TRUSTEES 'R' REPUBLICANS 'R' TRUSTEES. Today,
Tracy D sent out a district
“Update,” which has news about H1N1, Jim Wright—and something entitled
“Leadership in Fashion.”
Mention was made of this "fashion" thing at the last board meeting. It seems that at least three trustees (note: according to the Brown Act, if four of 'em gather, it’s a board meet!) and one Chancellor attended a recent event put on by the
Laguna Woods Village Republican Club, namely, “their biennial
Great Ones on Parade IX Fashion Show.”
Writes Tracy: “The models” [—and "Great Ones," I guess—] “included Board Vice President
John S. Williams, Trustees
Marcia Milchiker and
Nancy M. Padberg, and Chancellor
Raghu P. Mathur.”
Every damn one of our trustees is a Republican, you know. Mathur too. (Go to the OC GOP site. He's listed there as the chair of the Rat Bastard Republicans.)
I checked, and Laguna Woods Village lists an unbelievably long list of clubs. Seems like there’s a club for every geezer there. Most of the clubs are just what you’d expect, though I was intrigued by the existence of a “Parapsychology Club.”
I couldn’t find a “Birther” or “Obama is a Muslim” club. Maybe that stuff gets covered at the "parapsychology" get-togethers. Could be.
Sure enough, there’s a Republican Club. A Democratic Club, too.
I dunno. Seems to me there’s something unseemly about three trustees and the chancellor showing up at a subdivision of the
Republican Party. (Go to the county
GOP website. LWV's Repub Club is listed.)
GLAD TO MAKE THE CORRECTION. Earlier today, I ran into someone who assured me that something we reported back on the 27th of October was factually erroneous.
On that post (
About last night), I wrote:
In recent weeks, various people have been telling me to look for [“Dean of Academic Programs, Student Learning, and Research”] (that “new” dean position) to appear on the agenda for the board’s October meeting. … But [when the agenda came out,] it was nowhere to be found.
OK, all of that is true. Then I said:
Today, several people informed me that, at last night’s board meeting, during the closed session, Don Wagner was hopping mad (at Mathur?) that the DAPS item had been “pulled” from (or had not been placed on) the agenda.
As far as I know, the only thing allegedly erroneous about the above is
when Don was described as having “hopped madly.” Evidently, it was
before, not
during, the closed session.
Glad to make the correction.
IS THERE A 50% EMERGENCY? After the Oct 26 Board Meeting (
”Let’s kill all the lawyers” [said the trustee], I reported the following:
The board checked out the two colleges’ faculty hiring priority lists. Lang wanted to get a ballpark figure of how many of these hires would be pursued. [Chancellor Raghu] Mathur yammered for a while about how we’ve gotta keep an eye on the 50% Law (which requires that at least half of expenditures go to faculty salaries and benefits), blah, blah, blah. He couldn't give a “definitive” number. But Lang kept pressing, asking for an “educated guess,” and so Mathur spit out “20-25,” though I think I heard somebody yell “30.” Lang just smiled that dubious Milquetoast smile of his.
At the time, it seemed to me that there was more than the usual tension in the air during this exchange. Lang really did seem dissatisfied with Mathur’s answer. Mathur really did seem unwilling to give a number. What was that about?
But, since that time, odd things have begun to happen that suggest that the district is scrambling to increase “instructional” spending. That’s exactly what you've gotta do when you're in danger of crossing the 50% line.
You’ll recall that, a couple of years ago, Mathur acknowledged that he had allowed the proportion of non-instructional spending to grow ever closer to the 50% mark. The situation was so dire that the district was forced to hire 40 or so faculty in one semester!
I recall trustee Wagner saying something like, “this is no way to hire faculty.” (See
Mathurian fiasco.)
Well, duh.
And here we go again.
Send thank-you notes to Chancellor Raghu P. Mathur.
A “JAWS” MOMENT. The OC Reg’s “Science Dude” reported today Richard Dreyfuss' visit to Chapman U (
Dreyfuss picks UFOs over kids during Chapman talk).
… a different audience member asked [Dreyfuss] if it was true that he and the late Robert Shaw didn’t get along while they were making “Jaws.” Dreyfuss talked about Shaw’s well-documented problems with alcoholism. But he also told a heartbreaking story about how Shaw sobered up and delivered the famous speech in which his character (Quint) recounts the sinking of the USS Indianapolis, a tale from World War II that is actually true.
I thought the Chapman audience was going to cry. The crowd in Folino Theater went absolutely silent.
.jpg)
