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Statement on UT Board of Regents Meeting

AUSTIN – Americans for Prosperity Foundation State Director Peggy Venable, and America’s Next Impact Director Chris Covo, issued the following statements today in response to the recommendations given by University of Texas Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa at the UT Board of Regents meeting on Thursday:

Peggy Venable:

“We at Americans for Prosperity Foundation are encouraged by the reforms put forward by Chancellor Cigarroa to promote greater efficiencies at the University of Texas which should help provide a quality education at a lower cost to students and taxpayers. Today’s action is an important first step toward providing greater utilization of university resources, enhance access to more students and lower the cost
of a quality higher education.”

Chris Covo:

“It is clear UT Chancellor Cigarroa has the students and the University’s best interest at heart by recommending reforms that will allow more students to graduate in four years, help in lowering student loan debt, and increase professor productivity. We look forward to working with UT in implementing these important reforms.”

Powers and Cigarroa Unavailable for Comment. Zaffirini Denied Anything Unseemly. (timesoftexas.com)
Former UT adviser O’Donnell Says Zaffirini Mounted a Campaign to Demonize the Regents (timesoftexas.com)
UT Board Chairman Disputes Fired Official’s Account (timesoftexas.com)
Is the UT System Preparing for a New Medical School? – Higher Education | The Texas Tribune (gruntdoc.com)
Thoughts on Chancellor Cigarroa’s Message to UT Regents – Alex Cranberg (alexcranberg.wordpress.com)
Alex Cranberg in San Antonio Express News: Brokered Deal with MyEdu (alexcranberg.wordpress.com)
$70,000 Deal in Hand, ex-UT Official Rips Educators, Lawmaker (timesoftexas.com)
UT Controversy – Both Sides Say They Care About Higher Ed (timesoftexas.com)
Controversy Deflected Attention From Important Work (timesoftexas.com)

see more
http://www.americansforprosperity.org/texas

UT Chancellor Reflects on Feud Over Faculty Standards, Budget Struggles. By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz

August 2, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed Controversy, Solutions

Not too many people perform liver transplants in their spare time. Francisco Cigarroa says it keeps him grounded.

Cigarroa’s day job since February 2009 has been chancellor of the University of Texas System, overseeing 15 academic and health campuses. It’s been an especially challenging assignment the past few months.

His bosses, the nine members of the UT System Board of Regents, don’t necessarily see eye to eye on the appropriate teaching load for faculty members, the cost of tuition, the adequacy of legislative appropriations and other matters. Gene Powell, the chairman of the regents, bypassed Cigarroa in hiring an adviser. And although the adviser, Rick O’Donnell, was dismissed after seven weeks on the job, he has been lobbing verbal hand grenades from the sidelines.

Cigarroa sought and received a unanimous vote of support in May from the regents after insisting that they refrain from micromanaging. He plans to propose a framework for improving graduation rates, advising, introductory lecture courses and other facets of campus operations during the regents’ August meeting.

Cigarroa, 53, reflected on his chancellorship, surgery, the legislative session and other matters during an interview last week with the American-Statesman. Here is an edited account.

How often are you performing transplants?

Every third weekend on the average, which sends a powerful message that, despite being an administrator, you’re still involved in the front line of interacting with students and nurses and physicians. It’s predominantly liver and kidney transplants — mostly adults. You know, I can still throw in a pretty darn good stitch.

As these various controversies have bubbled up during the past few months, have you felt at any moment that you’d like to go back to surgery full time?

No. Leading the University of Texas System is one of the greatest privileges that can be given to an individual. The best time to be in a position like this is during challenging times, because this is a time to lead. I also feel that a debate such that we’re experiencing in Texas and the nation can be very positive if the best recommendations of the debate bubble to the top. Now, the one thing that I demand in any debate is respect, understanding of the value of our presidents and our faculty and our students, and to always keep debate in a constructive perspective.

It hasn’t always been that way, though. Just recently, Rick O’Donnell described some of the faculty at the Austin flagship as “dodgers” and “coasters.”

I personally was appalled with defining faculty in such terms. I have visited every campus and interacted with hundreds and hundreds of faculty. I see faculty who are working very, very hard, who are educating over 200,000 students, who are improving the number of degrees conferred systemwide, who are trying to improve their universities. Can we do better? Of course.

Was it a mistake for the Legislature to cut higher education funding?

I’m not going to say it was mistake in the sense that Texas had a historic budgetary shortfall. And in fact, we were facing at the beginning of the session an average of a 25 percent cut. It ended up being an average of about a 15 percent cut. But if it’s like this every biennium over the next decade, I think that would be a terrible mistake.

How are your relations with the regents?

Since May, the relationship between our regents and system administration has significantly improved. We’re still basically finding that better equilibrium. Listen, the dynamics of the board changed. Change is always a little anxiety-provoking, but we’re getting to a much better steady state. In August, if the framework I’ll be presenting moves forward, I would say that the debate was worth it. Tension, if it’s done constructively, can lead to good things. Being a classical guitarist, I also understand that if you put too much tension on a string it can pop and the performance will be bad.

What are some of the recommendations you’ll make?

The areas that I want to focus on include the need to improve student success and outcomes through increasing degrees conferred, and certainly working with our campuses to kind of redouble our efforts on graduation rates. I think we can do better to make sure that when students transfer from a community college to our four-year universities that we’re able to help those students define a major where most of their credits from the community college advance toward that major. It goes back to advising. One of the areas that we’ve been really significantly discussing is how we can use technology to improve student success and student learning and student outcomes in regards to these large gateway courses. And that’s where blended, online learning may actually be able to make a large classroom setting become much more interactive with the students.

Is it possible to do more with less? Read More

How Did the Provost Make Such an Elementary Mistake

July 26, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Transparency

1 Comment

In response to the below article, people should be asking the following questions:

How did the provost make such an elementary mistake? Anyone who has worked with state agency budgets knows the difference between an FTE and a real person. What do you think?

UT provost claim inaccurate. By Rick O’Donnell

A story in Thursday’s Express-News (“UT profs labeled ‘dodgers,’ ‘coasters,’ ” Metro) quotes the University of Texas at Austin provost as saying my study of faculty data must be incorrect because it examines more teachers than there are FTE (full-time) faculty at UT.

FTE is a budgeting and accounting figure but that is not what was used in the revised and corrected data released by the UT System, which was used in my analysis. A teacher may count as three-fifths of an FTE for accounting purposes but they are still one person.

As my report states, it analyzed the revised and corrected data released by the UT System. It included 623 teaching assistants and we left out 118 people identified as non-instructional or incomplete data as well as the 275 separately labeled as non-instructional administrators like Powers. We also normalized full- and part-time teachers.

If you look at page 3 of this UT document (http://www.utexas.edu/academic/ima/sites/default/files/SHB09-10Faculty-Staff.pdf) it lists 2,493 FTE, although it clearly states next that there are 3,886 FTE teaching staff at UT, closer, but still not counting every person.

State agencies, including public universities, earn a big part of the public’s trust by being transparent and providing the public with accurate, timely information and not unintentionally or intentionally misleading the public.

