I thought this article, written by SIU grad Molly Parker, was extremely well done. Long, but worth the read. Also quite aggravating, as SIU does not need additional, unnecessary headwinds to battle.
Noticed this article too - explains how the delay in funding for the Comm rebuild has caused redesign (can't do all that was in the original plan) due to much higher costs in the last 10 years.
@siudawgs A long article indeed, but spot on. Thank you kindly for posting. Not only do state/public universities rely on federal funding, but small/rural towns across Illinois and this nation as well. If our nations capital can not assist with education, developing well rounded, informed, and overall educated people, our country's crisis will continue, and further impede our progress world wide. Shameful
@siudawgs A long article indeed, but spot on. Thank you kindly for posting. Not only do state/public universities rely on federal funding, but small/rural towns across Illinois and this nation as well. If our nations capital can not assist with education, developing well rounded, informed, and overall educated people, our country's crisis will continue, and further impede our progress world wide. Shameful
A good, accurate article, if not a pleasant one. Still remember the first in-depth article I read about SIU -- the infamous Chicago magazine hit piece that ran my sophomore year and really trashed the school with distortions and anonymous quotes and anecdotes. This one was at least was fair, balanced and well-researched.
The people of Illinois have elected to spend over 5 billion a year on illegal aliens. Those tax dollars could have been spent on education. The government you elect is the government you deserve.
Really? I'd sure like to see a reference for that, because I don't believe it. Sounds like bullshit.
And FYI, we are way better off than we were when Bruce Rauner gave 0 dollars to state universities. Schools had to borrow money (and pay interest of course) to keep going.
As if SIU doesn't have enough challenges, there are two bills in the Illinois Congress to allow junior colleges to offer bachelors degrees. (which is not allowed in the JC charter)
Unfortunately, Pritzker has come out in favor of this - cheaper BAs. That would be a disaster for state universities not named U of I.
@mr_woogers The conservative estimate for illegal alien health care in Illinois is 1.5-2 billion dollars. SIU's budget is about 500 million dollars. Maybe you believe that SIU should have 100's of Vice Chancellors for anti-racism, with 6 figure salaries, and even bigger pensions.
Why does everything come down to someone's political opinion instead of trying to compromise and fix a problem I am so tired of right vs left who cares conservatives or liberals fix the problem are we so far down the rabbit hole we can't be civilized and fix problems I guess that is to difficult it is just easier to blame others
From a non-political viewpoint, perhaps we should try and understand why staff levels were so low in the early 90s (when enrollment was high) and now staffing is high with very low enrollment.
If I remember correctly, Bill Clinton cut nearly 400,000 federal employees and nobody seemed to mind. The previous administration identified up to 1 trillion of unaccounted for spending. DOGE is following up on the work the previous guy did. https://www.gao.gov/blog/federal-government-made-236-billion-improper-payments-last-fiscal-year
“The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody has decided not to see.”
― Ayn Rand
You are about the least non-political person on the planet.
Snopes, USAToday and others researched this. Yes Clinton cut jobs and made government more efficient. The methods was totally different and had bipartisan support.
The Elon Don Putin plan is to chaotically dismantle government and is completely ignorant. No doubt there's a lot of waste in the government of a country with 350 million people.
To let an arrogant oligarch from South Africa do whatever he wants to our government is #1 crazy, and #2 unconstitutional as evidenced by the many Federal judges saying hold on a minute. If the Republican Congress had any balls, they would zip their spines back in and tell Don no! that's the wrong way to go about it.
Now Musk is going to use AI and some inexperienced programmers to rewrite the Cobol Social Security software in a few months? Hah! Talk about arrogant AND ignorant. Guy doesn't know squat about software, but he'll let an 19 year old programmer screw with SS software? That will be a disaster. That's a multi-year project and for sure is not the only Federal gov't software written in that ancient business language. It also probably running on IBM mainframes in ice cold rooms. Probably still using punch cards at times.
Good luck getting your SS check in a few months. (of course the real idea is to get rid of one of the most popular government programs in history cuz the take home pay of billionaires is inadequate.)
Check out
The Legacy IT Reduction Act
and
https://www.ibm.com/policy/modern-mainframe-government/
"In fact, two thirds of Fortune 100 companies, 45 of the world’s top 50 banks, 8 of the top 10 insurers, 7 of the top 10 global retailers, and 8 out of the top 10 telcos use IBM zSystems for mission critical workloads. The mainframe is pervasive in the private sector because it offers the best mix of security, performance, reliability, and resiliency."
from Snopes:
It's true that during his presidency, Clinton reduced the federal government's workforce by more than 377,000 employees as part of an initiative called the National Partnership for Reinventing Government (initially called the National Performance Review, or NPR). However, there's a key difference between how Clinton's NPR cut jobs and what Trump and Musk are trying.
In March 1993, just two months into his presidency, Clinton announced the creation of the National Performance Review, led by his Vice President, Al Gore. Its goal, according to Clinton's announcement, was "to make the entire Federal Government both less expensive and more efficient, and to change the culture of our national bureaucracy away from complacency and entitlement toward initiative and empowerment."
The review lasted six months, and made 384 recommendations to improve the federal bureaucracy. The implementation of those policies took a lot longer, and some required legislation to be passed through Congress. For instance, in 1994, Clinton signed a bill that offered federal workers buyouts of up to $25,000 in an effort to reduce the workforce by 272,000 employees. According to an April 1995 statement from Clinton, the buyouts were largely offered to management positions in an effort to "reduce the layers of bureaucracy and micromanagement that were tying Government in knots." That statement said that about 70 of the buyouts in non-Department of Defense agencies went to managers and other individuals "at higher grade levels."
