UNI faculty seek end to general fund support for athletics

[UNIpanther99]

https://www.thegazette.com/higher-education/northern-iowa-faculty-seek-end-to-general-fund-support-for-athletics/?utm_campaign=snd-autopilot&fbclid=IwAR3DkMOdcHXogkOvGuFw4A4JubxyB4ExQyZjVx2K0mspSueCsand1KFVyXE

This is so frustratingly disingenuous from the faculty.

And UNI’s United Faculty union is calling for an end to the practice of shifting general university funds to athletics — urging UNI Athletics to become self-supporting, like its counterparts at the University of Iowa and Iowa State University.

Yep... We would love to have B1G and BXII TV revenue. If the United Faculty can find a way to get the MVC $100 million from ESPN I'm all for it.

[BCPanther]

When your best argument is that we don't have enough professors in Textiles and Apparel, maybe it's time to reevaluate your argument.

They can't compare us to actual peers because they know that we take so much less than they do. It's an immediate losing argument so they pull the 'look at these places that get giant checks because people want to watch the schools they play against' argument. They wouldn't allow arguments like that in their classes but they're happy to shout it in this setting.

[UNIpanther99]

Imagine the outrage if every few years our coaches got together to complain about how much money academics were getting? Instead, it's the opposite... They are the best ambassadors for the university as a whole.

[Born-a-Panther]

Imagine the outrage if every few years our coaches got together to complain about how much money academics were getting? Instead, it's the opposite... They are the best ambassadors for the university as a whole.

100% this!!!

[unipanthers8907]

Comparing UNI to Iowa and ISU is an insane argument. Would be like me asking the faculty members why they don't bring in the same amount of research dollars every year that our public counterparts do at the University of Iowa and Iowa State University.

[pnthr53]

UNI is strapped for cash....I feel that if we stopped those funds....we would lose all athletics and while some think this would solve some issues, it wouldn't take much time and the doors would close. Right or wrong....sports is the face of most universities. The regents aren't going to help out. We have to generate on our own and our university doesn't have the influx of big donors to draw from. I sure don't know the answer but cutting general fund money won't fix anything in my opinion. Go Panthers!

[BCPanther]

Ending athletics results in UI-CF in really short order. You have to draw people to your campus and athletics and performing arts are the way that that gets done.

It's typical blowhard faculty stuff.

[sivert]

Might as well stop advertising. The end of this path is half the profs losing their jobs. NM, this will happen anyway...

[UNIpanther99]

The other complaint from the faculty is they want more "shared governance." The follow-up I wish the reporter would ask is, "in your opinion, how much money should UNI spend on athletics?"

There is no way they would answer that question, at least not honestly. But it should be asked to provide the reader context.

[Newsbreaker]

This is all so short-sighted. I'd hoped we'd put this kind of argument behind us, but that was too optimistic.

First, I think very highly of Chris Martin. He and I agree on close to nothing, except wanting the best for UNI. He is, however, the single person most responsible for the fact I attended Northern Iowa, and he was a significant person to me while enrolled. I couldn't thank him enough.

This, however, I adamantly disagree with.

I don't disagree that, if we were setting up our system of colleges and universities from scratch, we'd never entangle them with athletics. No one would even think to do so, if we hadn't all inherited this. We have, however, not just the preeminent system of colleges and universities on earth, but in the whole of human history. It might be America's greatest collective achievement; a literal fountain of knowledge and thought. One of the things that sets them apart, I believe, is unusual alumni and community connection. We don't just attend colleges and sometimes notice the document on the office wall; we stay connected for life, and are welcomed back over and over again. We reinvest, continually.

It isn't academics that welcomes us back; no one from my major department has ever given me another second's thought the moment I left, let alone asked me to engage for some reason. Athletics - the "front porch" (to borrow a phrase) - is what welcomes us home. The Dome and McLeod remain "our" spaces long after the dorms and classrooms close to us.

I think there are other elements at play here - I think some factions in our faculty don't have an accurate understanding of what schools are, and are not, our peers - but that's for another day. Losing athletics, which isn't their direct call, but is the natural result of their demand, would murder UNI's identity, sentence its connection to alumni, and disintegrate even more of it's connection with the local community. It would be suicide.

I'm frustrated this is coming when the university finally, for the first time in more than a decade, has articulated a mission and a future, but I suppose that isn't a coincidence.

[QCPanther05]

This is all so short-sighted. I'd hoped we'd put this kind of argument behind us, but that was too optimistic.

First, I think very highly of Chris Martin. He and I agree on close to nothing, except wanting the best for UNI. He is, however, the single person most responsible for the fact I attended Northern Iowa, and he was a significant person to me while enrolled. I couldn't thank him enough.

This, however, I adamantly disagree with.

I don't disagree that, if we were setting up our system of colleges and universities from scratch, we'd never entangle them with athletics. No one would even think to do so, if we hadn't all inherited this. We have, however, not just the preeminent system of colleges and universities on earth, but in the whole of human history. It might be America's greatest collective achievement; a literal fountain of knowledge and thought. One of the things that sets them apart, I believe, is unusual alumni and community connection. We don't just attend colleges and sometimes notice the document on the office wall; we stay connected for life, and are welcomed back over and over again. We reinvest, continually.

It isn't academics that welcomes us back; no one from my major department has ever given me another second's thought the moment I left, let alone asked me to engage for some reason. Athletics - the "front porch" (to borrow a phrase) - is what welcomes us home. The Dome and McLeod remain "our" spaces long after the dorms and classrooms close to us.

I think there are other elements at play here - I think some factions in our faculty don't have an accurate understanding of what schools are, and are not, our peers - but that's for another day. Losing athletics, which isn't their direct call, but is the natural result of their demand, would murder UNI's identity, sentence its connection to alumni, and disintegrate even more of it's connection with the local community. It would be suicide.

I'm frustrated this is coming when the university finally, for the first time in more than a decade, has articulated a mission and a future, but I suppose that isn't a coincidence.

Here, here. Well said.