, and his response was that this was untrue. As I edit this piece for Flyer News’ digital edition, I had learned that one of the sweetest professors I had in my junior year was recently let go. She is now at Sinclair.
PROF: Having tenure [means you have] job security, you’ve been here longer. Tenure track is on the process to get tenure, which is what I am. Lecturers are usually people with PhDs, many of whom have been here for decades, and you can find statistics online, but a quarter of professors on campus are lecturers–maybe even a third–it’s a large number. Basically, that first category [tier] is open for layoff, which is a huge deal in academic institutions to layoff that many people at once. I mean, it has happened at a few places in the last two years, but it’s controversial when many–and most of my colleagues in the business school, would say [there’s] ethical problems when you layoff enormous numbers of employees, who have been working there [with] job security for years. That’s the first issue with the layoffs. One number I heard was that it’s going to be at least 220.
ME: I’ve heard at least over 200 and think they even said it at the senate meeting.
PROF: Yeah, and that’s a lot for a school this size. It’s detailed in this issue of the report. Statistics are also available publicly through the propaganda that the president’s office churns out. Their reports are packaged up in a way that’s not truthful, but the numbers are at least measurable. The second [issue] I’m most familiar with is how the curriculum is changing. I don’t know if you’ve heard…?
ME: [sighing] Oh, I’ve heard a lot.
PROF: People in Humanities are furious, every single professor in every department because five Humanities majors are being reduced to two [classes], so all the 103 classes are going to be canceled. There will be no 103’s–Philosophy, History, Religious studies, English […] That’s the second issue, [which] isn’t covered in the report as much, there’s actually a new document being formed–I saw a draft that I can’t share with you–about how the dismantling about the Humanities curriculum is really at the heart of dismantling the Liberal Arts education of UD. People come here for a Catholic, Liberal Arts education rooted in reading, and writing, and thinking. [103 classes] are going to be turned into next fall, “Humanities 1” and “Humanities 2”, and those are the only requirements. Humanities 1 can be counted for AP credits, so anyone in high school who takes an AP credit [class] doesn’t need to take Humanities 1. Humanities 2 will be the [Humanities] 1 class to replace the entire entry level curriculum. It’s pretty big overall. That’s the second way that these cuts are affecting [UD]. My colleagues were worried about what it means to get a Liberal Arts education at a school that doesn’t have Liberal Arts. In my department specifically, students can come here now and never take a History class, ever. You can get a bachelor’s degree at a Liberal Arts institution based on Marianist education that fosters diversity and scholarship and [students will] never learn about slavery, for example. Not even a mention in a class. It’s a big thing for Philosophy [and] Religious studies–you can go to a Catholic school and never take a class on religion, never think critically on Catholicism, Christianity, other world religions […] These concerns are at the heart of the identity of the school.
ME: Being a Liberal Arts major–yeah, they’re all connected, and they’re all so valuable to my major and to my studies without [relating to] English.
PROF: Yeah, when there’s a practical concern that there will be an advance Humanities requirement, students will take Humanities 2, or 1, then they’ll have to take one or two upper-level classes, but it does mean you’ll take upper-level History [class] having never taken entry-level or upper-level Philosophy–never having taken an entry-level [course]. It throws the entire curriculum into disarray because you can’t scaffold classes. I teach Animal History, but I always know that students have taken History 103, so they have a general understanding of what history is and know a few tidbits about it, same with Philosophy, I’m teaching upper-level Philosophy, I expect my students to know [or] heard of Aristotle.
In education, scaffold or scaffolding is an institutional practice where teachers gradually move guidance and support for students as they learn and become more competent–having the necessary skills and knowledge to perform successfully. Without these 103 classes as an introduction to the basics of the Liberal Arts courses, students will lose a core foundation that is built off from other sections of the curriculum.
ME: I tell this to everyone: I didn’t know anything about any philosopher until I got here.
Prof explained how crucial the entry-level classes are in order to bring about new ideas and epiphanies to students. They explained as an example of a student taking an upper Women in Gender studies course and never having to think about sexism before. They continued stating that every department has their own issues, and it’s all field-specific.
PROF: That’s huge, and from a business standpoint, Catholic universities pride themselves on Liberal Arts education. Faculty are worried about how we’re going to compete–at this really expensive school–how are we going to compete with, not just other Catholic institutions, but other Liberal Arts colleges like Fordum or Miami University, Notre Dame, Vanderbilt, the list is long. Most likely my job is safe, because I’m tenure track–[budget’s] not exempt on tenure yet, but I’m concerned with that.
