Looks as if SIUC is running a deficit of about $10 million. Not as bad as the $19 million it was down in 2019 but still not good. Appears that athletics accounts for about $8 million of that and health services another million. Handing out optional bonuses to top administrators is certainly not a good look when the university is running in the red, but then neither is an extensive focus on athletics to the detriment of other areas, such as infrastructure.
I believe the deficit is actually in the region of $14 million but may be more. SIUC's books need to be audited, and an outside team sent in to investigate, either by the State or the IRS. The BOT should now take back the bonuses since they have not been earned especially by an administration that has been running the University into a deficit. They should also strongly insist that the Chancellor and President now reside in Carbondale as their predecessors did, if only to sort out the mess. Otherwise, the place will go the way of WIU. No extra money is coming from the State that has its own fiscal crisis. Perhaps the deficit is a way of declaring a fiscal emergency to fire faculty as in the Derge Purge of 1973? The phony pay rises agreed by the faculty Union and administration look dubious, unless it is a way of closing departments and continuing the deficit so athletics can continue? As you say, SIUC is no place for real education.
ReplyDeleteI must disagree with your last sentence. I think the administration has a lot of problems but SIUC has a number of very good departments and degrees. Unfortunately, the administration focuses more on cosmetics such as the new welcome center, administration building and athletics complex rather than address the infrastructure problems that make it much more difficult for instructors to do their job.
ReplyDeleteYes, there are good departments and degrees, but they are under siege by cutbacks, faculty leaving or retiring and not being replaced. As a result, due to the cosmetic problems, you mention, education suffers. When something breaks down, students notice, and this is all due to plagiarist President Glenn Poshard's belief that students are coming here soley for sport and not education. Thus, education suffers and sports gains in continuing a $1 million annual deficit.
DeleteSports, as I pointed out during the sales tax discussion over a decade ago, are never, save for athletes on scholarships, the reason a student chooses a college.
ReplyDeleteTell that to Poshard and one of your posters on a previous thread who stated that Sports, rather than Education, is the prime mission of a University!
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