Studying languages opens up opportunities
Cutting the World Languages, Literatures and Linguistics Department at West Virginia University is short-sighted. In our globalized world, it is important for business leaders to be fluent in other languages. A person cannot be truly educated if they are only familiar with the English language.
I studied French and Spanish in high school and college, and because I was enrolled in a Spanish-language class my junior year in college, I was able to spend a month over winter break that year with a family in Costa Rica. It was the best experience of my college career.
I also worked as a bilingual interviewer with Social Security in Miami, where I wanted to live at that time, and later moved to Los Angeles, where knowing Spanish helped me in my work and daily life.
I know that students at WVU have traveled to Eastern Europe and other parts of the globe as part of their studies, and those I’ve spoken to say it was a memorable time for them. Learning languages from an app is not nearly the same as being in a class or taking a trip.
Citing the “needs of industry” is short-sighted. Those needs change and people often learn on the job.
The sincerity of the administration is suspect when they announce the cuts on a Friday and demand appeals by the following Friday. Those of us who write letters on Saturday know it will be a week before our letters can appear, by which time the final decisions will be made, WVU will be impoverished and many of our friends will be forced to look elsewhere for work, a deep cut to the life of our community.
Barry Lee Wendell
Morgantown
If faculty are cut, will admins be cut, too?
I am writing to address the erroneous claim by WVU’s administration that declining enrollments caused last year’s $45 million deficit.
In fact, enrollments fell, by The Dominion Post’s own reporting, about 1%. This decline, therefore, contributed only $8 million-$10 million to the deficit.
The DP supported the extension of Gordon Gee’s contract to complete the “academic transformation.” The current deficit, however, happened under his leadership and stemmed from his plan to grow the university to 40,000 students.
Gee’s plan was incredibly short-sighted considering every leader in higher education knew 10 years ago the number of college age students would begin to decline dramatically in 2026.
Spending money growing the university through public-private partnerships, expanding administrative positions and moving WVU Tech from Montgomery to Beckley all supported his disastrous plan. Gee’s flawed leadership created the problem; why should we trust him and his administration “to fix” his mistakes?
Furthermore, WVU’s efforts at “academic transformation” relied on defective data and reveal the administration’s continued ineptitude. For example, the numbers of majors and budget information provided to departments by the administration were incorrect.
This basic incompetence should not come as a surprise. For example, Gee shunned best-practices in higher education and hired his current provost, who does not hold a terminal degree, without a national search. Given these facts, how can we assume this administration’s “transformation” will be logical, fair and effective?
The goal of any “academic transformation” is to chart a new vision and correct mistakes. The first act, therefore, should be to terminate Gee and his entire senior administration — those responsible for the current crisis. The second should be trimming WVU’s bloated administration, and the third to direct those resources to the deficit.
After a budgetary scandal at Ohio State involving Gee in 2012, the “Chronicle of Higher Education” wrote: “It has been said that the only survivors of a nuclear holocaust will be cockroaches and Cher. At this point, it might seem reasonable to add E. Gordon Gee to that list.”
John P. Lambertson
Morgantown
