Brooklyn College PSC-CUNY

The PSC represents thousands of professional staff across CUNY, including over 100 here at Brooklyn College. These members serve as Higher Education Officers (HEO’s). HEOs work in the registrar’s office, financial aid, run programs, advise students, and perform a variety of administrative roles such as managing outcomes assessment and international study. As with many other people working at CUNY, they have been subjected to overloads, speedups, and low pay over the last few decades. More recently they have been on the front lines of implementing the two   major CUNY Central initiatives, Pathways and CUNY First, while chronically understaffed. About 10 years ago some HEO’s began to complain that they were being forced to work beyond their contractual obligation of 35 hours a week. There have always been periods, such as registration time, when people were expected to temporarily work longer hours in exchange for comp time. More recently, however, these expectations have grown...

The PSC presented CUNY management with its primary demands 3 years ago. Three years is too long to wait for serious negotiations. Part of the problem is that CUNY management has to answer to the City and State Governments, which have not been interested in serious negotiations as they pursue a politics of austerity in which unionized workers are asked to work more for less, while billions in tax breaks are handed out to the real estate and financial industries . The CUNY Board of Trustees is supposed to oversee the management of CUNY on behalf of the Governor and Mayor, who appoint them. Since the Governor and the Mayor are our ultimate bargaining partners, especially on financial matters, it’s imperative that they know what the faculty are demanding at that rank and file members are dissatisfied. Over the last few years serious questions have been raised about the suitability of our trustees and their numerous instances of failing to do what’s best for CUNY and its students ...

Benno Schmidt, what university are you a trustee of? by Corey Robin 31 JUL Benno Schmidt has an oped in the   Wall Street Journal   that’s filled with a lot of nonsense. The sun also rises. But this passage caught my eye: The greatest threat to academic freedom today is not from outside the academy, but from within. Political correctness and “speech codes” that stifle debate are common on America’s campuses. Schmidt is the   chair of the Board of Trustees at CUNY . CUNY is the home of Brooklyn College. Brooklyn College is the home of my department. My department was the target last semester of powerful New York City politicians who were angry about our co-sponsoring a panel on the BDS movement. Some of them even threatened to withhold funding from CUNY in response. I know Benno’s a busy man, what with being the chairman of “ a worldwide system of for profit, private K-12 schools .” But that whole BDS thing was   kind of a big deal . Even the ...

President Replaces Department Chiefs, Changes Curriculum By NEANDA SALVATERRA July 19, 2013 The removal of department chiefs and changes to curriculum have roiled Brooklyn College, where the administration is seeking accreditation for popular majors at one of the City University of New York's largest senior branches. Brooklyn College President Karen Gould has rejected the faculty-elected department chairmen for three departments for the next school year, including the college's top majors—finance and business management and accounting—as well as the smaller department of modern languages and literatures. The president also removed the director for the children and youth studies program and almost halved the program's course offerings. "The administration's exercise of power is arbitrary and it has major implications, not just for professors but also for students," says Gertrud Lenzer, who was removed on July 1 as program director for child...

Why is the public university investing so much money in a celebrity hire? By Kieran Lalor / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS    Former CIA director Gen. David Petraeus. Friday, July 12, 2013, 4:30 AM It takes a lot to put liberal college professors, a Democratic candidate for mayor and a conservative Hudson Valley assemblyman on the same page. The City University of New York has done just that through its decision to hire retired Gen. David Petraeus for an enormous sum — and its incoherent explanations about the hiring since. I am joined by the American Association of University Professors and Public Advocate Bill de Blasio in criticizing the bloated $150,000 payday CUNY has handed Petraeus to teach a single, once-a-week class. The seminar at CUNY’s Macaulay Honors college will be nice for the bright young students enrolled in it in the fall (16 have enrolled so far) and spring. Petraeus is a brilliant man with tremendous experience in the military and...

While the details of Petraeus’s hiring remain sketchy, a real issue has emerged about the source of his $150-200,000 salary, itself supplemented with teaching assistants and research support. The information provided in the documents obtained by Gawker raise more questions than they answer. The latest information is from an apparent letter or email dated July 1 st   from the Macaulay Dean, Ann Kirschner, posted by CUNY in response to the Gawker article , and possibly communicated before that date . This document claims that the salary will only be $150,000, part of which will be donated to veterans. How much? No one will say. It goes on to state that: Chancellor Matthew Goldstein has provided private funding for your position, which will be paid through the CUNY Research Foundation. How do we know, however, that the Chancellor has secured the private donations to cover all of the expenses associated with this hire? For years the Research Foundation (RF), a private entity no...

Outrage over Petraeus's appointment to the Macaulay Honors College has exploded since Gawker published the salary and employment negotiations that led to his accepting the job. To entice Petraeus to CUNY, Matthew Goldstein and Macaulay Dean Kirschner offered Petraeus either $200,000 or $150,000 to teach a single three-credit course, meeting either for one or two semesters. Petraeus has also been offered assistants to do his grading, course administration, and even research, leaving him with what is truly a three-hour/week appointment. At approximately $3,000 per course, average adjunct salaries are, unsurprisingly, considerably less than this. For more on the scandal, and particularly Assemblyman and Iraq Veteran Kieran Michael Lalor 's outraged response, and the CUNY's evolving claims over Petraeus's salary , see Corey Robin's typically excellent blog post . Undoubtedly, Professor Robin will continue to update his blog as more information becomes available. Hun...