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HOW THE LEGISLATURE ANNEXED PUBLIC HIGHER EDUCATION TO PARTISAN POLITICS

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Contributor "Will Davie's Ghost" analyzes what is arguably the most significant instance of politicization of public higher education in the 45 year history of the UNC system. HIGHER EDUCATION IN THE JONES STREET DOMINION As the end of the recent legislative session fades into the past, North Carolinians should know that moment also marks the establishment of a new era for public higher education in this state: lawmakers finally swept aside or transgressed nearly all the checks and balances protecting our universities from partisan political interference. These new statutory provisions are so broad in reach, and ill-conceived in substance, that members of the University community are still struggling to make sense of the implications and intent of this historically unprecedented arrogation of power. The full force of these changes will not be felt for months, and in some cases for years, but when they are citizens will wonder how one of the best systems of ...
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No good work goes unpunished

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NC has what is arguably the best system of public higher education in the country, yet (for the fifth year running) there wasn't a single NC public university on the Chronicle of Higher Education's 2015 " Great Colleges to Work For ." (Kudos to Wake Tech for making some of the earlier lists for 2 year institutions, but the absence of NCCC system schools in recent rankings only reinforces the concerns raised here). This of course stands in sharp contrast with the great work that NC staff and faculty have done to make many UNC schools among the most highly ranked institutions -- from a student's perspective. What drives this gap? As I have argued elsewhere in this blog, there is a sense in which the UNC system is (one of) the best in the country despite the problematic policies and laws of the NC legislature and the UNC Board of Governors. There is a sense in which UNC staff, faculty, and administrators have insulated the University from the destructive effec...
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Protecting autocratic snowflakes from freedom of speech

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UPDATE, 2 November 17: There have been several changes to the Board of Governors (BoG) proposed policy (which has now been approved in committee and forward to the full Board for a vote tomorrow). These incorporate some of the concerns raised by the Association of Student Governments, the UNC Staff Assembly, and the UNC Faculty Assembly. The legal staff at General Administration is likely to be responsible for rolling back some of the really bad language and ideas. While some of those changes have mitigated problematic features of the legislation and the Board's interventions in the management of campus affairs, several very troubling issues were made manifest during the BoG Governance Committee meeting, viz: -- Steve Long, the Chair of the Committee, openly conceded that the policy did little more than recapitulate existing legislation protecting freedom of speech. As noted below, laws to enforce laws are almost always an indication that something pernicious is at stake. ...
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