ME: I’m thinking of all the professors I know myself […] I hear it’s also a lot of young professors [and] lecturers, and I have had a lot [of classes with young professors]. It’s so disheartening, the changes, the cuts, who’s going to be cut […]
The time that faculty will know about if they are part of the cuts UD is planning will be this upcoming March 2025. But many students and professors have been speaking out about the budget cuts and explaining why it’s damaging to the university.
PROF: Although [cuts] are starting to come out now […] there’s going to be a lot of upset and angry professors, either younger ones or people who have been here a long time who are tenure track, who just found out that they don’t have jobs anymore. My heart’s broken for my colleagues who have been here for over ten years. It sucks. Now you know those two issues are different, how the curriculum’s going to shape the school in the future is different from how these people have been fired all at once. It’s a double-whammy. Then there’s a triple-whammy, one I don’t know about and just want to share, but this somebody I asked in a different department, but graduate programs on campus are being cut. We don’t have a graduate program in History, so it doesn’t affect me directly, but departments that have graduate programs are very furious because graduate programs are very prestigious. They capture a lot of attention, they help people write grants for laboratories–graduate students often work in laboratories, so the canceling of these graduate programs…well, people are angry about it.
We spoke about the academic senate meeting, how we both watched another professor, a younger man, speak at the microphone to address these budget cuts in alignment with graduate programs, graduate students, and funding for their projects.
PROF: The administrators are worried about cutting costs immediately, and his point was to rapidly cut costs where it appears in the present as worthwhile, [where] it doesn’t take longer.
The meeting is recorded and is available in Porches through this link.
We talked more about graduate students and the labs that need the students in order to run the labs. Biology labs are packed with graduate students, who are paid for the position. Without the graduate students to help aid these professors, who are teaching three other classes simultaneously, professors lose the help that the school is giving them in order to be able to teach their various other courses. Research is also essential for the labs, and the cuts will have graduate programs losing this as well. Prof explained the terrible list as a “cascading effect, that administrators don’t understand because they are slashing anyone without consulting anyone.” This was Prof’s third concern they had when it comes to the budget.
PROF: Which brings me to [my] fourth concern. The fourth is detailed in here [unredacted documents], it’s still the tip of the iceberg, that every single professor, every single department, of every single rank, whether they’re full professors with tenure or adjuncts wants administrators (president, provost, deans, assistant deans, etc.) to be held accountable. It’s very clear that there’s been financial mismanagement for the last decade or more, that there has not been long-term financial planning, budgeting, fiscal responsibility…from a conservative perspective, this was captured in the essence of the talk that Joel Pruce gave. There’s been growth, growth, growth ever since I got here, but long before I got here, I’ve only been here for four years. Why have we been growing, growing, growing? Why have we spent tens of millions of dollars on all these investments if we knew student enrollment would decline because there’s less college-age students now? We’ve known [this] for a decade, and every university is facing it. That’s the jist of it.
I let Prof know that my managing editor and I were to be in a meeting with Spina that next week to ask about the budget cuts, and if a handful of topics surrounding why they’re happening led to it. I wanted to understand the problem from the inside out, to understand how this was going to lead to a rift between the faculty and the higher-ups. I mentioned that FAFSA was one of the topics that lent a helping hand to the budget cuts, and this is what Prof had to say about it.
PROF: The president has been using this FAFSA issue like a scapegoat. They’ve been calling the election a reason. It’s very clear with faculty that this is just conjuring externalities so you don’t have to take responsibility for the collapse of functionality and leadership here. There’s disdain and rage towards how much waste happens in the upper offices.
We talked about paychecks, where Prof listed Spina’s as being $1.2 million, and a new tidbit of knowledge that I never knew: he has a $2 million house paid for by UD. Prof wasn’t so sure about Weaver’s pay but stated hints of it may be found online, though they estimated it was around $400,000 a year, perhaps much more. The people Spina fired in the first round made $5,000 a class, still resulting in being the lowest-paid in the chain of academic faculty. No cuts have been made in any of the administrative offices, Prof told me, in fact, they added to their help, hiring a new dean. It was also noted that Spina is the highest paid president for a school of UD’s size.
Prof explained that they themselves are looking for any and every job in North America in case budgets affect them, and that their colleagues are also scrambling to look for jobs.
The university is changing, and many students have reached out to Flyer News, asking if we were covering this situation. We have been gathering information as it comes to us, from fired up students to faculty and staff. With us releasing this in February, we aim to remind everyone that next month, March, is when everything will change for professors at UD. We hope that you all let us know what you think, and write your own think-pieces in response to the aftermath. You can email Flyer News at flyernews@udayton.edu.
