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AAUP Proposal

It has been the role of the AAUP for many years and at many institutions to provide alternativeviewpoints which bring to center stage the fundamental missions of education, scholarship, and

community service in our universities, particularly when it seems that some actors in positions ofpower are not doing so. This document represents an effort by the AAUP chapter of CSUP to providesome of that approach, and in so doing, to ma!e some specific proposals to handle the current "crisis."

Several things are clear# $irst, the true e%tent of the crisis is not !nown. The crisis mentality eruptedafter a multimillion dollar accounting error made in the CSUP budgeting office. Charging for C&$'the (Colorado &pportunity $und)* has been found to be incorrect, after a couple of years of trying tocorrect ongoing errors, as recently as a few wee!s ago. Upper administrators fran!ly admit that ourcampus "$act +oo!" is so filled with errors that every single page has one or more. Senior facultywho have loo!ed at some budget spreadsheets are completely mystified about what certain linesrepresent and these lines represent nontrivial adustments to what our actual financial situation is.

Second, the vision Chancellor -artin e%pressed in his meeting with the campus community on anuary/th is completely at odds with CSUPueblo0s mission in our community, in southern Colorado, as an1SI and an institution which serves many current and former military service members and theirfamilies, indeed as a public, fouryear, regional comprehensive university. That the System should beconsidering e%panding into South -etro 2enver while its core mission is at ris! in Pueblo 'we aretold*, is a sign that the System has abandoned that core mission. CSU -etro 2enver is not anopportunity for CSUPueblo to e%pand, and "going to where the customers are" does not protect ourmission and the vital roles CSUP plays3 it places profits over the diverse group of people in southernColorado we should continue to serve.

Third, an item of institutional memory which has now been forgotten# the University of SouthernColorado oined the CSU System in order to gain benefits of wor!ing with CSU$C and to bringbenefits to $t Collins 'as we regularly do, particularly by our 1SI status and great diversity* but notto lose authority and control to an organi4ation in 2enver which does not care about Pueblo. This wasmade very clear in the proposals which were presented to, and voted on by, the USC faculty. It ispossible that today0s "crisis" is the first e%ample where Pueblo0s interests are so abandoned by theSystem that a conflict appears, but we should remember that we did not originally offer ourselves to besold down the river.

$ourth, for more institutional memory# CSU 5lobal was created to tap into an educational mar!etwhich could provide operating funds for the rest of the System. 5lobal may have paid bac! its upfront

financial debts, but many of the courses there are based on intellectual property from the othercampuses which was freely given with the clear understanding that everyone had at the time# 5lobal0sprofits would be used for the other campus0s operating e%penses. 'If not, what is 5lobal for6 2o wesimply want to compete with the University of Phoeni% and other forprofit colleges and universities6*

$ifth, it is clear that there has been a huge failure of shared governance on this campus, and that all"middle management" 'deans and the provost* has abrogated its responsibility to advocate for our

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students and our faculty, and even its responsibility to communicate. To her great credit, President 2i-are seems to be open to hearing faculty voices and has pushed deadlines and accepted input from$aculty Senate and the AAUP3 those under her have given no public indication of any inclination tospea! on behalf of the faculty and students.

What to do now?

7* It is obvious that a complete restructuring and mangement8personnel overhaul is necessary in thebudgeting and financial offices at CSUP 'and, to be honest, in other offices which are in turn theirsupervisors throughout the Administration building on our campus and even in the System office 9which surely bears some responsibility*. The AAUP recommends that an e%ternal forensic auditor bebrought in to ma!e a careful and complete analysis of our current fiscal situation and what canreasonably be e%trapolated for the future. :ithout this information, it is impossible to plan wisely.

;* The AAUP recommends against firing any teaching faculty whatsoever, and cautions against othermovements against faculty which would have conse

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has, with great caution, no obection. &ne area which would be