Maybe the provost didn’t know what numbers his university was providing the public when it released the revised and corrected faculty data, but his statement as it relates to my study is plainly inaccurate. Whatever the motive, it once again kept the university from having to actually address the fundamental question about quality and cost if a majority of the undergraduate credit hours are taught by low-ranking faculty.

Unfortunately, the San Antonio Express-News did not give me a chance to respond to the provost’s charge. If they had done so, I could have pointed out that whatever the provost was referring to, it wasn’t the data released by the UT system that was the basis of my study.

Rick O’Donnell is a former special adviser to the University of Texas System.

UT Controversy – Rick O’Donnell, UT System Settle (timesoftexas.com)
UT System Public Records Tied up by Possible Suit From Ex-Adviser Rick O’Donnell (timesoftexas.com)
Controversy Deflected Attention From Important Work (timesoftexas.com)
Former UT System adviser slams faculty as slackers (chron.com)
Rick O’Donnell, UT System Agree to Settlement (timesoftexas.com)
UT Controversy – Both Sides Say They Care About Higher Ed (timesoftexas.com)
Bigger UT Teaching Loads Are Suggested (timesoftexas.com)
$70,000 Deal in Hand, ex-UT Official Rips Educators, Lawmaker (timesoftexas.com)
“Dream Team Coalition” Steps Up Smear Campaign Againts Regent Chair Gene Powell (timesoftexas.com)
UT Board Chairman Disputes Fired Official’s Account (timesoftexas.com)
The Texas Tribune: A Lightning Rod on U.T. Board, Regent Is Not Deterred (nytimes.com)
A&M Administrators, Faculty Discuss ‘seven solutions’ (timesoftexas.com)
UT System Issues Updated Faculty “Productivity” Data (timesoftexas.com)

Kenneth Jastrow, Member of the “Coalition” Writes Testy Letter to Powell

July 26, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy

Regarding the following article that was written By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz AMERICAN-STATESMAN, students, parents and taxpayers should publicly ask the following question: Is it true or not that UT President Bill Powers attempted to withhold information from the public and regents, as alleged by Rick O’Donnell? Is anyone going to ask Powers this question?

By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz (original headline: Booster urges top regent to stand up for UT president)

A leading booster of the University of Texashas written a testy letter to the chairman of its governing board demanding that he stand up for the school’s president.

The letter to Board of Regents Chairman Gene Powell from Kenneth Jastrow II underscores the continuing divide between Powell and much of the Longhorn nation.

The chairman’s critics also include major donors, such as Dallas investor Peter O’Donnell Jr., as well as the Ex-Students’ Association, also known as the Texas Exes.

Jastrow is chairman of the university’s $3 billion fundraising campaign and led its blue-ribbon Commission of 125.

He wrote to Powell after the regents’ chairman issued a statement last month defending Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa, who oversees the UT System’s 15 academic and health campuses, against allegations by a dismissed system official, Rick O’Donnell (no relation to Peter O’Donnell Jr.).

Although O’Donnell also criticized UT-Austin President William Powers Jr., Powell’s statement made no mention of Powers. That didn’t sit well with Jastrow.

His July 8 letter outlines the Austin president’s impressive fundraising record during tough economic times, with more than $1.6 billion raised since the campaign was started in 2008.

“Clearly, 191,000 plus donors believe President Powers and others at UT are doing a good job, and they believe in the mission and core values of The University of Texas,” wrote Jastrow, former CEO of Temple-Inland Inc.

He went on to say, “Your overt lack of support of Bill Powers is troubling, especially given the fact that in a UT System Board of Regents roll call vote, Thursday, May 12, 2011, you voted to support Chancellor Cigarroa and the Presidents of each institution in the UT System which, of course, includes Bill Powers.” Read More

UT, Coalition Focused on Striking Back, not Solving Problems.

July 22, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy

2 Comments

Here was the original headline: “UT, Coalition Strike Back at O’Donnell Analysis“. While there continues to be a number of personal attacks on O’Donnell and his research methodology, there has been very little discussion about how to improve the quality, affordability and accessibility of our universities.

Whether or not you agree with O’Donnell, now the tax paying public has more information on where their money is going and what the administration does with it. Everyone in the debate agrees and has said publicly that productivity, accountability and transparency must be improved. While there is no one right answer for the challenges we face, we do need to start moving forward and hope those who disagree with O’Donnell and others who are trying, will move beyond the spin and offer their own solutions.

Here is the original story by Reeve Hamilton

Update, 2 p.m.: Rick O’Donnell is not swayed by the arguments leveled against his recent faculty analysis by a University of Texas administrator.

In a statement, UT Provost Steven Leslie questioned O’Donnell’s analysis because it included 3,968 faculty members when the number of full-time equivalent faculty is 2,493. O’Donnell said he was using the data provided by the system, which includes more than just full-time equivalent (or “FTE“) faculty.

He noted that the data included 623 teaching assistant, and said that he left out 118 people “identified as non-instructional or incomplete data” as well as 275 individuals labeled as non-instructional administrators. He also said full- and part-time teachers were normalized in the analysis.

“FTE is a budgeting and accounting figure but that is not what was used in the revised and corrected data released by UT System, which was used in my analysis,” O’Donnell said in an email. “A teacher may count as three-fifths of an FTE for accounting purposes but they are still one person.”

Therefore, O’Donnell said, whether intentionally or unintentionally, Leslie’s charge is inaccurate. “Whatever the motive,” O’Donnell said, “it once again kept the university from having to actually address the fundamental question about quality and cost if a majority of the undergraduate credit hours are taught by low-ranking faculty.”

UT officials declined to comment further.

Earlier story:

When Rick O’Donnell, a controversial former adviser to the University of Texas System, released an analysis of faculty data from the University of Texas and Texas A&M, he anticipated that it might receive criticism.

He was right. Read More

Rick O’Donnell Releases Faculty Productivity Analysis

July 20, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Jobs, Solutions, Transparency

By Reeve Hamilton

A new analysis of faculty productivity data from the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M University-College Station argues that the institutions’ employment practices resemble “a Himalayan trek, where indigenous Sherpas carry the heavy loads so Western tourists can simply enjoy the view.”

The author of the study is Rick O’Donnell, the controversial former adviser to the University of Texas System whose previous writings questioning the value of academic research helped ignite a debate about the future of the state’s higher education systems.

After settling with the UT System last month following a threat of a lawsuit over the terms of his abrupt termination, O’Donnell told The Texas Tribune that he intended to remain involved in that debate in Texas. Clearly, he means it.

In his analysis, O’Donnell divides faculty into five categories: “dodgers,” “coasters,” “sherpas,” “pioneers” and “stars.”

In this system, coasters have low teaching loads and very little externally funded research. Dodgers are the most extreme segment of coasters. Sherpas have high teaching loads and low research funding. Pioneers have the inverse of that. And stars have both high teaching loads and high levels of research funding. Read More

Powers and Cigarroa Unavailable for Comment. Zaffirini Denied Anything Unseemly.

