CSU Faculty Voice: For the Chicago State West Side Campus: "Where have all our dollars gone, long time passing . . . gone to other pockets everyone."*

Sunday, June 21, 2015

For the Chicago State West Side Campus: "Where have all our dollars gone, long time passing . . . gone to other pockets everyone."*

*With apologies to Pete Seeger.

My version of a ballad of longing for the west side campus:

My campus lies over the expressway
My campus that only I see
My campus lies over the expressway
Oh, bring back my campus to me...

Bring back, bring back
O,Bring back my campus to me, to me
Bring back, bring back
O,Bring back my campus to me

Last night as I lay on my pillow
Last night as I lay on my bed
Last night as I lay on my pillow
I dreamt that my campus was dead

Oh blow the winds o'er the expressway
Help all of my cronies to see
Oh blow the winds o'er the expressway
And bring back my campus to me

My apologies to the author of the Scottish folk song "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean."

Remember the $40 million scam on the Illinois taxpayers called the Chicago State West campus? Remember how the Chicago State web site trumpeted the imminent arrival of the new site? Remember how the Chicago State web site promised that classes would begin in fall 2015? Remember seeing this on the Chicago State web site?

Remember seeing this helpful information sheet on the Chicago State web site?

Just like Stalin’s censors purged Leon Trotsky, Nikolai Yezhov and countless others from photographs after they fell out of favor, Chicago State’s web site has apparently tried to erase the West campus from history. A look at the university’s web site today reveals nary a reference to the coming expansion. Currently, we are registering no students for classes at such a place and to the best of my knowledge, we never even applied to the IBHE and the DOE for permission to teach courses at any west side facility.

In an April appearance before the State Assembly’s Higher Learning Appropriations Committee, university administrators talked about the new campus and told the legislators that Chicago State would need more than the original appropriation to begin operations at the site. Has our shiny new west side campus been allowed to die an ignoble death? What to do about the persons who reportedly expected the expanded campus to be built on land they owned? How will they now profit from their real estate holdings? How will this person (or persons) now tap into the public coffers? What happened to the $40 million appropriation? How much of it did we spend and for what? So many questions.

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Thanks to Haki Madhabuti

"1. He/she must be a scholar of national note, with significant peer review publications and books in his or her field. There must be no doubt as to his/her standing in the community of scholars. This would also include a history of the candidate’s participation in the appropriate professional organizations.

2. He/she must have served with distinction as the administrative head of a major unit within an institution of higher learning or at the important position of Provost and/or Dean. Of course, prior service at the presidential level is preferred.

3. He/she must have a documented history of raising significant monies from the private and public sectors. At most major and research one universities it is not unusual to expect the president to come with a plan to raise in excess of half a billion dollars or more in the first few years.

4. The prospective president must have a consensus buy-in from the faculty, students, administration and staff, therefore, arriving with a unity mandate to lead by joining a University community that has bought into his or her vision for the future."

From an open letter to the CSU Community, 2009.