ANNOUNCEMENTS

THE BENEFITS OF MEMBERSHIP AT THE CHAPTER MEETING TOMORROW

At tomorrow's Friday Chapter meeting, Michelle Young will make a presentation on the benefits of UFF membership. Membership benefits include not only union standards like the right to representation in grievances, to run and vote in statewide UFF and UFF USF Chapter elections of officials and representatives, and subscriptions to higher education journals, but also special deals in insurance, finance, travel, etc. arranged by our state and national affiliates. For an idea, see the recent Biweekly Extra on the benefits of membership. And come to our UFF USF Chapter meeting TOMORROW at 12 noon on USF-Tampa in EDU 150 to find out more.

ELECTION SEASON

The union is a democracy, and the Florida Education Association has just reminded us that the FEA's own executive officers (president, vice president, and secretary-treasurer) will be elected at the fall 2012 FEA Delegate Assembly scheduled for October 18 – 20 in Tampa. The USF Chapter of the UFF is electing several delegates in this spring's elections, and all UFF members are eligible to run for delegate (and to vote in the spring election). If you are interested in running for one of UFF USF's seats at the Delegate Assembly, send a self-nomination letter to the UFF USF Election Chair, Professor Steve Tauber, at stauber@tampbay.rr.com, with your name, office and preferred email addresses, office and home phones, office and home mailing addresses, a 250-word self-description, biographical sketch or campaign statement, and a URL to any site you would like fellow union members to see when looking over candidates. But remember: only UFF members may run or vote, so JOIN TODAY!

FEBRUARY 24 CHAPTER MEETING IN USF-SARASOTA / MANATEE

The February 24 UFF USF Chapter Meeting, two weeks from tomorrow, will meet at USF-Sarasota/Manatee. The meeting will be at 12 noon in a room TBA. This is part of the Chapter's policy of visiting every campus during the semester.

JOIN UFF TODAY!

Download, fill in, and mail the membership form. Benefits of membership include the right to run and vote in UFF chapter and statewide elections; representation in grievances (UFF cannot represent a non-member in a grievance or future litigation); greater opportunities for influencing the bargaining agenda; special deals in insurance, travel, legal advice, and other packages provided by our affiliates (there will be a presentation on these benefits at our February 10 Chapter Meeting TOMORROW); free insurance coverage for job-related liability; and the knowledge you are supporting education in Florida. And if you join now, you will get a $ 100 rebate dues rebate. Come and join the movement.

IN THIS ISSUE

CHANGING THE SUBJECT – AND THE SUBJECT IS FUNDING HIGHER ED. Before last spring, the unions, the business community, and the education administrators agreed that the issue was funding. If Florida is to be a major player in the Twenty-first century, and if the I-4 High Tech corridor was going to be a reality, the universities would have to have a lot more resources. Last year, a new and radical leadership in Tallahassee, buoyed by a sudden fashion for ideology in the business community, produced a stream of toxic legislation that swept away any discussion of investing in the universities. This year is an election year with redistricting, so the legislature is quieter, but the problem remains the same: with a $ 2 billion plus hole in the budget, neither the radicals nor the ideologues want to talk about investing in higher education. But a recent report suggests that the problem is not going away...

ARTICLES

CHANGING THE SUBJECT – AND THE SUBJECT IS FUNDING HIGHER ED

"When they say 'It's not the money; it's the principle of the thing,'" advised Mad Magazine, "They really mean, 'It's the money.'"

For over a year, we have been awash in highly principled arguments against public investment in, well, anything. Before the 2010 election, there had been a lot of public discussion about investing in infrastructure, new energy sources, and education. The USA was once the leader in public education, but now our global standing has become embarrassing. The USA still holds the lead in research and scholarship, and students worldwide still come here for college, but the growing research efforts in east Asia and the competition for international students with universities in Australia, India, and several European nations suggest that this is not a time for the USA to rest on its laurels.

In 2010, the resting-on-our-laurels-while-yelling-We're-Number-One crowd won the elections. Public investment is a lot less fashionable now. But it seems that reality does not accommodate our delusions, and a recent National Science Board's Science and Engineering Indicators 2012 report suggests that the problem is still pressing.

The overview begins with the observation that:

Governments in many parts of the developing world, viewing science and technology as integral to economic growth and development, have set out to build more knowledge-intensive economies. They have taken steps to open their markets to trade and foreign investment, develop their S&T [science & technology] infrastructures, stimulate industrial R&D, expand their higher education systems, and build indigenous R&D capabilities. Over time, global S&T capabilities have grown, nowhere more so than in Asia.

And how did the USA state governments respond to rising investments abroad? Scanning the charts in Chapter Eight on State Indicators, one cannot help noticing that the states reporting higher performance in K-12 science and mathematics are often the same states reporting higher teacher salaries and public education expenditure. Apparently, one gets what one pays for. And Florida is improving but not outstanding in mathematics, rather weak in science, and of course when it comes to salaries and expenditure, Florida is cheap and proud of it.

As administrators have noted, in Florida tuition is low. At $ 11,959 per year (on average) in 2010, Florida is in the bottom quartile in cost to resident students. (The national average in 2010 was $ 15,014.) Florida tuition had gone up 60 % over the previous decade, but while students are paying more, the state government is paying less. In 2000, Florida allocated 0.58 % of its gross domestic product to higher education; by 2005, after five years of Governor Jeb Bush, it was 0.53 %; in 2010, after four years of Governor Charlie Crist, it was 0.50 %.

Nationwide, state expenditures per enrolled student (in constant dollars) in research universities fell from $ 9,427 in 2002 to $ 9,082 in 2010, for a nationwide drop of 3.7 %. Florida expenditures fell from $ 7,822 to $ 7,625, a drop of 2.5 %. There may be a correlation between education allocation and economic power. For example, New York's state funding of universities per student was $ 15,017 in 2010, allocating 0.42 % of its $ 1.16 trillion GDP, while Mississippi's funding per student was $ 7,457, allocating 1.03 % of its $ 97 billion GDP. With a GDP of $ 39,000 per capita, Florida is closer to Mississippi's $ 32,000 per capita GDP than New York's $ 58,000 per capita GDP. But there are must be other factors involved, for state funding of universities per enrolled student varies from Colorado's $ 3,803 to Wyoming's $ 18,901.

Returning to Florida, how does Florida's substandard investment in higher education compare to its economic performance? Florida sits in the bottom two quartiles in most measures of percentage of its workforce with postdoctoral degrees in science and education. Florida R & D sits in the lower two quartiles in several production measures, although Florida science and engineering professors produce unusually large numbers of doctoral students – and patents and articles per dollar spent in research. At least, we academics are doing our jobs. Ever hopeful, Florida state agencies spend a lot on R & D while Florida has a lot of little high tech companies.

Investors are not impressed: Florida does not get much venture capital for high tech companies – which says volumes about the business groups that only two years ago were vowing to bring Florida into the Twenty-first century but last year cheered the legislative leadership's destructive agenda.

Right now, the Florida Education Association is the most powerful voice for public education in Florida. And considering the globalized era we live in, that makes the FEA the most prominent voice for the investment required for Florida's economic future. And FEA's basic message is: if we intend to compete effectively in a global economy, we will have to make the necessary investments.

LOGISTICS

Next Chapter Meeting tomorrow, Friday, February 10, at noon, in EDU 150, on USF –Tampa.

• Click here for the standing agenda
• Click here for the minutes of the previous meeting.

Membership: Everyone in the UFF USF System Bargaining unit is eligible for UFF membership: to join, simply fill out and send in the membership form.

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