July 1, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Solutions, Transparency

20 Comments

Top UT officials under fire – Former adviser says they blocked release of data

By MELISSA LUDWIG

Rick O’Donnell, a former special adviser to the University of Texas System who received a $70,000 settlement, this week skewered top UT officials for trying to block the release of faculty productivity data, accusing them of orchestrating a scare campaign to pit donors and alumni against regents pushing for changes at the system.

He also took shots at state Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, who chairs the higher education committee, saying she went to bat for university brass due to overly cozy relations between lawmakers and public universities.

Faculty and administrators “basically want to be left alone,” O’Donnell said. “They push back when regents try to run the university. They ask for lots of (state) funding, and legislators get buildings named after them and tickets to bowl games. (Zaffirini) seems to be extremely defensive of the administration, more so than what is in the best interests of taxpayers.”

Zaffirini denied there is anything unseemly about her support of academia.

“I proudly carry the banner of higher education,” Zaffirini said. O’Donnell and other critics “seem to hate higher education; they seem to hate UT.”

The exchange is a skirmish in a larger philosophical battle over the direction of higher education in Texas. Read More

Opponents to ‘breakthrough solutions’ – Ramping up Fight

July 1, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Jobs, Solutions, Transparency

Yet, no solutions presented on the “right way” to improve higher ed.

A group of business, civic and education leaders is ramping up its efforts to fight changes in higher education promoted by an Austin-based think tank with close ties to Gov. Rick Perry.

The Texas Coalition for Excellence in Higher Education announced today that it had added 24 names to a list of founding members that already numbered more than 200.

Earlier this week, the coalition issued a statement criticizing an analysis of University of Texas faculty productivity data by a researcher with ties to the think tank, the Texas Public Policy Foundation.

The new members of the coalition include Gary Kelly, CEO of Southwest Airlines; Ben Barnes, a former Texas House speaker and lieutenant governor; William Mobley, a former president of Texas A&M University and a former chancellor of the A&M System; and Robert Rowling, a former UT System regent and former chairman of the regents’ investment arm.

“As former president of Texas A&M University and chancellor of the Texas A&M University System, I am deeply concerned about the future of our university and am pleased to join this effort to ensure that we preserve the integrity and continue to enhance the quality of not only Texas A&M but also all of our institutions of higher education in Texas,” Mobley said in a statement.

The coalition’s website says the group was established because of “the strong belief that there is a right way to improve higher education and that there is a wrong way that could have long-term damaging effects on our institutions of higher learning, our state’s economy and on our future. Current recommendations being floated — from dramatically expanding enrollment while slashing tuition to separating research and teaching budgets, and seceding from a recognized and respected accreditation organization — are decidedly the wrong way. We believe our public university presidents and chancellors have earned our support with their ongoing commitment to a culture of excellence and continual innovation, while also working to cut operating costs and institute reforms.”

The recommendations opposed by the coalition are being promoted by the Texas Public Policy Foundation as “breakthrough solutions.” The foundation also contends that university research is overemphasized to the detriment of teaching. Perry, who is donating proceeds from his book to the foundation, has urged university board regents — all of whom were appointed by him — to pursue many of the foundation’s recommendations. Read More

Emails Give Insight Into UT Controversy

June 29, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Jobs, Solutions

19 Comments

Accountability, Affordability, Education Reform, Higher Ed Controversy, Solutions

At the height of a controversy about the direction of the school’s governing board earlier this year, the chairman of the University of Texas System regents told a fellow regent that he felt as winded as he did during football practices decades ago under coach Darrell Royal.

“Reminds me of two-a-days in Austin in August — you never seem to catch your breath and when you do it feels like steam!” Gene Powell, chairman of the UT System Board of Regents, said in an email to Regent Robert Stillwell in March.

That email and hundreds more that circulated among regents and others involved in the controversy were obtained from the UT System by the American-Statesman under the Texas Public Information Act.

The messages convey frustration on the part of some regents that they were being criticized as anti-research, as well as an intense interest among regents in gathering data from the system’s campuses on online class offerings, teacher evaluations and other matters. When those data were eventually released publicly, the system said the information was “raw” and “cannot yield accurate analysis, interpretations or conclusions.”

The emails also show that three prominent supporters of higher education wrote a strongly worded letter to Powell urging the regents to make “meaningful statements” regarding the importance of fundamental and applied research, the benefit of the dual mission of teaching and research, and the value of tenured faculty members.

Such statements are essential to address “the perception that actions are being taken that would hurt UT System schools, in particular UT-Austin,” said the letter April 1 from Kenny Jastrow, former CEO of Temple-Inland Inc. and chairman of the university’s ongoing $3 billion capital campaign; Charles Tate, a member of the University of Texas Investment Management Co.’s board; and Pam Willeford, a former chairwoman of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and a former ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein.

The UT System is seeking approval from state Attorney General Greg Abbott for its decision to withhold an unknown number of emails and to black out portions of some that it released to the Statesman.

The Statesman will argue that the information should be made public, said Editor Fred Zipp.

The emails give a flavor of Powell’s reaction to criticism from some lawmakers, alumni and others for his hiring of a $200,000-a-year special adviser who had written that much academic research lacks value. Powell also drew criticism for suggesting in an interview with the Statesman that it might be possible to offer cut-rate degrees that he styled as Bel Air quality, a reference to a mid-level Chevrolet of a generation ago.

“I promise everyone I will be much more careful with my metaphors in the future!!!!” Powell said in a March 9 email to various UT System officials.

The adviser, Rick O’Donnell, was dismissed April 19 after accusing top UT System and UT-Austin officials of suppressing information on faculty members’ productivity. O’Donnell and the system reached a settlement Friday under which he agreed not to sue the system in exchange for $70,000 and a glowing letter about his work from Powell.

In a March 14 email to O’Donnell, Powell said the “loyal opposition” is “telling anyone that will listen that you will be making policy and you have been hired to fire the Chancellor, fire the president of UT Austin and to take over the System.” Read More

$70,000 Deal in Hand, ex-UT Official Rips Educators, Lawmaker

June 28, 2011

25 Comments

A $70,000 settlement between the University of Texas System and a former system official seeks, among other things, to “buy peace,” as the agreement released Monday puts it.

But any peace the UT System obtained with its money and a glowing letter from the chairman of the Board of Regents about the former employee’s work and integrity didn’t last long.

Rick O’Donnell, who was dismissed April 19 after seven weeks on the job, lashed out within hours of the settlement’s release at UT System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa, UT-Austin President William Powers Jr. and state Sen. Judith Zaffirini, a Democrat from Laredo who leads the Higher Education Committee.

In an interview with the American-Statesman, O’Donnell said Cigarroa and Powers ginned up opposition among donors, alumni and faculty members to efforts by O’Donnell, regents Chairman Gene Powell and other regents to obtain faculty productivity data.

He said Zaffirini has been carrying water for university administrators instead of letting regents govern the institution.

O’Donnell also charged that Cigarroa, Powers and Zaffirini mounted “a brutal campaign” to demonize the regents who have been active in pursuing faculty data, including Powell, Alex Cranberg, Wallace Hall and Brenda Pejovich. And he said Powers begged him and Powell not to collect the data.

