Wow - powerful letter to A/P Staff

I was sent this by a few people in the last few days. I think an amazing number of people are reading my little blog, don't you people have lives? Turns out my buddy Dave has been talking to Wendler and reports that Wendler is reading my blog. Go figure? Might be better to pay my consulting fee than get it free here? :)

Here is the link to the meeting minutes. I'm not smart enough to know if this is true or correct, but I am smart enough to know that management shouldn't try to power grab over things that don't matter. The idea is to have enough control to run the organization without pissing off the people who do the work.

I removed the writer of the letter's name, but you can dig it out if you want to.


Dear A/P Council:

I was confused to receive Council minutes from two meetings spaced by only nine days, August 16 and 25. Now that I have re-read the August 25 minutes, I surmise that a special meeting was called because of Chancellor Wendler's announcement of the "Excellence Through Commitment Awards Program."

Councilors Ashner, Bankester, and Curkin spoke candidly, and some might say bravely, about this latest diminution of the A/P Council's role in the representation and advancement of the A/P constituency. They asked how the constituents might feel if A/P Council were to forfeit to Anthony Hall its role of recognizing outstanding A/P staff.

This constituent objects very strongly. I also object to a practice that started while I was on A/P Council. With regard to A/P representation on important University committees, we were no longer permitted to submit our choice, but rather a slate from which the Chancellor would choose. As the minutes state, "This is more relinquishment of shared governance and the fact that it is being eroded on this campus."

As one of the early reviewers of this abomination called Southern at 150, I could see it coming. One section called for "empowering top-level administrators" and "eliminating unnecessary layers in the decision-making process." It has been softened somewhat in the sections Aspiration: Stability in Leadership and Governance and Aspiration: Develop Streamlined, Agile Administrative Structures but, really, how can anyone not recognize that language as foreshadowing a departure from constituency consultation and shared governance? Who do you think was an unnecessary layer?

And yet, people put on tuxedos and gowns and celebrated the ascendancy of the politburo.

Seeing as Ashner, Bankester, and Curkin have not minced words, I'll not mince them either. I recommend that A/P Council merely ignore the politburo's awards program and proceed with its own as usual. The A/P Outstanding Service Award may not be able to bestow money on the recipients any more, but I'd rather win recognition from my peers than filthy lucre anyhow.

I recommend that A/P Council speak forcefully on this issue. I think A/P is the last non-union constituency on campus, but it will not remain so for long the way things are going. The usurpations must stop.