MORGANTOWN – Responses began pouring in over the weekend to WVU’s proposal to discontinue 32 of 338 Morgantown campus majors and cut 169 faculty positions.
Before we share some of those voices, we have some updated information on the proposed faculty cuts. Our Sunday story provided the faculty size the reviewed programs should be reduced to, but not how many would be cut. WVU provided those numbers after that article was posted.
The single biggest proposed cut is World Languages, Literatures and Linguistics.
Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources: Civil and Environmental Engineering, cut 4, reduce to 14; Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, cut 7, reduce to 28; Mining Engineering/Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering, merged, cut 1 reduce to 5.
College of Applied Human Sciences: School of Education, cut 9, reduce to 18.
College of Creative Arts: School of Art and Design, cut 7, reduce to 15; School of Music, cut 8, reduce to 33; School of Theatre and Dance, cut 4, reduce to 16.
College of Law: cut 5, reduce to 24.
Davis College of Agriculture, Natural Resources and Design: Design and Community Development, cut 11, reduce to 16; Forestry and Natural Resources, cut 6, reduce to 22; Plant and Soil Sciences, cut 11, reduce to 10; Resource Economics and Management, keep at 8.
Eberly College of Arts and Sciences: Chemistry, cut 5, reduce to 23; Communication Studies, cut 5, reduce to 11; English, cut 10, reduce to 26; Mathematical and Data Sciences, cut 18, reduce to 30; Public Administration, cut 5, reduce to 0; World Languages, Literatures and Linguistics, cut 24, reduce to 0.
John Chambers College of Business and Economics: Management, cut 2, reduce to 17.
School of Medicine: Human Performance and Communication Sciences and Disorders, cut 4, reduce to 18.
Pharmacy: cut 8, reduce to 33.
School of Public Health: cut 14, reduce to 26.
Total faculty reduction proposed: 169; total remaining faculty in the affected areas: 411. WVU notes that total FTE (full-time equivalent) faculty is 2,326 and the proposed cuts make up 7.27% of FTE positions.
After 128 program reviews, 18 majors are proposed to continue with no specific action; 50 continue with specific action (faculty reductions); 15 will develop a cooperative program; 32 are proposed to discontinue; 13 are exempt from any action.
WVU adds these clarifying points: Certain faculty categories were not included in the unit level numbers but were included in the denominator to arrive at total percentage of faculty reduction; personnel rosters were received on July 1 and as rosters are fluid, what is listed on a website may not be an accurate representation of faculty numbers; the recommended total faculty reduction (169) can come through the RIF (reduction in force) process, non-renewals, retirements and voluntary separation; the reduction of faculty will not occur all at once, WVU will have personnel needs to support teach outs.
Campus reactions
Here are some voices.
Gwen Bergner
professor of English
“English’s budget is in the black. We generate more revenue in student credit hours than our total department expenses/budget. We have also reduced our expenditures each of the last three years.
“As an efficient, revenue-generating unit, English is being asked to shoulder more than its fair share of the budget deficit reduction plan. That is especially evident in the recommendation that we cut our faculty from about 36 to 26, a reduction of nearly 28%.
“Moreover, students who graduate from our programs already have an excellent employment record and credit their English degrees with preparing them for professional careers. It is unlikely that discontinuing the nationally recognized MFA in creative writing, shifting the focus of the PhD to professional writing, and increasing class sizes while reducing course offerings for the English major will produce more satisfied students or better prepared graduates.”
Lara Farina
professor of English
“I’ll just say that the transformation recommendations are nonsensical, even financially. There is widespread belief that the whole review process was just a sham. In the English Department, the MFA degree is by far our most competitive program, with the greatest numbers of applications, yet it has been targeted for discontinuation while the MA in professional writing, which struggles to attract applicants and retain faculty, emerged unscathed.
“All our graduate students teach two courses a semester, mostly required composition courses, and are paid a fraction of what a faculty member costs, actually making money for the university. Without an MFA program and with shrunken MA and PhD programs, we just simply can’t staff the courses that are required of all WVU students and will also lose that income.”
Former Delegate Barbara Evans Fleischauer
“I just think it’s all so shocking, that it’s come to this. And it’s really sad. It seems to me that our flagship is being turned into a community college.”
By that, she meant that the cuts target liberal arts education, suggesting a shift in focus to career courses. Especially cutting all the foreign languages when we’re seeking to be part of a global economy.
She said that the proposed program and faculty reductions will contribute to the state’s brain drain and hurt the state’s culture and economy . “The idea that we aren’t going to have a PhD in math is astonishing to me.”
On the proposed cuts to the arts: “That is part of what makes a whole human being, is some sensitivity. The arts help us understand the world. … It’s just shocking. And I blame the Legislature and the executive branch.”
She referred to years of higher education budget cuts, particularly for WVU.
During the recent special session, the Legislature passed HB 117 devoting $45 million to Marshall University to expand its cybersecurity program to serve as a hub for the 13-state Appalachian region.
She said she doesn’t oppose that for Marshall, but Gov. Jim Justice offered no corresponding bill for $45 million to cover WVU’s budget shortfall. And an amendment to HB 117 by Delegate Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, to give WVU $45 million was ruled not germane to the bill.
“I think it’s an unforced error,” she said.
She said she agrees with many others that this process has been hasty and sudden. “It’s demoralizing. There are just so many questions, it doesn’t make sense. It’s just really tragic.”
Paula M. Krebs
executive director, Modern Language Association
(a letter addressed to President Gordon Gee and circulated among faculty and shared with The Dominion Post)
“As the executive director of the Modern Language Association, the largest disciplinary association in the humanities, with 20,000 members in the U.S. and 100 other countries, I write to express how vital it is for you to support and retain teaching and research in modern languages, English, and other humanities fields at the flagship public higher education institution in West Virginia.
“We at the MLA have been receiving messages from people all over the country who are alarmed at the notion that a public land grant university would abandon its commitment to its state, a commitment to provide the education its residents need and deserve. A full liberal arts education includes providing students with the tools that enable them to interact both with their neighbors in West Virginia and with the rest of the world.
“Science, technology, and business courses and majors are not enough for WVU to offer if it wants to produce fully informed and thinking citizens for West Virginia. I will leave it to others to make the arguments about the economic impact of arts and sciences and, especially, humanities programs on campus.
“I understand that both the World Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics department and the English department generate substantial tuition revenue for the university beyond their expenses, so we are left to wonder at the motivation for these cuts.
“Because we monitor the status of language and literature departments across the nation and conduct a regular census of language enrollments, I can tell you that no other state flagship university has forsaken language education for its students or made the kinds of cuts to the humanities that WVU is undertaking.
“Such cuts dramatically narrow educational opportunities not just for humanities students but for STEM and business students as well. All students’ job prospects and lives are enriched by language study, writing instruction, and the research and analytical skills taught in beginning and advanced literature and culture courses. Access to these courses is especially important in public higher education, which is often the only route to a degree for many state residents.
“The humanities should not be reserved for students who can afford private higher education. In addition, state flagship universities have an obligation to contribute to the production of knowledge in all their disciplines. Research in language and literature needs the support of universities if we are to move forward in our understanding of the world around us, and that is no less true in the humanities than it is in STEM fields.”
email: dbeard@dominionpost.com