Moreover, O’Donnell said his understanding and expectation from conversations and emails with Powell and Francie Frederick, general counsel to the regents, was that he had been hired for the long term.

Barry Burgdorf, vice chancellor and general counsel for the UT System, said no assurances or promises of continuing employment were given to O’Donnell. System officials declined to address O’Donnell’s comments about Cigarroa.

Powers said, “I am not in a position now to comment on his comments in the press.”

Zaffirini said, “Clearly, he doesn’t know me or understand the principles by which I operate.”

O’Donnell, a former executive director of the Colorado Department of Higher Education, was fired from his $200,000-a-year job with the UT System after writing a letter accusing officials at the “highest levels” of the system and its Austin flagship of suppressing data showing that a growing sum of tuition and taxpayer money is paid to professors and administrators who do little teaching.

The data were later released publicly in response to open records requests, with UT System and campus officials arguing that the figures on faculty salaries, teaching loads and other matters are not only raw and unverified but also give no insight into the quality and impact of professors’ work.

O’Donnell became a focus of controversy shortly after Powell, without consulting other regents, hired him March 1. Critics cited his previously published policy papers that criticized much academic research as lacking value and that recommended reducing such “wasteful spending” and returning universities to the “rightful mission of teaching.”

Within about three weeks of his hiring, O’Donnell was reassigned as a special assistant for research and told that his job would end by Aug. 31. His hold on employment got even shakier when the UT System announced that it was investigating errors in one of his published articles.

It’s unusual for the UT System to award money to people it has dismissed. In O’Donnell’s case, a settlement made economic sense, Burgdorf said.

“It was very clear that he was going to sue the UT System, and he had the backing to do it,” Burgdorf said. “It would have cost me a lot more to defend that lawsuit and get it dismissed than we ended up paying.”

The letter from Powell to O’Donnell, which is part of the settlement, was negotiated, Burgdorf said. “The chairman would not have signed it had he not believed what was in it,” Burgdorf said.

In the letter, Powell praised O’Donnell’s work as “excellent by all measures and done with integrity.” Powell noted “how sorry I am for the unfortunate controversies that surrounded your original appointment and subsequent work for the System” and said the controversies were “not of your making.”

Regent Steve Hicks, vice chairman of the UT board, said the settlement agreement was not submitted to the board for a vote. Such a vote is not required.

Asked whether he supports the settlement, Hicks replied, “I don’t have an opinion on that. The settlement speaks for itself.”

O’Donnell said the settlement tells prospective employers that he was not fired for performance issues.

“Not even universities can fire people for free speech and civil rights and speaking out,” O’Donnell said. Read More

Controversy Deflected Attention From Important Work

June 27, 2011

Accountability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Solutions

23 Comments

Fired UT advisor Rick O’Donnell gets $70,000 settlement

By MELISSA LUDWIG

The University of Texas System has settled for $70,000 with a former special adviser who threatened to sue after being fired in April, according to a settlement offer released by UT officials.

Rick O’Donnell’s brief employment at UT kicked up a storm of controversy, with observers questioning his $200,000-a-year salary during a hiring freeze, his job description and his attitude toward academic research.

Neither party admits wrongdoing in the agreement. O’Donnell agrees not to sue in exchange for the $70,000 payout and a letter from Gene Powell, chairman of the UT Board of Regents, praising O’Donnell as “professional and hardworking” and saying the furor that led his firing was not his fault.

“Much of what you were hired to do … was, as you know, mischaracterized by some and the subject of controversy that was not of your making, a controversy that deflected attention from the mission of your important work,” Powell wrote in the letter.

O’Donnell started work March 1 as a special adviser reporting directly to the UT Board of Regents. His job was to staff two task forces Powell created on efficiency and blended learning. Read More

UT Controversy – Rick O’Donnell, UT System Settle

June 27, 2011

Accountability, Affordability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Jobs, Solutions

15 Comments

By Reeve Hamilton

The Rick O’Donnell saga at the University of Texas System appears to have reached an end. Last week, under threat of a lawsuit, the system agreed to a settlement with the former adviser.

O’Donnell was hired as a $200,000-a-year special adviser to the board of regents in February. His first day on the job was in March. A turbulent period of controversy ensued, sparked by questions about the manner in which O’Donnell was hired, his six-figure salary at a time of significant budget cuts, and why he did not report to UT System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa (eventually, the chain of command was altered so that he did). Another central focus of the debate was a white paper O’Donnell had written for a conservative think tank questioning investments in academic research. His employment was abruptly terminated in April.

Under the settlement agreement, in which the parties continue to dispute the circumstances of their separation and neither party admits to wrongdoing of any kind, O’Donnell will not sue the system. In return, the system will provide O’Donnell with $70,000 and a letter from Gene Powell, the chairman of the board of regents. Read More

Controversial UT Regent Hopes to “Push a Reset Button”

June 12, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Innovation, Solutions, Technology

12 Comments

By Reeve Hamilton

Enlarge photo by: Bob Daemmrich

Regent Alex M. Cranberg at the University of Texas Board of Regents meeting on May 12, 2011.

On Feb. 12, Gene Powell, the chairman of the University of Texas System Board of Regents, sent a note to Francisco Cigarroa, chancellor of the UT System, about the newest regents appointed by Gov. Rick Perry. The new members “all have extensive experience in higher education and all of them are hard core conservatives. And none of them are shy. We will see no ‘break in’ period from these individuals,” he wrote.

It was an early hint of the changes afoot at the UT board and the tense months — some of the most tumultuous in institutional memory, with the regents seemingly pitted against the flagship university in a highly public spat — that lay ahead. Of that new crop of board members, none have received more scrutiny than Alex Cranberg. Read More

Gov. Perry – A Top Priority to Improve State Universities

May 31, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Innovation, Technology

6 Comments

The big lie making the rounds in Texas is that elected or appointed officials want to undermine or de-emphasize research at our colleges and universities

By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

Rick Perry had been governor of Texas for all of 13 days when he announced in January 2001 that higher education would be his top legislative priority. He called for voucher-style funding, an expansion of online learning and a dramatic increase in student financial aid.

More than 10 years later, reinventing public higher education remains a work in progress for the state’s longest-serving governor.

That effort has taken an unusual turn lately, with prominent alumni, donors, business leaders and university officials questioning Perry’s initiatives and those of his appointees to university governing boards. The governor, for his part, has accused critics, whom he did not name, of lying.

“The big lie making the rounds in Texas is that elected or appointed officials want to undermine or de-emphasize research at our colleges and universities,” Perry wrote in a recent column in the American-Statesman. “That disinformation campaign is nothing more than an attempt to shut down an open discussion about ways to improve our state universities and make them more effective, accountable, affordable and transparent.” Read More

Wentworth Says he’s Not in Running for A&M Chancellor

May 18, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Innovation, Technology

Texas senator will ‘wait and see if the call comes’

By Mary Tuma

Although his name has arisen as a possible successor to retiring Texas A&M University System Chancellor Mike McKinney, state Sen. Jeff Wentworth (R-San Antonio) doesn’t appear to be in the running, at least not yet.

