Throughout the week of Dec. 15, University Communications will post summaries of some of the ideas that come out of the forums. Whether or not you’re able to attend any of the three forums in person, we invite you to continue the discussion online.
Read what others are thinking and add a comment of your own.
We ask only that you identify yourself in the post, refrain from personal attacks and, most importantly, stay on topic.
Thanks in advance for participating!
12:34 p.m.
The timing of these forums precludes meaningful student participation. Students would be better served if this “conversation” was held at the beginning of the spring semester.
8:07 p.m.
Jeffrey — We appreciate the feedback. The chancellor will be holding another forum, open to all, but especially for students early after the second semester begins. The forums times were selected on availability of the chancellor’s schedule. We’ll publicize the additional session yet this week. Thanks again.
9:15 p.m.
I attended the forum this afternoon. I believe several people touched on this topic, but I wanted to suggest that we should be engaging our best scholars on what has been described as the “science of infrastructure”. We have expertise in organizational design and performance, industrial engineering, operations research, federated security, visualization, etc. Unfortunately, the requirements of tenure and promotion run counter to any desire on the part of our best scholars to engage in these areas. They cannot afford to turn their attention to the service of the institution. Would it be possible to turn some of our scholarly capacity inward?
The chancellor’s commitment to transparency would be enhanced by the active engagement of faculty and research staff in the analysis of alternatives. We are also likely to come up with more support for any sweeping changes if there were a group of scholars able to articulate the evidence base studied and the conclusions derived from that study.
8:20 a.m.
Deans and Departments are not held to a standardized quantitative accountability standard for performance. There is no report back on quantitative measures of success or efficiency of operation. Money goes out and we trust it is spent well. Trust, but verify. Football has its quarterback rating. It’s a quantitative measure of performance that uses the completion percentage, and the yards, touchdowns, and interceptions per attempt in a formula to calculate the passing efficiency. What do we have at UW-Madison? Without quantitative measures of success, we cannot expect to get what we want. Defining quantitative measures to compare departments will increase transparency, allow better decision-making, and allow us to become better stewards of the resources we are given by the taxpayers.
2:15 p.m.
I thought the meeting went very well yesterday. I think its great that the Chancellor is taking input from the University community on this issue. One thing that was mentioned that didn’t make it into the notes, was the idea of creating more employment oppertunities for students, to help them offset the increasingh cost of tuition. I think it is a win win proposition, because it provides income to the students and helps staff the facilities during a time of limited hiring.
11:50 p.m.
has anyone thought of restricting or limiting the number of double or multiple majors in L&S? it seems like most undergraduates are double-majoring these days, putting a strain on enrollments as students struggle to collect enough credits to complete more than one major. in most cases, more than one major is unnecessary and sometimes even redundant. only those students who absolutely need a double major should be allowed to do so, not just those who think it will look good on their transcripts.
11:36 a.m.
I think it would be wise to postpone the renovation of Union South as a means to cut down on unnecessary costs. While the building may be unattractive and the new building plans look great, this is not the time to invest in something so frivolous. As a student, I do not want to pay for something like this with my tuition on top of the tuition increases, which although I do not want increased tuition either, I can understand why it may be necessary at this time. Cutbacks need to be made to take as much strain off of students as possible, cutbacks such as the Union South renovation. Otherwise, if tuition costs are too great, students will leave. I know that since my brother will be attending college next semester that if tuition increases too much, I will probably not be coming back next year and will compromise my education by going to a less expensive college due to my inability to pay the increasing bills.
12:36 p.m.
It is not fair to raise tuition to families who work hard and make enough money so that they do not receive financial benefits. These truly middle-income families are having to pay for their children’s college tuition and the tuition of other students from lower-income families. Universities across the country including UW-Madison publicize how much financial aid they give to families that can not afford college tuition. Of course that is a good thing. The problem is they are making up for the loss of money in financial aid by increasing tuition for middle-income and higher-income families. Many of these families have two or three children to send to college, a factor that is not accounted for when calculating financial aid. I read a news story that next year UW-Madison is accepting a record amount of students whose parents did not go to college. It is reasonable to assume that these students’ families do not make that much money, and are receiving financial aid. So while a depression is going on the university is accepting more students who require financial aid which means the tuition of families who receive no financial aid is going to increase, during a depression! A depression affects everyone.
I am an out of state student, and one of the things that make UW-Madison great is the number of out of state students there are for a public university. Other universities have extremely high out of state tuition costs, thereby making more and more students just settle for their own state’s university. UW’s out of state tuition is creeping up to the level where out of state students (and their families) will reason that despite UW’s this or that, the extra cost is not worth it.
2:26 a.m.
I notice demand for a quantitative measure of efficiency. The input is obviously money which becomes the denominator. The university’s goals determine the output/numerator. There are a lot of measures that already exist, and the only concern is enumerating and prioritizing them.
Regarding the preparation of students for future endeavors: starting salary of graduates, graduation rates, employment rate (including future educational pursuits) of students leaving the college
Regarding research endeavors: number of papers published, number of patents received
General satisfaction (made quantitative via survey): overall satisfaction of the students, overall satisfaction of recent alumni, overall satisfaction of the employees, overall satisfaction of the employers of graduates
Other: number of companies spawned, number of non-profit organizations spawned
Please feel free to add to the list, and don’t forget to encourage others to contribute to the forums!!!
9:15 a.m.
I agree with Sarah. Now is not the time to be tearing down
buildings and building new ones just because they don’t meet
our standards. Union South is not that old and is in a very
attractive and student friendly environment. We need to try
and put our money towards a more economical stand point.