Tag Archives: Mizzou

Editor’s Pick, Education, Featured, US

Mizzou Loses Around 1,500 Students, Faces Massive Budget Shortfalls

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By Blake Neff – The University of Missouri (MU) is losing about 1500 students and is facing a huge $32 million budget shortfall four months after it attracted national attention as the site of massive race-based campus protests.

“I am writing to you today to confirm that we project a very significant budget shortfall due to an unexpected sharp decline in first-year enrollments and student retention this coming fall. I wish I had better news,” said MU interim chancellor Hank Foley in a Wednesday letter to school staff that was obtained by Fox Sports.

According to Foley’s letter, MU will have about 1500 fewer students in fall 2016 compared to last year, an unexpected drop that is in turn causing a big dip in the school’s tuition income.

Because of the abrupt and unexpected nature of the shortfall, Foley is taking immediate and severe steps to fix the situation: The school budget is being cut 5 percent across the board, all hiring is being frozen (barring exceptional circumstances), and annual raises have been canceled. He has also announced a new, more intensive effort to recruit potential Mizzou students by phone, email, and even via Skype.

Even with all these measures, Foley anticipates MU having a deficit of about $1o million,which he said would be made up using the school’s reserve funds.

In November 2015, MU was rocked by major protests led by the Concerned Student 1950 group, which accused President Timothy Wolfe of not doing enough to address racial tensions on campus. After black players on the school football team announced a strike, Wolfe resigned and the school caved to a host of other protester demands. Meanwhile, the same day of Wolfe’s resignation, communications professor Melissa Click grabbed headlines for attacking a student journalist who tried to cover the ongoing protests.

Now, while Click and Wolfe are gone, the consequences of that turbulent November continue to reverberate, not the least because Concerned Student 1950 continues to engage in very public protests while demanding even more concessions from the school.

It was already known that MU had seen a drop in applications following the protests, but Foley’s letter drives home just how big a blow the school has been dealt.

Foley doesn’t break down the 1,500 lost student by class year, but the bulk of the decline comes from a major dip in the size of the entering freshman class. How major? In 2015, MU had 6,200 freshman undergraduates, meaning its freshman class size may have shrunk by 20 percent or more, an incredible swing for a single year.

Notably, Foley’s letter makes no mention of the protests as a potential factor in Mizzou’s declining appeal.

Foley also is unlikely to have much luck in turning to Missouri lawmakers for support. Disgusted by the university’s actions last fall, Republicans have refused to increase its budget and have even been considering making a big cut to the school’s state support.

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Education, Featured, US

Mizzou Diversity Director Tells Protesters To Grow Up, Stop Making Insane Demands

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By Blake Neff – The chief diversity officer at the University of Missouri (MU) has authored a letter sharply reprimanding the school’s black activist movement, urging it to stop relying on threats and impossible demands.

“If you sincerely want better relationships, the time for demands, threats and arbitrary deadlines is over — you don’t need them,” said Chuck Henson, who was appointed as MU’s interim vice chancellor for inclusion, diversity and equity following massive campus protests last fall. The letter, written Thursday, was obtained and released by the Columbia Missourian Friday night.

Last week, Concerned Student 1950, the activist group that helped force out MU president Timothy Wolfe last fall, released a new set of demands, which largely reiterates previous commands that have gone unmet. Some of the demands that were emphasized included a call for an “academic bankruptcy program” (essentially letting students void the results of an entire term), an expansion in the number of black faculty and the erection of a statue of 1930s civil rights activist Lloyd Gaines on campus. Many of the demands have explicit deadlines, and the group has emphasized that the school will be made to fulfill them “by any means necessary.”

But according to Henson, the group is presenting its demands in a flatly unacceptable manner. Not only that, but many of them are impossible.

“[T]here are things, like hiring faculty or staff, or admitting students based on protected characteristics to meet a numerical target, [that] will not and cannot be done,” he said. “It is against state and federal law. It also is a bad model for a sustainable community.” Similarly, he said demands that course curricula be changed was purely the responsibility of faculty, and could not be meddled with by administrators without quashing academic freedom.

Henson also faulted activists for apparently avoiding a face-to-face meeting with school administrators.

“For my part, I have been seeking you out. I have invited you to come see me,” Henson said in the letter. “However, as yet we haven’t met. Had you accepted my invitation to meet face-to-face, you would already know the answers to most of the issues raised in your recent communication.”

The diversity director suggested that activists try attending meetings of The Working Group, a body created by MU’s administration in order to transparently reform the school following mass protests last fall. Despite its intention of changing MU with student input, few people seem to have attended Working Group meetings.

At the least, Concerned Student 1950 can’t accuse Henson of flaunting his white privilege, as Henson himself is a black man.

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Education, US

Mizzou Communications Professor Resigns From Appointment After Threatening Reporter

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By Kerry Picket University of Missouri faculty member Melissa Click apologized Tuesday night and resigned her courtesy appointment with the Missouri School of Journalism. David Kurpius, dean of the journalism school at MU, posted the news to Twitter just before 9 p.m.

Click’s resignation came one day after she joined protesting students in the school’s quadrangle who were angered over two incendiary on campus incidents, which led to the resignation of both the president of the school and later the chancellor.

A courtesy appointment permits members of one academic department to serve on graduate committees for students from other academic departments. Click teaches mass media in the Communication Department. The School of Journalism is separate from the Communications Department.

Click and Assistant Director of Greek Life Jana Basler were both captured on video verbally intimidating student photographer Tim Tai, who was on a freelance assignment to cover the protests. Towards the tail end of the video, Click asks for “muscle” to deal with the video maker MU junior Mark Schierbecker. The video was later uploaded to YouTube.

“Yesterday was an historic day at MU — full of emotion and confusion. I have reviewed and reflected upon the video of me that is circulating, and have written this statement to offer both apology and context for my actions,” Click said in a statement released to the Columbia Missourian Tuesday afternoon by the College of Arts and Science.

“I have reached out to the journalists involved to offer my sincere apologies and to express regret over my actions. I regret the language and strategies I used, and sincerely apologize to the MU campus community, and journalists at large, for my behavior, and also for the way my actions have shifted attention away from the students’ campaign for justice,”she said in the statement.

Tai told The Huffington Post that Click had apologized to him, and said she was “very gracious.”

“I don’t have — and never had — bad feelings against her and feel bad that she’s been receiving threats and other nasty messages,” Tai told HuffPost. “I wish she had handled the situation differently, but as a journalist it really just became part of the scene I was presented with and I never took her or anyone else’s actions personally.”

 

This article was republished with permission from The Daily Caller.