Editor,
I've been following pretty closely the details regarding the faculty's impending meeting with UNM's version of "The Three Blind Mice": President David Schmidly, Executive Vice President David Harris and Regents President Jamie Koch.
The initial refusal of Harris and Koch to show up at the upcoming meeting addressing a possible vote of no confidence shows complete arrogance and lack of understanding from two people who know less about higher education than a wet-behind-the-ears high school teacher getting his or her first class. Schmidly comes from a background of being an administrator at Oklahoma State and Texas Tech, places where he was considered a failure.
The main issue here is that their responses and arrogance, not at all unlike our last U.S. president, shows they don't have a clue. Two political cronies and a twice-failed
administrator show that running things like a business and giving your friends jobs does not equal success. Success is measured in numerous other ways, such as increased graduation rates, increased number of applicants, higher GPAs of present and incoming students as well as test scores and number of those who attend graduate school after receiving a bachelor's degree. The Three Blind Mice don't get that. They seem to think that action from a significant number of the faculty is undermining the reputation of the University in the Legislature and that they're not directly responsible to accusations from the faculty.
As a graduate student who earned a bachelor's degree and a master's degree at institutions that were better academically and administratively than UNM, I do have some basis for comparison. One has been relatively static with news, but it adds new programs or labs occasionally, as its enrollment is about 10 percent of what UNM has. Where I completed my bachelor's in 2004 has in the last eight years added five Ph.D. programs including programs in sustainability, astrophysics and Microsystems engineering. The college's student population has increased by more than 2,000, a 15 percent bump over that same period. They built an 8,000 seat, multipurpose athletic facility for $25 million, less than half the planned cost for The Pit renovation, and it made the transition of one of its athletic programs from Division III to Division I all the while maintaining and even improving its academic reputation.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
All Schmidly did was try to hire his son. I applaud the faculty who signed the petition as a major first step in the process to getting an administration that even has a clue on how to run a major university. I can only hope a majority of the faculty and fellow students here at UNM recognize the fraud, waste and abuse the current administrative leaders have engaged in needs. I hope students and faculty demand for this to end immediately. I say this so that in the future, our degrees are worth more than just the paper they are printed on.
James Hulka
UNM student