The Republican lawmaker says he has not received a call from A&M yet. When asked if he would accept such a position, Wentworth replied he would have to just “wait and see if the call comes.” Past opportunities, said the Republican lawmaker, have come at the behest of university system leaders. Read More

Federal Subsidies for Higher Ed – Drive up Costs, Stifle Competition and Make Students and Universities Less Price-Sensitive.

May 18, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Innovation

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AUSTIN — Want to lower the cost of college? End all federal subsidies for higher education.

That was the provocative solution proffered at a panel discussion Friday put on by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative Austin think tank whose “Seven Breakthrough Solutions” for higher education have created a firestorm of controversy within the Texas A&M University and University of Texas Systems.

Neal McCluskey, a free-market advocate with the Cato Institute, said federal student aid such as Pell grants and research grants drive up costs, stifle competition and make students and universities less price-sensitive.

“If you are using your own money, you demand a good product,” McCluskey said. “You professors need to be teaching me something, not doing research or sitting in your office not doing office hours.” Read More

Chairman Powell of UT System Regents – Moving Forward

May 16, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Higher Ed Controversy, Innovation

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Now that Chancellor Cigarroa is on board with Powell’s vision, Regents can focus on educational accountability and productivity.

Austin, TX

Gene Powell has had a few trying months. First, the formation of two task forces, one on excellence and productivity and the other on blended and online learning were established to give the Regents information and data on methods to improve and innovate, helping to create a benchmark to move the UT system forward.

Secondly, in an attempt to instill positive academic change and facilitate the process for educated decision-making within the task forces, Rick O’Donnell was hired as an adviser. Although there were no improprieties in this process, a fury of condemnation from all sides attacked Powell for doing what was in the best interest of the UT System. Read More

UT Regents Support Cigarroa’s New Framework for Measuring Success and Accountability

May 12, 2011

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By Melissa Ludwig

University of Texas System regents on Thursday issued a unanimous vote of confidence in its CEO, Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa, in an attempt to sooth recent turmoil at the system and answer rumors that Cigarroa’s job was in jeopardy because he would not toe the line of conservative regents pushing for dramatic change.

In that vote, regents also agreed to support Cigarroa’s new framework for measuring success and accountability at the system’s 15 campuses.

Before the vote, Steve Hicks, a regent from Austin, asked for a roll call to see where each of his fellow regents stood.

“Now is the time to get fully behind our chancellor … not to micromanage his affairs,” Hicks said. “Today, we have the opportunity to beginning earning back the trust of our constituency.” Read More

UT Regents Unanimously Back Chancellor Cigarroa

May 12, 2011

In a major show of confidence in Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa, University of Texas System regents today unanimously endorsed his vision of pursuing excellence across the system’s academic and health campuses.

Cigarroa outlined that vision in a 34-minute speech. Each of the nine members of the board, along with the nonvoting student regent, subsequently expressed support.

Chairman Gene Powell, whose comments and actions in recent months raised questions about his support of the chancellor, said he “wholeheartedly” agreed with Cigarroa and was proud to call him a colleague and friend. Read More

Regents’ Meeting Could be Defining Moment for UT System Chancellor

May 10, 2011

Dan Berrett http://www.insidehighered.com

7 Comments

By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

Francisco Cigarroa will sketch plan for future.

Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa.

Rodolfo Gonzalez/AMERICAN-STATESMAN

University of Texas System regents have a lengthy to-do list for their meeting in Austin today and Thursday, but perhaps nothing will be watched more closely than the interplay between the regents and Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa.

A telling moment could come Thursday when Cigarroa outlines what the agenda describes as “a framework for advancing excellence” throughout the system.

The regents are scheduled to vote on his recommendations, and in light of recent controversy about the direction of the UT System, that could amount to a referendum on Cigarroa himself.

This is the first meeting of the regents since debate erupted a few months ago regarding several higher education “breakthrough solutions” advocated by Gov. Rick Perry and Jeff Sandefer, an Austin businessman, philanthropist and Perry campaign contributor. Read More

UT President Powers – Wants Accountability, but not “this way.”

May 10, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Innovation

2 Comments

Faculty and administrators at public universities in Texas said Monday they don’t want to shrink from efforts to make public higher education more accountable — they just don’t want to do it this way.

In this case, “this way” refers to efforts by the University of Texas System Board of Regents to measure the productivity of faculty members in strictly numerical terms. The efforts are reflected in 821 pages of raw data that have been collected by the UT system (which can be downloaded here). The data have not been vetted. Each page contains the disclaimer that the information is “incomplete and has not yet been fully verified or cross referenced [and] [i]n its present raw form … cannot yield accurate analysis, interpretations or conclusions.” Originally planned for release after more thorough review later this year, the data reached the public last week through open records requests filed by several Texas newspapers. The information lists the salary, teaching load and number of students of each faculty member, as well as his or her external research funding. Read More

Many Glad to Hear – UT President Powers Acknowledges Changes Are Needed

May 9, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Innovation, Technology

1 Comment

AUSTIN, Texas — Once again defending academic research against proposals that question taxpayer funds not being spent on classroom teaching, University of Texas President William Powers said Monday that the state’s flagship campus is receptive to change but not at the expense of research.

“The result of an unfettered, curiosity-driven research model is that it expands knowledge for society,” Powers said. “If we try too hard to direct research from the top, we’ll diminish our overall returns.”

Powers spoke to about 200 invited university officials, UT alumni and faculty, many of whom are concerned with ideas to revamp higher education that Gov. Rick Perry has endorsed. Among them is scrutinizing the role of research at Texas colleges and universities, which critics argue doesn’t always give the state enough bang for its buck.

Powers did not directly mention the controversy or name the most recent outspoken critics of academic research during his speech on the UT campus, the timing of which school officials called rare. The UT System Board of Regents is scheduled to meet later this week. Read More

Jeff Sandefer – A Hero for Education. Passionate Business Educator AND Gifted Teacher.

May 9, 2011

Accountability, Education, Education Reform, Excellence, Higher Ed, Innovation, Solutions, Technology

4 Comments

When Jeff Sandefer bought a small plane, he chose one of the few models equipped with a parachute designed to protect occupants by lowering the aircraft to the ground in an emergency.

That desire to avoid unnecessary risks has guided his investments as well. After graduating from the University of Texas and Harvard Business School in the 1980s, Sandefer formed an oil company but eschewed the wildcatting style of his father and grandfather. Read More

UT’s Bill Powers: “We need to be careful about how we change”

May 9, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Innovation, Technology

2 Comments

By Holly Hacker/Reporter hhacker@dallasnews.com | Bio

The University of Texas must continue to improve as both a research institution and a teaching one, President Bill Powers said Monday.

Powers’ speech to the UT campus comes amid an increasingly intense debate over the future of public higher education in Texas. Gene Powell, the chairman of the UT System board of regents, has suggested UT dramatically boost its undergraduate enrollment while slashing tuition costs in half. Some groups, including the Texas Public Policy Foundation, want UT and other universities to focus more on undergraduate teaching and less on research, especially when it’s of questionable value.

