Copy of post to the Members’ Forum for the Association of Academic Staff (AASUA)
Text of the first document referred to as “attached” is copied in below.
Dear Colleagues,
Monday’s meeting of the General Faculties Council may very well be the most consequential in the University’s history. I write to offer you some key information about what will be before GFC as well as my view of what is at stake.
At its November 23rd meeting, GFC discussed the three final scenarios of the Academic Restructuring Working Group (ARWG) as well as the “Invisible College (Shared Services)” model prepared by faculty members who were following the consultation process about the original scenarios with great care, and seeking a model that would address the very strong messages that the University community was sending about what it found to be wrong about the ARWG’s proposals. At its meeting of November 25th the Academic Planning Committee, which was charged with making a recommendation to GFC on what model for academic restructuring it should recommend to the Board of Governors, decided simply to endorse “the concept of a college model” and leave GFC to decide between the two college models.
In these two models there are entirely different visions of the University at stake.
The Academic Restructuring Working Group’s college model proposes that the University create a new academic unit, the college, in which the importance and role of the University’s 16 faculties will be diminished even as a new, expensive administrative layer is created. In the ARWG’s September and November 2020 reports, these new academic administrators are called “Executive Deans.”
In the second model, the Invisible College (Shared Services) model, faculties are bundled into nominal colleges for the purpose of reducing administrative costs by sharing services. This model would achieve exactly the same cost savings (if not more) than the ARWG’s model while avoiding a strategic blunder. It is based on the premise that while the University must, unfortunately, make very serious adjustments to its operations in relation to the Kenney government’s dire program of cuts to the University’s budget, it must make these adjustments while preserving the identities and autonomy of our largest academic units, faculties. This model does not create a new academic unit nor does it create new academic administrative positions.
On behalf of the authors of the Invisible College (Shared Services) model, I attach two documents for you that I hope will provide additional perspective on what is at stake.
The first is a “Frequently Asked Questions” document in which we provide our answers to the questions about the model that we have been hearing.
The second document aims to offer crucial perspective on the Provost’s desire to create new academic units and a new layer of administrative bureaucracy by providing organizational information about the universities that the Academic Restructuring Working Group presented as inspirations and models for its work.
As you will see from this second document, only one of these universities, the University of Western Australia, made the mistake of creating the additional layer of administration that the Provost desires and the ARWG proposes. Just six weeks ago, Western Australia reversed that decision, and eliminated all of its Executive Deans.
The second document also shows that the only university in the ARWG’s set of models that has Executive Deans of the kind the Provost desires, Queen Mary (London), did not create an additional layer of administration because it has no equivalent to the Provost. Queen Mary’s Executive Deans report directly to the President and Principal.
Our University community has already sent a very strong message to the senior administration that it does not support the creation of “Executive Deans.” And so yesterday the President issued a revised version of the second motion it proposes for the consideration of the General Faculties Council on Monday afternoon. (The first motion asks GFC to endorse a college model in general, with the second motion specifying the administrative structure.)
The senior administration’s revised motion 2 reads as follows:
As you can see, the revised motion does not in fact eliminate Executive Deans. It simply gives the new academic administrators who will manage other Deans a new name — they are “seconded” to serve as “Dean of the College.” It is not clear from this whether the senior administration has “heard” the message but not understood it, or if it is seriously underestimating the collective intellection of the University community.
On Monday, I will move an amendment to the administration’s revised motion 2 to ensure that GFC has the opportunity to approve the Invisible (Shared Services) College model.
A financial emergency should not be the occasion for the senior administration to wreak long-term damage to the University by introducing a new academic unit that is superior to and subordinates Faculties. Nor should it be the occasion for the creation of a new hierarchy of academic administrators in which Deans are no longer equal. Such a hierarchy will inevitably create hierarchies amongst Faculties. These hierarchies will be achieved and reinforced by the “Executive” or “Seconded” Deans, whose “strategic” initiatives with the Provost will turn on differentially distributing resources to Faculties through various means (including “performance metrics”). Restructuring will continue, in other words, but through more subtle means, with very serious consequences for the well-being and reputation of the University and its successful pursuit of the academic mission.
