Thoughts on Huddleston

I just want to start this off by apologizing for my light posting as of late. These past two weeks have probably been my busiest time at UNH and it sucks because there has been some juicy stuff on campus recently, and I'm not talking about the dude I just saw dressed up in a full Ghost Buster costume.

As most of you have probably heard by now the AAUP held a "No confidence" vote on President Huddleston. 202 out of the 420 faculty members who were eligible to vote casted their ballots. There were 129 votes of "no confidence" and 72 votes of "confidence." I am really split over this entire thing. Part of me says, look UNH is about to lose a heck of a lot of money from the little state funding we get, the entire business school fundraiser was a complete and miserable fiasco and this school has absolutely terrible spending habits... all under the watch of President Marky Mark, who was hired with the intentions that he is great at raising money. Usually I tend to side with the faculty, I have has some unbelievably great professors here who changed my life. Others kind of sucked, but on the whole UNH has some great professors.

So, then I look at what the AAUP was complaining about in President Huddleston's speech to the New Hampshire state finance committee.

He said:
"We still too frequently convey information in 50-minute lectures delivered by a ‘sage on the stage' to largely passive recipients in the audience three times a week for 15 weeks a term — as if that schedule were Biblically decreed and as if that were the way that ‘digital natives' actually learn today. Worse, we remain wedded to a credentialing regimen of courses and majors and degrees that mainly reflect ‘seat time,' rather than what students actually learn or need to learn."


I'm not gonna lie, I agree with Huddleston on this. Sure, it probably could have been said better, and it doesn't reflect UNH in the best light, but the he has a pretty decent point. Although, it should be included that because of the moneymaking scheme UNH calls "J-Term" the spring semester is a week shorter.

However, I think the majority of the administration is to blame on for this, which probably includes Huddleston.

"Largely passive recipients in the audience."
(Read: Lazy students who don't give a shit).

 Ha! You can say that again, maybe if our classes, professors and yes, even the administration were more interactive and allowing for more personal freedoms and choices within the registration process students would take more interest in their classes. I don't know about you, but I don't see how I'm ever going to need to be able to name which Beethoven symphony I'm listening to after just 15 seconds. Sorry, but Music 401 was probably the biggest waste of time and money in the history of my short life and student career. But put me in a class where we're discussing the causes and effects of the problems in Libya and I'll be completely tuned in. Others may not be, but I will, because I want to be there. There are classes that I go to everyday that I look forward to them because they are in my field of interest, bullshit gen eds will put anyone to sleep and changing those requirements is the first step in improving student interest.

I mean, I appreciate that I got an "A" and a GPA boost from taking Germs 101, but I already knew that washing your hands or wearing a condom is a good idea. GPA boosters are nice and all, but we aren't learning anything useful, which translates to a waste of time and money. I have a lot more to say on this issue of Huddleston and how it ties to a lot more that is wrong with UNH and the college system as a whole, so I think it might save it and spend some time putting it together for my next TNH column.

Have a nice weekend, party on out there and enjoy the weather!

PS: Friend of the blog "John That" has his new EP streaming here. Check it out! He'll also be at The Knot tonight at 9:30 and I'm planning on being in the crowd. Stop by for some good tunes and I'll buy you a drink buy me a beer.

Stay classy, not UMassy.

Thanks, but no thanks.

So, I get out of class today and open my Internet browser to see quite an interesting and surprising message in my inbox. It was from TNH's Executive Editor saying that the Union Leader called him and they wanted to rerun my last column. The catch was that they would only run the column with my real name. It was a tough call, but I decided that another year of blogging anonymity was more important to me than the UL running the column. Plus, there is a lot of stuff I've written in the past that I don't want my name to be connected with. When I started the blog I decided that being anonymous would allow me to write and say things I wouldn't necessarily want future employees finding out about. While it may hurt my reputation and ethos in some respects, I know that the blog is better for it. (Plus we all know the UL is super conservative and they only want to run it to point another finger at UNH's terrible liberalness in a way I didn't intend.) Also, Hunter S Thompson, one of my literary heros, once called the Union Leader the worst newspaper in America. While I'm not comparing myself to Thompson in any way, I can see where he came from. TNH and the blog are fine by me and anyone who wants to read what is really going on with UNH knows where to look.

For example, today the Union Leader ran an editorial called "Lunacy at UNH" how UNH professors are asking for way too much money. Meanwhile, President Huddleston makes well over $300,000, which is more than 10 times the lowest paid "professor" (read: lecturer). UNH has a recent trend of forcing, or strongly pushing, tenured (and great) professors into early retirement so they can hire lecturers on one year contracts and only pay them a highschool teacher's salary, or less (something like $28-32,000/year). (On that topic, everyone points fingers at Coach Umile for his $300,000+ salary, but in his defense, our hockey program makes this school a heck of a lot of money in more ways than you think.)

So you need to ask yourself, what is more important: Better professors or UNH saving more money?  Just like I said in that very column: "Universities have become giant machines like most of the corporations our professors tell us to watch out for." Better professors lead to smarter students who, in theory, will make more money. One of UNH's shortcomings is alumni donations.  One of New Hampshire's biggest shortcomings is funding for UNH. It's a vicious circle, huh?

Stay classy, not UMassy.

PS: Check out this new song written by a UNH student and blog reader:

John will be playing at The Knot tomorrow (Friday) night at 10 PM. If you're 21 be there.