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UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

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Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#101

Post by chrisrhoden »

scott_s wrote: post #85
chrisrhoden wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the south isn't a southern stereotype. The DC metro is more like a new england city than either of the two you mentioned. This paper is based out of southeastern VA, in the VA Beach and Norfolk area.

I grew up in the DC area (Virginia side), and myself and others there never considred it "the South." I always thought of it as the dividing line between North and South. This always seemed natural to me, since Virginia seceded in the Civil War, and Maryland did not.

Dirty little secret time - me too. I have moved around a bunch since then, and thats the case at every major metro "in the south." Norfolk considers itself the dividing line with the "real" south (which obviously starts in North Carolina), and guess how people feel about Raleigh? Even by the time that you get to Charlotte or as far as Atlanta, there is a feeling among most people that one is outside of "the south."

Know what? They are.

I would encourage you to compare any east coast city against any other. Then I would encourage you to compare an underpopulated area in Maine against an underpopulated area in Tennessee.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#102

Post by kmfrk »

aptwebapps wrote: post #83
kmfrk wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was later revealed this was the result of a coup by a bunch of Darden MBA's because they wanted "radical" change to the future plans of the University, not incremental change. Which, as I recall, was revealed in some seriously mustache-twirling e-mails that the main orchestrator had used the Reply All feature for or something to that extent. I can't remember which article I read this in, but this has all the eleme…

Perhaps this one? http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/hey_wait_a_m...

That's the one! This drama deserves a well-written article that captures the scope of this scandal.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#103

Post by bconway »

By this email I am submitting my resignation, effective immediately. I do not wish to be associated with an institution being as badly run as the current UVa. A BOV that so poorly understands UVa, and academic culture more generally, is going to make a lot more dumb decisions, so the University is headed for disaster, and I don’t want to be any part of that. And, frankly, I think you should be ashamed to be party to this debacle!

Is this real? That's barely proper English, and certainly not something I would submit to an (interim) university President.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#104

Post by chrisrhoden »

jleader wrote: post #92
rayiner wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's implicit in the context of the larger debate. The furor is in response to the board trying to cut departments, because UVA has increased expenditures by 80% in the last decade while tripling tuition. It's easy to say that's not what it's about, but practically that what it's about. The university has been increasing faculty expenditures at 4-5% for years in the face of 0.7% increases in enrollment. The state has…

But 4-5% increase in faculty expenditures since 2001 only produces a 60% increase. If the biggest line-item increased by 60%, why did the budget overall increase by 80%? Something else must be growing a lot faster than faculty expenditures! And why does an 80% increase in expenditures necessarily lead to a tripling of tuition? Shouldn't tuition go up 80% as well? Unless some other source of funding has disappeared?

Nope, the math here is a little different from that.

100 + 5% = 105 + 5% = 112.5 + 5% = 115.7625 + 5% ... = 179.5856326 - which is approximately an 80% increase over 12 years.

As for the tripling of tuition, let's assume that tuition accounted for 30% of the budget at the start of things above. Even if no other funding sources are decreased (which is not the case with public universities, but let's ignore that for now), increasing the cost of tuition by 79.58%, which is the same amount that the overall budget increased, gets us:

30 + 79.58% = 53.874

So if we still have 70% of the original budget covered, and we add it to our newly increased tuition cost, we get:

53.874 + 70 = 123.874

You can see that there's a bit of a deficit here.

All of that having been said, what is going on at UVa is pretty clearly messed up. Regardless of the changes that need to happen in the budget, which I think everyone can agree on, the BOG way overstepped here.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#105

Post by smutticus »

aptwebapps wrote: post #83
kmfrk wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was later revealed this was the result of a coup by a bunch of Darden MBA's because they wanted "radical" change to the future plans of the University, not incremental change. Which, as I recall, was revealed in some seriously mustache-twirling e-mails that the main orchestrator had used the Reply All feature for or something to that extent. I can't remember which article I read this in, but this has all the eleme…

Perhaps this one? http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/hey_wait_a_m...

How does someone get to be a University professor with writing that terrible. The content is interesting but the writing is atrocious.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#106

Post by aet »

InclinedPlane wrote: post #84
herdrick wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, what departments did she want to cut? Honestly, I've never hard a harder time trying to figure out what an HN story was all about.

The board, apparently spurred by professor Wulf, wanted deep cuts in spending. Sullivan, the president, was moving slowly to implement cuts so she was pushed out by the board. Now Wulf has quit as well, seemingly due to some sort of internal drama within the board due to widespread public condemnation of the ouster of Sullivan.

Wulf resigned in protest of the BoV's actions.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#107

Post by rmc »

trevelyan wrote: post #88
rayiner wrote: post #48

Additional backstory: the revolt of the faculty is due to the Board wanting to close marginal academic departments at the University. Further backstory: the expenditures of the academic division at UVA have increased about 80% since 2001. Enrollment has only increased 9%. In-state tuition has increased about 275%. I'm not a UVA alum, but I grew up in Virginia, so I care about what happens at UVA. UVA's faculty can wa…

I do not know the details, but it does seem incompetent to identify German (language of the most important economy in Europe) and the classics as marginal departments which must be eliminated in the name of economic efficiency. A vendetta against the humanities perhaps, but economic efficiency? Neither are departments likely to have soaring costs: all you need is a classroom and professor. Lecturers in the classics w…

Lots of people in Germany speak English.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#108

Post by acdanger »

aet wrote: post #106
InclinedPlane wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The board, apparently spurred by professor Wulf, wanted deep cuts in spending. Sullivan, the president, was moving slowly to implement cuts so she was pushed out by the board. Now Wulf has quit as well, seemingly due to some sort of internal drama within the board due to widespread public condemnation of the ouster of Sullivan.

Wulf resigned in protest of the BoV's actions.

Right. It's not clear though that Prof. Wulf was pushing the BOV to make deep spending cuts.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#109

Post by aphyr »

jleader wrote: post #90
rayiner wrote: post #48

Additional backstory: the revolt of the faculty is due to the Board wanting to close marginal academic departments at the University. Further backstory: the expenditures of the academic division at UVA have increased about 80% since 2001. Enrollment has only increased 9%. In-state tuition has increased about 275%. I'm not a UVA alum, but I grew up in Virginia, so I care about what happens at UVA. UVA's faculty can wa…

"the expenditures of the academic division at UVA have increased about 80% since 2001...In-state tuition has increased about 275%." This says to me that some other source of funding (state subsidy?) has just about disappeared, is that right?

Academics is only part of university budgets. Other principal costs include housing, tuition assistance, administration, buildings, grounds, support services, and athletics. Not exactly sure how UVA divvies things up.

Re: UVA Computer Science professor resigns over incompetence of board

#110

Post by repoman »

I don't like the letter. He spent too much time talking about his "experience". Oh come on. It's like "dude I am a Nobel prize winner, and none of you have that title so I am right." I hate people giving that kind of resignation, regardless of their intentions.
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