I hope you join me in rejecting all of this. The senior administration tell us that they must have their Executive or Seconded Deans in order to be “nimble,” but the nimbleness of a healthy organization comes from its foundational units — those doing the organization’s core work — and at this time in the University’s history it is crucial that we preserve the identities and autonomy of our Faculties. When your house is being battered by high-speed winds you don’t start attempting to build a costly and unnecessary third story. You batten down the hatches and protect your foundations.
Please let me know if you have any questions.
Carolyn
INVISIBLE COLLEGE (SHARED SERVICES) MODEL:
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Q1
What is the Invisible College (Shared Services) model?
The Invisible College (Shared Services) Model aims to deal with the budget cuts confronting the University of Alberta by organizing the University’s faculties into nominal colleges for the purpose of facilitating cost-saving sharing of services amongst faculties within each of the services colleges. This approach maximizes opportunities for efficiencies (the stated goal of the “UofA for Tomorrow” transformation) while minimizing adverse consequences, most importantly by preserving faculties as the largest academic units at the University. This is important for preserving the reputation and ranking of the University’s faculties, departments, and programs.
Q2
What is the biggest difference between the Academic Restructuring Working Group’s College (ARWG’s) model and the Invisible College (Shared Services) model?
Under our model, “colleges” exist for the purpose of sharing services, not as academic units. That makes it possible for our model to realize all of the “back office” savings that are assumed to take place with the ARWG’s college model, while avoiding the expense, inefficiency, and other very serious problems that come with the creation of the college as an academic unit and the Executive (or “Seconded”) Deans required by the ARWG model.
Q3
Exactly how much would the University save with the Invisible College (Shared Services) model?
We can provide only an estimate. But, using the same methodology that was used to estimate cost savings for the ARWG’s three proposed models, we estimate that the Invisible College Model will save $31.8M in administrative efficiencies and between $0M to $8.5M in leadership capacity. In total, the estimated cost savings would be between $31.8M to $40.3M+. Depending upon what decisions are made regarding reductions in leadership positions, our model is estimated to save approximately the same as or more than the ARWG’s College Model.
Q4
Are there other ways in which your model is better than the ARWG’s college model?
Yes! We think our model is superior because it finds ways that work with the “Service Excellence Transformation” process to cut costs without changing our well-established and successful academic structures (Faculties). We feel this is the most prudent course of action at this time.
In our view, a healthy organization does everything it can to minimize the negative impacts of external forces on its operations. The Kenney government’s cuts to the University of Alberta’s budget are deeply unfortunate, and we have no choice but to adjust in order to address them. But that shouldn’t result in our making drastic changes to the University’s structure that are not consistent with core academic principles and well-established structures for universities. We need to preserve the reputation of our Faculties and find a way to fix things behind-the-scenes, with cost-cutting through shared services, rather than through the creation of new academic units on top of Faculties along with their new, expensive bureaucracy and “Executive (or Seconded) Deans.” Any such new structure involves costs that the University cannot possibly afford at this time.
But not only can we not afford such a structure, it would be a strategic blunder to create academic colleges as they would diminish the importance and role of Faculties. No healthy organization would try to address a problem with its revenue streams by creating a new additional bureaucratic layer — in our case, a new academic structure on top of our current Faculties. The only NOUS-restructured university that we know of in Australia that created such a layer reversed its mistake earlier this year, and eliminated its Executive Deans. And the only NOUS-restructured university that we know of in the UK that created such a layer does not have a Provost. Please see our “Organizational Charts” document for further information about this.
Q5
How exactly would these “shared services colleges” work?
First, from the perspective of the public, nothing changes. Our sixteen Faculties retain their identities and autonomy. This is crucial both for the success of the Faculties and the University’s reputation. Everything that needs to change for us to try to manage the Kenney government’s budget cuts will happen with behind-the-scenes changes.