Powers never directly addressed people like Powell or the TPPF or Jeff Sandefer, the Austin oilman who’s pushing “Seven Breakthrough Solutions” for higher education. But he made his views clear: Read More

Zaffirini and Powell Escalate Texas Higher Ed Fight

May 3, 2011

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By Reeve Hamilton Texas Tribune

photo by: Bob Daemmrich

State Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, listens to a colleague while discussing SB5 on April 28, 2011.

An increasingly bitter disagreement over the future of the University of Texas at Austin between University of Texas System regents’ chairman Gene Powell and state Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, is ratcheting up the ongoing debate surrounding higher education in Texas.

Any thought that the tense atmosphere would calm following the departure of controversial employee Rick O’Donnell from the UT System can likely be laid to rest. This morning, Zaffirini, the chair of the Senate Higher Education Committee and the most vocal critic of reformist regents, specifically called out Powell, saying in a statement, “Since his election in February he has caused a firestorm of negativity that is detrimental to UT-Austin, to the system, to higher education in general — and to his relationship with legislators.” Read More

Regents’ Chairman Suggests Boosting UT Enrollment, Halving Tuition

May 3, 2011

Education, Innovation, Higher Ed, Education Reform

By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF – 445-3604

Rick Perry Governor wants schools to offer $10,000 degrees.

Chairman Gene Powell, UT Regents

The chairman of the University of Texas System Board of Regents has suggested increasing undergraduate enrollment by 10 percent a year for four years at UT-Austin and reducing tuition across the system in the range of 50 percent, according to a draft copy of his goals obtained by the American-Statesman.

The goals outlined by Gene Powell in an April 7 memorandum titled “Draft Notes and Ideas for Discussion” also include boosting enrollment by an unspecified percentage at the system’s eight other academic universities, adding a “high quality, low cost degree” to the system’s current offerings and coming up with a timeline for making the Austin flagship the nation’s No. 1 public university.

UT – Controversy, Debate, now Tussle – UT Prez, A&M Prof, TPPF

April 30, 2011

By Reeve Hamilton

At a panel hosted by the Texas Public Policy Foundation today, Bill Powers, the president of the University of Texas, and Robert Strawser, an accounting professor at Texas A&M University and the speaker of its faculty senate, responded to the conservative think tank’s proposed higher education reforms.

UT President Powers Addresses Affordable Education

April 30, 2011

Education, Education Reform

By: Jeff Stensland

As lawmakers consider cuts to higher education, some continue to push for affordable tuition.

Gov. Rick Perry is challenging Texas colleges and universities to offer a $10,000 degree.

Even with 48,000 students on the Austin campus, University of Texas President Bill Powers says only 15 percent of the school’s budget is covered by tuition. The rest comes from state subsidies and alumni donations.

Powers and several others discussed the future of education in Texas at a forum in Downtown Austin Friday.

University Reformers Advancing With Sandefer’s – ‘Seven’

April 29, 2011

Education, Education Reform, Higher Ed, Innovation, Technology

3 Comments

By Melissa Ludwig / mludwig@express-news.net

Effect on research, views on profs questioned.

University professors are: a) Teaching too much b) Not teaching enough c) Wasting time on frivolous research d) Elitist whiners State Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, joins a growing chorus choosing all but the first option.

“We have a lot of great professors. But we have a lot of whiners,” Patrick said. “Tenure was never the greatest idea.”

With budget cuts tightening around higher education’s neck, reformers who want to shake up the ivory tower are gaining a foothold with changes that would favor teaching over research, boost productivity and focus more on the needs of the customers, or students, rather than faculty.

UT Regent Cranberg Stands by Prior Critiques of Higher Education

April 29, 2011

Education Reform

1 Comment

Cranberg comments on professor evaluation, ‘diversity’ of faculty

By Patrick Brendel Texas Independent

University of Texas System Regent Alex Cranberg is not shying away from previous statements criticizing professor accountability, weighing faculty’s “credentials” versus “achievements,” and praising the Acton School of Business, co-founded by Jeff Sandefer, architect of the controversial seven breakthrough solutions for higher education.

Woodley Takes Over for O’Donnell to Advise UT Panels

April 28, 2011

Education Reform, Higher Ed

By Mary Lee Grant

The University of Texas System has named Sandra Woodley, vice chancellor for strategic initiatives, to replace controversial special adviser Rick O’Donnell, who was fired Tuesday, the Austin American-Statesmanreports. She will assist two panels serving the UT Board of Regents, one studying productivity and excellence, while the other focuses on online and blended learning.

UT Education Reform – The Controversy (and Battle) Has Just Begun

April 27, 2011

3 Comments

By Reeve Hamilton Texas Tribune

One week ago, Rick O’Donnell’s employment at the University of Texas System came to an abrupt end after 50 days marked by tension and confusion in the higher education community — especially at the University of Texas at Austin.

O’Donnell’s position initially raised questions because of its $200,000-per-year salary and its similarities to the job description of UT System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa — and the fact that he was to report directly to Gene Powell, the chairman of the UT System Board of Regents. Powell failed in his initial attempts to quell the controversy by having O’Donnell report to administrators under Cigarroa and ending O’Donnell’s employment at the end of August. An email O’Donnell wrote to a sympathetic regent last week criticizing the actions of system and university leaders since his hiring appears to have been the last straw, and O’Donnell was dismissed.

Controversy Could Hurt UT in Long Run-UT Regent Cranberg Speaks Out.

April 25, 2011

3 Comments

By Melissa Ludwig
mludwig@express-news.net

Recent controversy at the University of Texas System could hamper serious attempts for reform and taint the results of two task forces studying efficiency and online and blended learning, observers say.

“It is harmful for a bunch of false hysteria to be whipped up about what the board may or may not actually do,” said Alex Cranberg, a UT regent appointed in February.

Cranberg did not direct his comments at the task forces, one of which he sits on, but Richard Leshin, president of the Texas Exes, UT Austin‘s alumni association, did.

“The genesis (of the task forces) is tainted, so I think it will continue to be tainted,” Leshin said about the group’s work.

The controversy sparked six weeks ago when UT regents hired Rick O’Donnell, a Colorado native, to staff two UT task forces on distance learning and efficiency. News reports linked O’Donnell to Jeff Sandefer, a wealthy entrepreneur whose “Seven Breakthrough Solutions” for higher education reform hold a lot of sway with Gov. Rick Perry, who made them the topic of a summit for university regents in 2008.

‘Insubordination’

Despite a chilly reception to the solutions, Perry continued to push behind the scenes for implementation at Texas A&M University and the University of Texas systems, according to internal emails.

Texas A&M carried out a couple of the solutions, garnering backlash from faculty and the public. UT held back.

Observers speculated O’Donnell was brought in to “bring UT to heel” to the seven solutions, and rumors surfaced that regents tried to fire Francisco Cigarroa, chancellor of the UT System, and Bill Powers, president of UT Austin, for “insubordination.”

Cranberg said Friday the rumors are untrue.

“Anyone who says otherwise is misinformed or manipulating,” Cranberg said in an email.

Leshin, whose Texas Exes adopted a resolution this week supporting Powers, said he “has heard from some very good sources that the two were both considered at-risk.”

