Are the Newbies Boobies?
By Rob Wallace
Replacing VP for Finance and Management Dickmeyer is Barbara Gliwa, Associate Dean at the Sophie Davis Medical School. Though it seems unfair that Gliwa was plopped into such an important position on little notice, her apparent inexperience, disorganization and indecision, as well as on the part of Ira Blumenreich from Fiscal Planning, led to late budget allocations for departments early this semester.
This in turn led to late payments to some adjuncts as budget lines were topsy-turvy into the first week of class. This writer, an adjunct lecturer, didn’t receive his first check of the semester until the second week of March, a violation of the faculty contract. Adjuncts typically live from check to check as it is. Making them wait for six weeks for their first check is disgraceful. What is City College, Russia?
Zeev Dagan, a professor in Mechanical Engineering, is the new Provost. Formerly a Deputy Provost, Dagan replaces David Lavallee, now Provost at SUNY New Paltz. It seems Dagan’s heavy-handed ways, including forcing an increase in full-time faculty workload, heavy as it already is, have really pissed faculty off (see Bill Crain’s editorial this issue).
One faculty told The Messenger, “Professor Dagan has generated a great deal of resentment among the faculty and lower administration. Humanities has had four deans in less than a year. Deans of several other divisions have announced their resignations, and many department chairs are considering doing so. The substantial segment of the faculty that really work hard feel that they are not appreciated, and are highly demoralized. Many more faculty are thinking of retirement than before.”
By extracting productivity gains from full-time faculty, Dagan was able to spearhead a bloody mass firing of adjuncts at the beginning of the semester. While CUNY students deserve more full-time faculty, whipping harder what full-timers are left is just dumb. Instead, money should be deployed in hiring many of the adjuncts as full-timers.
Other replacements abound. The latest Humanities dean is Professor Jim Watts of the History Department. At a joint meeting of the Faculty Senate and Faculty Council Watts proclaimed his support for a resolution that called for forgoing the extra year of remediation provided for by the Board of Regents. As described in last month’s Messenger, the resolution was defeated.
George Ranalli, formerly of Yale, took over the deanship at the School of Architecture and Environmental Studies. Professor Alfred Posamentier was named interim dean of the besieged School of Education. William DiBrienza has returned as CCNY’s Director of Admissions, a position he held in the 1970s. He replaces Laurie Austin, who is now Director of Recruitment at CUNY Central. Mary Lou Edmondson, formerly of the American Museum of Natural History, is now CCNY’s Assistant Vice President of Communication.
The Messenger wishes all the new hires luck. Good luck when helping students. Bad luck when instituting destructive policies dictated by the mayor, governor, Board of Trustees or chancellor. And as CCNY has been placed in a kind of receivership under CUNY Central, some of the newbies may be doing plenty of the latter. —RW