BudgetCrisis2

(July 27, 2009) Who's Next? A Guest Editorial by Victoria Tyler "A number of tenured faculty in USM's College of Arts & Letters must have spent the weekend wondering if they are the targets of dean Denise von Herrmann's $2 million budget cut...".

(July 24, 2009) Following the Boards "The news and discussion surrounding the USM financial crisis is heating up daily, and more and more USM faculty are chiming in about the Martha Saunders administration's lack of transparency concerning the situation...".

(July 24, 2009)Accreditors Beckon "USM faculty are now posting on the USM Forum - Message Board that, based on discussions with USM administration, academic programs that fall victim to the current budgetary crisis do not have to be supported beyond the year in which the cuts are made...".

(July 23, 2009) This is Leading? "... It really is simple: leaders lead. Leaders can certainly be wrong and unpopular. What they cannot be is a non-leader; that is career suicide. On the bright side, you may not have to worry about working so hard on the centennial plans."

(July 23, 2009) USM Financial Situation Dire and Getting Worse "With Ed Kemp's 23-July-09 article for The Hattiesburg American entitled "USM prepares for budget cuts," you have to wonder just what now-former CoB associate professor of finance John Clark knows about USM's dire budgetary situation and why he is leaving for the University of Missouri - Kansas City...".

(July 14, 2009) Martha's Memo "USM constituents are having a fear fest of sorts regarding the diminishing level of communication between USM president Martha Saunders, a so-called communications specialist...".

(July 27, 2009) 2 Questions for Becker Concerning Budget Cuts "CoB TM/MGT (?) associate professor Cherylynn Becker was brought to the CoB - shortly after the beginning of the Harold Doty administration (2003-07) - to chair the tourism management department...".

(July 27, 2009) The Nitty Gritty: A Look at Some Sans-ECO CoB Budget Savings "After examining the data on salaries, fringes, etc. from the CoB's ECO group, recent speculation that eliminating ECO from the CoB would save about $1 million appears to be right on the mark...".

(July 28, 2009) Frivolous Expenditures Are Bad PR "Given President Saunders’ extensive education in communications and public relations, I would expect that she would have refrained from purchasing a two million dollar plane at the onset of a recession...".

(July 28, 2009) Shaking the Trees on USM's Budget Crisis "If you're searching around for more news about the USM budget crisis, you're not likely to find any on the USM Faculty Senate's homepage. That's a real shame because the FS represents the faculty and is in a position to know more than the average USM constituent about what is going on around the USM campuses...".

(July 28, 2009) It's Simple . . . Martha's Plane May Cost Jobs, A Guest Editorial by Victoria Tyler "Maybe, just maybe, as a result of USM president Martha Saunders' decision to spend $2 million in taxpayer funds to lease a Beechcraft plane there's a pilot out there who is now considering membership in the Hattiesburg Country Club. That's nice. However, there are at least seven CoAL faculty out there now, some tenured, who can blame Saunders for their terminal contracts, should they come as expected on 1-Sept-09, that are the result of financial exigencies...".

(July 29, 2009) Public Relations Wars "With various CoB academic programs thought to be on the cutting block in order to meet president Saunders' $2 million cut for the CoB, one would expect a public relations barrage out of these programs to begin/intensify between now and the 1-Sept-09 deadline for terminating tenured faculty...".

(July 29, 2009) Terminal Confusion "A 24-July-09 news story by The Hattiesburg American's higher education reporter Ed Kemp has resulted in some misinformation/confusion among the USM community concerning the ongoing budget crisis...".

(July 30, 2009) How Bad is the Financial Crisis? Read the July 7, 2009 report of the Academic Planning Group (Academic Subcommittee) July 7, 2009 and draw your own conclusions "… Chief Financial Officer Joe Morgan presented updated and unsettling news on the budget scenario...".

(July 30, 2009) How Bad is the Financial Crisis?, part II Read the July 14, 2009 report of the Academic Planning Group (Academic Subcommittee) and draw your own conclusions "... The APG will continue to evaluate programs and the offices that report to the Provost and make recommendations to the Executive Cabinet about how to achieve these cuts. It is anticipated that these cuts cannot be made without some programs being eliminated and faculty being released...".