Shared Governance Destroyed at UK
By 
Deloitte loaded the gun, the Board of Trustees pulled the trigger.
The University of Kentucky’s university senate will be dissolved and moved into an advisory role, changing its role in setting school policies, the board of trustees voted on Friday. The decision comes after two months of debate and objections from faculty, though student and staff groups support the changes. Faculty members have said they worry about the long-term implications of making the university senate an advisory body, with hundreds of faculty attending the meeting on Friday. Nine people spoke before the board in opposition of the proposed changes on Friday morning, while five people spoke in favor of it. President Eli Capilouto presented the new governance structure to the board of trustees, which moves the university senate, established in 1917, from a policy-making body to an advisory faculty senate. The Student Government Association and the staff senate would remain as advisory bodies at UK. Capilouto said the time to make changes was now, in order to be able to change and evolve. Capilouto said he’d heard from staff and students throughout this process, who said they often felt left out of the decision-making process at the university. “Change can be uncomfortable. That’s why they’re called growing pains,” Capilouto said. “But if we are to live up to our promise and to our potential, we must be willing to evolve with the world around us.”
It’s a sad day but not a surprising development. Administration is inherently and unalterably hostile to the interests of faculty. The decades-long process of turning over the university system to administration was only ever going to end in one place. “Months of debate” is a lie; the President and Board predetermined the elimination of shared governance and hired Deloitte to generate a report that would provide the excuse for dissolving the Senate. The President has promised that principles of shared governance will continue to be honored at lower levels of authority. From personal experience I can tell you that this is also a lie; the voices of faculty are being silenced at every level of university administration.
If you’re considering a career in academia… please stop considering it. The demographic cliff, the adjunctification of faculty, the destruction of faculty voice within the university… these trends have made the job untenable in the medium and long term. From this point forward I will not even consider writing a letter of recommendation for a student to pursue a Ph.D., unless I can be assured that they are seeking and are likely to find a position in government or industry. Academia is the deadest of dead ends.