The Executive Committee of the Chancellor’s Council, which represents more than 300 donors to the UT System, issued a similar statement in support of Cigarroa earlier this month.

In the end, it was O’Donnell who got the pink slip.

His $200,000 a year salary and job description first raised alarms, prompting regents to reassign O’Donnell and made his job temporary. Emails later showed that Gene Powell, chairman of the board of regents, had settled on O’Donnell before even writing a job description.

Powell declined a request for an interview.

When it came out that O’Donnell had written a 2008 policy paper that deemed most academic research a waste of time and money, supporters of UT Austin feared a plot to destroy the flagship’s mighty research enterprise. An Express-News analysis later found two dozen citation and other errors in the paper, written for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think-tank.

In letters and public statements, alumni, donors, students and lawmakers raised concerns that regents’ reforms were headed in the wrong direction.

On Monday, O’Donnell penned a letter to Regent Wallace Hall complaining that leaders at the system and the flagship campus had resisted his efforts to get data, which he said showed a growing share of tuition and tax dollars going to professors and administrators who did little teaching.

By Tuesday, O’Donnell was out of a job.

Like ‘Coca-Cola‘

Charles Miller, former chairman of the UT Board of Regents, said he believes Powell fumbled O’Donnell’s hiring, but that UT stakeholders overreacted with their public statements and letter-writing campaigns, damaging the school’s reputation nationally and abroad.

“If you are Coca-Cola, you don’t let your brand be diminished,” Miller said.

The work of the task forces is critically important, he said. Technology, combined with dwindling budgets, is forcing a paradigm shift in higher education. Leaders must find a way to lower the cost of educating while teaching more students. Powell’s instinct to study online education and productivity was right on, he said.

But will the task forces lose credibility in light of recent events?

“That could happen if we don’t tone down the discussion,” Miller said.

Kyle Kalkwarf, UT’s student regent and a medical student at the UT Health Science Center at San Antonio, disagreed.

“I don’t have a problem with people speaking up because they are interested,” Kalkwarf said. “I think it’s good we are having an open, frank discussion.”

Cranberg, a Coloradoan who has known O’Donnell for years and Sandefer from the oil and gas business, agreed that change is imperative, but denied that he is doing Perry’s bidding by pushing Sandefer’s seven solutions as the answer.

“Gov. Perry is a man whose opinions I respect,” Cranberg said. “However, I am very much my own man. I’m too committed to making a difference based on the principles I believe in to try running my life according to someone else’s belief system.”

Cranberg said excellence comes from “a fearless willingness to ask hard questions, experiment and capacity to make sometimes uncomfortable change.”

“I hope and expect that each campus’ leadership will be fearless in the pursuit of excellence and will follow that trail wherever it leads.”

Retired U.S. House Majority Leader Dick Armey – too many UT and A&M professors are “content to rest on their laurels.”

April 24, 2011

Education Reform

2 Comments

By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF

The firing last week of Rick O’Donnell, a University of Texas System official whose star fell as quickly as it rose, is the latest in a series of developments that, added together, constitute a clear message from the Longhorn faithful to Gov. Rick Perry: Don’t mess too much with UT. Just over three weeks ago, the governor dismissed criticism of O’Donnell and Jeff Sandefer, a Perry donor and adviser on higher education matters, who had upset alumni, donors and others with writings contending that much academic research lacks value and that schools would be better off with fewer tenured faculty members.”That’s an interesting ploy, to make those two guys be the evil ones,” Perry told the American-Statesman at the time. “The fact is that’s a distraction. There’s no there there.”

As it turned out, there was plenty of controversy there. And the dust-up has put the governor into damage control mode, seeking on the one hand to play down the matter and on the other to tout UT-Austin‘s potential to help Austin become, as he puts it, “the next Silicon Valley.”

But it was Perry himself who planted the seeds of controversy. The governor called public university governing boards to a May 2008 summit in Austin where he and Sandefer promoted several “breakthrough solutions,” including separation of research and teaching budgets and bonus pay for instructors based solely on student evaluations. The Texas Public Policy Foundation — Sandefer is a longtime board member and O’Donnell was a senior research fellow for the think tank at the time — helped organize the summit.

The recommendations didn’t sit well with many higher education leaders, but the Texas A&M University System, whose chancellor, Mike McKinney, is a former Perry chief of staff, moved briskly to adopt some of them. In October, the Association of American Universities rebuked McKinney, declaring that such policies ignore quality and complexity.

The UT System Board of Regents, under the leadership of H. Scott Caven Jr., James Huffines and Colleen McHugh, wasn’t so eager to salute the governor. That seemed to change when their terms on the board ended.

Perry let it be known that he wanted Gene Powell to lead the board, and the governor appointed two new regents, Alex Cranberg and Wallace Hall, who have been seen as sympathetic to some of the changes sought by the governor, Sandefer and O’Donnell. Emails indicate that Sandefer and O’Donnell knew the two would be appointed weeks before the governor’s office made a public announcement.

Powell, a San Antonio developer and technology entrepreneur, didn’t waste time putting his stamp on policy.

Like Perry, Powell said costs need to be pruned and productivity increased. Like Perry, he said it might be possible to develop a four-year degree costing no more than $10,000, including tuition and books. And like Perry, he wanted to differentiate research and teaching in terms of costs and revenue. He hired O’Donnell on March 1 to do some of that work.

Soon, voices that rarely utter a cross word about the university or the governor began speaking out.

The Ex-Students’ Association at UT-Austin urged the 206,000 alumni, supporters and others on its email list to contact regents. Current and former leaders of the Chancellor’s Council Executive Committee, including prominent figures in the state’s business and civic life, called on Powell and the other regents to “rise above the politics of the moment” and focus on the mission of research and teaching.

Red McCombs, a prominent UT donor and Republican supporter, told Powell that it was time “to cool the current wave of rhetoric” and that “enlightened supporters of the university know that we must have a healthy balance of research and teaching.”

And last week, Dallas investor, major UT donor and Republican stalwart Peter O’Donnell Jr. — no relation to Rick O’Donnell — warned that some of the changes recommended by Perry and Powell could harm the model of public higher education that relies heavily on philanthropic donations.

“I think the Board of Regents needs to formally adopt a policy that recognizes the importance of university research, to let people know what they’re for and what they’re not for,” O’Donnell said.

Kenneth Ashworth, author of “Horns of a Dilemma: Coping with Politics at the University of Texas” and a former Texas commissioner of higher education, said, “Sometimes regents think they need to protect the university against political intrusion. In this case, the regents are interjecting political interference into the administration of the university. People who are concerned about the university and love the institution are looking carefully at policies that could be detrimental or harmful to the institution they either graduated from or support.”

Lucy Nashed, a spokeswoman for the governor, said he “appreciates everyone’s interest” in the higher education discussion.

“Gov. Perry has continued to make higher education a priority, and this session, has challenged institutions of higher education to develop a degree that costs no more than $10,000 including textbooks, and called on them to develop a plan to offer veterans college credit for the knowledge and skills they developed in the military,” Nashed said in a statement.