Think, for example, of how a big resort hotel provides its patrons with dining options. Such hotels typically have multiple restaurants (coffee shop, casual lunch place, a fancy restaurant for dinner, a different kind of fancy place for dinner, and so on.) But behind-the-scenes there is only one large shared kitchen. The public gets to enjoy a range of eating places without having to worry about who’s preparing the food, or how a manager behind the scenes is co-ordinating the kitchen’s purveyance of food to multiple dining places.
In our model, a college Services Manager will be responsible for the work of ensuring the co-ordinated or shared services within each nominal college. This professional will make sure shared services between a cluster of Faculties work smoothly. The Services Manager will report to the Deans of the Faculties within the nominal college.
Q6
I’m a student, and all of this restructuring stuff is so confusing. Does the Invisible College (Shared Services) model make any difference for students?
We think our model makes a huge difference for students. Our concern for students is one of the reasons it was so important to us to develop and bring forward this model.
The Provost’s college model creates an academic entity on top of the current Faculties. This will necessarily redirect money away from the teaching and research front-lines. The Provost is asking Faculties to cut their number of departments in order to cut the number of chairs and associate chairs within Faculties. In our view, this is a very serious mistake as it is the University’s chairs and associate chairs who do some of the most important work in administering the University. They do that work in close contact with students. We do not agree to any proposal that wants to save money at this important level of administration in order to create an unnecessary new academic entity, an academic college on top of Faculties, with new costs arising from the new expensive “Executive (or Seconded) Deans” and their professional teams. The Board of Governors wants students to pay more tuition. It is not fair for students to be asked to pay even more tuition (current amounts are already too high!) and then for the University to use funds in the operating budget to pay for this new “higher level” academic structure.
We were so concerned about the impact of the Provost’s model on students that we took a close look at the Australian universities that are supposedly an inspiration for his model.
According to the ARWG, the inspiration for adding Executive (or Seconded) Deans comes from Australia. Specifically, the University’s consultant (the Nous Group) claims that seven Australian universities serve as examples of the “benefits” of the organizational changes it recommends. These include the University of Melbourne, Monash University, University of Sydney, University of New South Wales, University of Western Australia, University of South Australia, and University of Queensland. The available data suggests that the restructuring of these universities has not been good for students.
According to the 2019 Student Experience Survey conducted by the Australian Government Department of Education and Training, these seven universities are some of the worst performing universities in Australia when ranked by “quality of entire educational experience for undergraduate students.” Specifically, two of the universities described by Nous in the ARWG’s Interim Report as “high performing” are actually the two worst-performing universities in Australia according to the survey results: the University of New South Wales is ranked #41 out of the 41 universities ranked, while the University of Sydney is ranked #40 out of 41. Others are clearly middling at best: the University of Melbourne is ranked #29 out of 41; Monash is #24; the University of South Australia is #21; and the University of Western Australia is #16. In other words, these three are all in the middle two quartiles. Even the best performing Australian university in the Nous sample, the University of Queensland, ranks only #13 out of 41. In other words, not a single Australian university in the Nous sample even makes it into the top quartile when ranked by “quality of entire educational experience for undergraduate students.”
Additionally, according to the Australian government’s own data, the average university in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada performs better than the average university in Australia. For this reason, it seems questionable at best to utilize any of the Australian universities as justification for changes at the University of Alberta.
Q7
I’m a member of the General Faculties Council, and I am puzzled about where this model came from. Why should we consider it?
The Invisible College Model was prepared by faculty members from various Faculties who have been paying very close attention to the proposals of the Academic Restructuring Working Group and have been dedicating a lot of time to following the consultation process. Everything has been proceeding with great haste, as everyone knows. The model we prepared is exactly the model we expected the ARWG to include in its second report, had they acted on the feedback from the University community. When we saw that this model was not amongst the ARWG’s “Final Scenarios” we did our best to prepare our model and get it to GFC members as soon as we could after the Academic Restructuring Working Group release of its second report late on the afternoon of Friday, November 13th. (We had to see what the final proposed scenarios were before we could proceed.) We did the best we could in doing this work on top of meeting our full-time responsibilities, first and most importantly, our responsibilities to our students.
