The Dawning of CCRI’s Administrative Aristocracy: Guest MINDSETTER™ Forleo
Monday, December 31, 2018
It’s been nearly three years since the CCRI political takeover began. I attempted to raise the red flag about the proposed steamrolling through the “people’s” college, even calling out certain legislators to abate a shift away from our core philosophical mission toward embracing the corporate metrics-driven, top-down politically operated agenda.
Along with me, many of my colleagues have also issued the clarion call only to be ignored. Adding more insult, we’ve been publicly vilified as difficult and afraid of change.
The discord we are experiencing at CCRI is not unlike other colleges in the throes of flagrant political intrusion.
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLASTIt all comes down to how we view higher education, and what we perceive our role to be in the mettlesome political priorities such as championing the erosion of shared governance, mandating administrative data-driven end results, and the emboldening of utter contempt for faculty autonomy.
Critical Thinking or Job Creation
Since February 2016, many of us perceive a move to wrest control of our mission by promoting a slick marketing veneer revealing a not-so-subtle slide to business generated management practices.
There appears to be a master plan of treating students like widgets through an assembly line by persuading them to enroll into courses that only better their chances of gaining employment and “fast-tracking” them with an almost impossible Promise to graduate in two years.
Perhaps most notably, many of us are well aware of students being used as pawns for J-Term in a shameful display of political grandstanding akin to a governor who loves the way the PR breeze blows (cooler or warmer), particularly with the intent of turning CCRI into a tuition-free testing ground for political ambitions.
Corporate College
The danger of viewing CCRI, or any other community college through such a politically simplistic, rather myopic lens causes unnecessary faculty unrest by placing a premium on how many businesses can be coaxed into creating certificates for a job search rather than realistically advancing the academic long-term benefits of connecting learning to a more balanced, well-rounded career path.
Community colleges generally, and CCRI specifically since February 2016, appear more and more to be malleable appendages to big business, billion-dollar foundations, legislative whimsy, and the ever-increasing influence of pie-in-the-sky workforce development promises.
Why else would community colleges engage in guided pathways, marketable/stackable credentials, outside employer generated curricula, and cozy relationships with an outfit like those wrangling pirates from Goldman Sachs?
Why else would college administrators tout the vast amount of new business partnerships lassoed? Why else would state legislatures create business modeled performance-based metrics? And why else would entire community college administrations appear as bloated as wood ticks on an unsuspecting host?
Boardroom or Classroom
One of the most vexing issues with community colleges would be the novelty of training college students to serve the workforce of the global economy. At a closer gander, it’s nothing but shop talk for big business to increase cheap labor, basically using the unwitting as fodder for this grand plan of creating and proliferating a servant economy.
Yup, the Ancient Eight ruling class subjugating the “less educated” to menial positions by affording them a quick fix certificate that is overtly meaningless for a lifelong career. But it sure does increase those retention and grad rates, as well as making good sound bites for national attention.
Big Ticket OJT
It’s all corporate babble of course, but across the country we see more of these business-background administrators hired from private industry with less-than-zero higher education leadership experience.
Once installed, these grossly overpaid OJT visionaries are sent to many conferences, seminars and classes to learn how to be leaders, sponsored by big-money cliques like Complete College America, Aspen Institute, and Achieving the Dream.
Across the higher education landscape, these exalted novices continue to scoop up record taxpayer-funded salaries, while implementing the business model fixed on pushing a product, customer satisfaction, and expanding overhead hires.
It’s the ascension of the administrative aristocracy. The students are customers, faculty treated as factory floor supervisors, and layer upon layer of executive staff create nothing but political turmoil by obliterating traditional governance norms, often resulting in the uber-expensive outsourcing of key strategic initiatives previously done in-house. And perhaps all of it generously paid for through taxpayer-funded state budgets.
You’re welcome.
These so-called “reformers” talk a big game of inclusion, civility, and collegial discourse. However, when pressed for specifics on any level, all that’s provided is more insipid drivel consisting of hackneyed catch phrases and vapid platitudes.
That’s why business-minded college administrators looking to expand their brand spout boring boardroom jargon like “teamwork”, “institutional culture change”, “best practices”, “professional development”.
In addition, these politically driven administrators use community colleges as experimental laboratories for implementing ingenious educative prerogatives, such as one-size-fits-all class instruction, business model management agendas, a focusing on short-term success, the tamping down of faculty dissent, and the unmitigated disregard and disdain for faculty independence.
Whatever happened to defending the democratic values of promoting the importance of an educated person?
It’s safe to say there’s no political gain or career advancement in those outdated ideals.
The Bottom Line
Rhode Island, like so many other states, must now grapple with choosing the identity of its lone community college. In my opinion, this decision should not be dictated by an audacious power grab from any governor, shuttled over to a hand-picked higher education council consisting of commerce types.
This is precisely why the legislature should step up to advance measures ensuring the complete higher education board have quantifiable higher education experience. And the committee chairperson must be elected by the sitting board members not unilaterally chosen by any governor.
Also, legislators must seriously consider oversight hearings on all state budget allocations relative to the burgeoning coterie of six-figure administrative hires.
The tail is now wagging the dog...bigly!
The Primary Stakeholders
College professors and students deserve transparency, authenticity, respect, and a genuine concern for lifelong learning.
Classroom experts do not respect nor approve of shortsighted sloganeers masquerading as change agents.
Back in 1964, a determined faculty along with William Flanagan’s true enterprising concepts forged the “people’s” college here in Rhode Island.
The CCRI faculty then, as now, faithfully serves Rhode Island’s diverse educative needs.
The current faculty reveres and preserves the unique mission created decades ago, and strives to provide student-learners the career path necessary for success.
And I truly believe the entire state owes a huge debt of gratitude to William Flanagan, the pioneer and true visionary of a unique and special place now aptly named, The Community College of Rhode Island.
Do not abandon those who’ve given so much for so many.
Steven F. Forleo is an olive-skinned concerned citizen who teaches Shakespeare in his spare time.
Related Slideshow: CCRI Promise Report March 2018
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