“Also, to help Texas families plan for the cost of higher education, he has renewed his call for a four-year tuition freeze, locking in a student’s freshman year tuition rate for four years. Additionally, because taxpayers deserve to see more results than just enrollment numbers, the governor has also asked the Legislature to explore outcomes-based funding, which would tie some state funding to university graduation rates, rather than just enrollment,” she said.

Perry has also sought to redirect the discussion by focusing on prospects for Central Texas to become a major high-tech hub and bringing UT officials and industry leaders together last week to discuss the matter.

As for Rick O’Donnell, he came to the UT System after a stint working for Sandefer’s charitable foundations, whose beneficiaries include the Acton School of Business, a small business school that Sandefer co-founded in Austin. O’Donnell previously was executive director of the Colorado Department of Higher Education and an unsuccessful Republican candidate for the U.S. House in that state.

He was fired by the UT System on Tuesday after writing a letter in which he accused unnamed officials at the “highest levels” of the system and the Austin campus of suppressing the release of data on faculty costs and revenue to regents, two task forces advising the regents and the public. The system and campus said in a joint statement that the data are in a draft format and will eventually be shared with the Board of Regents. But the statement didn’t specifically say whether the data would be released publicly.

Asked about O’Donnell’s dismissal, Katherine Cesinger, a spokeswoman for Perry, said, “This was a university decision, and I’d refer you to them to talk about personnel issues.”

Anthony de Bruyn, a UT System spokesman, said only that O’Donnell’s services “were no longer needed.”

A recently formed group of more than two dozen business executives quickly weighed in, urging regents to ask tough questions and to pursue cost savings and greater access to higher education.

Justin Keener, a spokesman for Texas Business for Higher Education, said, “What this group cares about is not so much the staff involved in helping the regents ask the questions and gather information, but are those questions being asked and is information being shared freely and are we doing everything we can to continue to find ways to improve our great universities?”

Retired U.S. House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Dallas, also has entered the fray.

Armey, who described the faculty senate as “an imbecile institution” when he spoke at Perry’s 2008 summit, is circulating a petition that calls on UT and A&M regents to adopt greater transparency in spending and “results-based evaluations” of teachers and students.

Armey , now chairman of Washington-based FreedomWorks, wrote that too many UT and A&M professors are “content to rest on their laurels. This ruling elite of academics is focused on doing less, but making more, all the while ignoring the needs of students and caring nothing for the cost born by the taxpayers.”

rhaurwitz@statesman.com; 445-3604

See story @
http://www.statesman.com/news/local/perry-getting-pushback-from-longhorn-faithful-1428555.html?page=2

Lofty Dissertations Use Too Many Big Words for Gov. Perry (and John Kelso)

April 6, 2011

Education

by John Kelso, Commentary – of the Statesman – Saturday, April 2, 2011

Gov. Rick Perry says the latest intellectual squabble over what to do with the University of Texas is a “waste of time.”

Of course, Dr. Perry’s idea of a valuable dissertation would be “How To Fish.”

OK, so there’s this debate going on over at the Forty Acres pitting eggheadism vs. entrepreneurship, brains vs. bucks, noggins vs. numbers. And we all know which side Perry comes down on. Certainly not on the brains side.

Rick O’Donnell, initially hired as a special adviser to the UT System Board of Regents, has written that much university research is useless and that colleges would be better off with fewer tenured professors.

His writings were published by the Texas Public Policy Foundation, an Austin-based pro-moolah think tank that is buddy-buddy with Professor Perry. It has not set well with some that the regents hired O’Donnell, who has since been reassigned.

This business has caused a big intellectual stink between the money guys, who want to use UT to turn Austin into the next Silicon Valley, and the eggheads, who want to keep churning out lofty papers that are never anything you can understand.

A friend’s daughter, for example, published a scientific paper titled “Sequence- and Structure-Specific RNA Processing by a CRISPR Endonuclease.” I don’t know what that means, but it sounds like it itches.

So Perry wants the next Silicon Valley right here in Austin, huh? Didn’t we already do that a few years ago?

You can accuse Perry of a lot of things, but originality isn’t at the top of the list. Remember when techies could go to work around here in their shorts and eat free California rolls out of the lounge refrigerator? Wasn’t that the next Silicon Valley? Then it all went belly up, and the techies had to bring baloney sandwiches from home.

Do we really want to go through that again?

Maybe so. I can see this both ways, sort of, because let’s face it: A lot of college research seems pretty screwy.

My friend Bob Wade, who used to teach art at then-North Texas State University up in Denton, once signed off on a master’s thesis on tattooing a pig. “Step 1: Catch the pig.” Really. A graduate student, Andy Feehan, approached Wade and said he wanted to tattoo a pig for his master’s degree. For the project, Feehand had wings tattooed on a pig.

His master’s thesis was called “The Tattooed Pig as Aesthetic Dialectic.” My thesis would be “The Tattooed Pig as Lunch.” I’ll bet if you asked the Board of Regents to define “dialectic,” at least one of them would tell you he’s taking it for heartburn.

Then there was this professor/researcher up east who had done a study on how a number of men had blown out an eyeball while having sex. I saw a small article about this phenomenon in the newspaper, so I just had to call the guy up and ask him about it.

I think the guy worked for the University of Pittsburgh. From his staid demeanor during our conversation, I could tell he was taking his eyeball research quite seriously. He gave me a bunch of eyeball blowout statistics. Then I asked him, “What percent of these guys were flying solo?”

This was the only interview I’ve ever conducted where I had to fight to keep from bursting out laughing. I’m over in the corner of the newsroom, on the phone, having trouble breathing. Meanwhile, the guy on the other end of the line is acting like he’s handing out income tax statistics or something.

So maybe this time Perry’s right. And “How to Fish” might be some good reading.

Kelso’s column appears on Sundays and Fridays. Contact him at 445-3606 or jkelso@statesman.com.

See story @
http://www.statesman.com/news/local/lofty-dissertations-use-too-many-big-words-for-1369879.html

UT System: “We’re Listening”

March 17, 2011

Education

by Reeve Hamilton of Texas Tribune

Enlarge

Gene Powell and Francisco Cigarroa

Top officials at the University of Texas System — Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa and Board of Regents Chairman Gene Powell — said in an interview with The Texas Tribune today that they are moving quickly to allay the concerns of lawmakers, alumni and others regarding the direction and standing of UT, starting with the reassignment of a newly hired adviser to the Board of Regents.

Powell said that, contrary to recent speculation, the UT System “unequivocally” supports academic research, and said concerns that the views of recent hire Rick O’Donnell might change that “are absolutely incorrect.” In fact, they’re moving O’Donnell — who previously worked for the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a conservative think tank that espouses controversial higher ed reforms — to a different spot on the UT System’s organization chart. He was hired to report directly to the regents, but now he’ll work for the chancellor instead.

“We’re listening,” Powell said. “We’re definitely listening to what our constituents and our friends and partners in the Legislature are telling us.”

See full story @
http://www.texastribune.org/texas-education/university-of-texas-system/ut-system-reassigns-odonnell-were-listening/

Rick O’Donnell – I’m Happy To Talk To Anyone And Engage In Frank Discussion

March 8, 2011

Education Reform