We hope that all the members of the General Faculties Council, along with all members of the Board of Governors, will choose to take decisions that are in the best interests of the University. We respectfully submit that this model is the model in the best interests of the University.
Q8
I’m a faculty member and agree that under no circumstances should the University create a new level of administration with Executive (or Seconded) Deans. But what do you say to critics of the Invisible College Model who say it doesn’t do “enough”?
We think our model does exactly what it needs to in order to address the budget crisis precipitated by the Kenney government’s funding cuts. Whether we are faculty, staff, or students we should not support restructuring the University any more than is necessary. Our shared commitment across Faculties should be to minimize the immense damage to the University and its reputation that the Kenney cuts are doing. The University should not have to survive with one thousand fewer support staff. This is such a terrible development for the University. But we do not agree that the financial crisis must lead to the creation of either new academic units or new academic leader positions (“Executive” or “Seconded” Deans). These will not only result in higher costs for academic administration they will also diminish the role of Faculties by in effect demoting them and all those who work within them. That is not how collegial governance works. It is also not a prescription for the successful pursuit of the academic mission. The President and the Provost should provide strategic direction for the University in their continuing work with all Deans as the academic administrators who run Faculties as peers across Faculties.
Q9
Isn’t the Provost saying that GFC needs to approve the ARWG’s model, not this one, if the University is to be able to “foster interdisciplinary teaching and research”?
There are many ways to foster interdisciplinary research and teaching such as establishing interdisciplinary research centres and institutes, revising promotion and tenure procedures, creating structures that allow for instructors to teach courses outside of their home departments, and offering courses that contribute to programs in multiple departments.[1] Many of these approaches already occur at the University of Alberta. There is no evidence that bundling Faculties into academic “Colleges” will foster interdisciplinary teaching and research. If anything, the bundling of Faculties into Colleges will jeopardize the breadth of interdisciplinarity by containing it among the members of those Faculties who happen to have been placed within the same academic college rather than encouraging interdisciplinarity across the whole of the University. In our proposed shared services College Model, Faculties will remain as they currently exist with autonomy over their budgets, Faculty evaluation processes, and academic programs for interdisciplinarity should grow from the foundation of strong autonomous Faculties.
Q10
I don’t think I like any college model, invisible or not! Could GFC still choose something else?
Yes, it is still possible for GFC not to choose any college model at all. It could choose one of the ARWG’s other models (“Consolidation” or “Hybrid”). It could even revert to one of the original scenarios, Scenario A, which did the least amount of restructuring of any of the models. It would of course also be possible for the General Faculties Council to pass a resolution saying that it recommends that there be no academic restructuring whatsoever, and that the Board of Governors simply implement the “Services Excellence Transformation” model that it has already approved. The University’s 16 Faculties would then continue to operate as entirely autonomous units under the new budget model. To be clear, based on the ARWG’s math, the university could achieve 100% of the required budget cuts without making any changes to Faculties. All that would be required is for it to follow the new budget model as was specified in the 2020-21 Budget and that was approved by the Board of Governors in March 2020.
Q11
I’m not on GFC, but I really don’t want to see us create any Executive, Super, or Seconded Deans — or whatever they call them at Monday’s meeting. I see this model as the sensible solution. What can I do to help?
Whether you are academic staff, non-academic staff, or a student, you could get in touch with those who have been elected to represent your Faculty and/or constituency on GFC. The membership list is here.
We also encourage you to be in touch if you have a question that is not addressed above. Please let us hear any additional question for which you’d like an answer by writing sale@ualberta.ca.
Thank you.
[1] National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, and Institute of Medicine. 2005. Facilitating Interdisciplinary Research. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/11153.
Arts Squared 