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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]In true U Chicago style, here are two professors' arguments on the financial situation- logic, and facts supporting two opposing points of view that are both very interesting. I do think agree there is a big issue with the three decades of very low undergraduate numbers, leading to a low base of donors vs the other Ivy Plus schools.

John Boyer (recently retired Dean of the College)
https://chicagomaroon.com/40782/viewpoints/letter/john-w-boyer-on-the-state-of-the-universitys-finances/

Clifford Ando (Classics Professor)
https://chicagomaroon.com/40809/viewpoints/letter/all-amazing-all-unequal/ [/quote]

Hi, I speak Academic. Let me translate:

Boyer says that Chicago is broke because they had too few undergrads for decades, that affects alumni donations. (He’s didn’t say WHY they had so few students) So they had to borrow money to do the necessary spending to make Chicago into the top very selective school it is today. It’s competing head to head with the Ivies so it’s worth it.

Ando says yeah, but. We spent a ton of money but it wasn’t on faculty, we still rely too much on unequal adjuncts. A lot of them didn’t get the chances white men got to be full faculty. It’s cutting corners and unfair. What’s the point of all this spending if teaching quality is affected and it goes against our values?[/quote]

These are complementary positions. The hard push to increase UG numbers worked, but resulted in the need for a significant increase in instructors. Chicago didn't have the money to staff properly so resorted to underpaid adjuncts, which indeed affects teaching quality and compromises institutional values.[/quote]

The Classics professor is trying to protect against cuts in the humanities.  The Dean was trying to justify the deficit by laying the blame on a prior generation of leadership (which had undergraduate enrollment levels too low) and say that the deficit has helped propel Chicago to Ivy + standing.  Neither is actually looking at this from a standpoint of judiciously spending within means.  They are netting $60K or so per year from each one of these additional undergraduates.  Endowments are usually specified as to purpose (e.g. a professorship in the graduate school of business) by the donor and don't sit around to offset deficits run up by overspending on the part of the administration in specific areas.  This is simply a school that has overspent.  They actually need the additional revenue from undergraduate enrollment to help service the debt.  They aren't alone in using undergraduates to fund programs.  Many schools use undergraduates to help fund graduate education and research.  [/quote]

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