It's Monday, January 19 at the second Spring meeting of the Student Senate. I want to give people an update on what is being discussed at the Senate meetings regarding, among other issues, the 98 staff layoffs that occurred late last semester.

I'll be posting updates as we hear them at today's meeting. But before the meeting gets started, let me talk about what was said last week about the layoff situation:

• A Facebook group of students against financial mismanagement at the Institute was created last semester once students began to learn about the layoffs. See that Facebook group's page for a lot more updates from their front.
• Ninety-eight positions were eliminated from the Institute staff on Tuesday, December 16.
• Those people laid off were all staff members, but covered a wide range of job responsibilities, departments, and years of employment at RPI. Those laid off included directors, executive assistants, program managers, campus designers, and others.
• Most schools at RPI have already held forums to discuss the layoff situation and effects of the financial downturn on the RPI community. I will ask others who went to those events to post information from them.
• Dr. Eddie Ade Knowles, the VP for Student Life, will be hosting a similar forum on Wednesday, January 21 at 7 pm in the McNeil Room of the Union. Residence Life staff, Student Life staff, and others will also be attendance.

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Jan 19 Financial Situation Updates From the Senate:

Dr. Jackson, based on her meeting with GM Kara Chesal last week, is very upset with the layoffs sitution. After meeting with her, Dr. Jackson agreed to send out the FAQ on the HR website. Dr. Jackson agrees that the RPI community needs more information than people outside of campus. She admits that more information should have been sent out earlier (the media should not be the first source of info).

From Kara's meeting: the base salary for professors ranges from $80,000 to $200,000. RPI allows our professors to be consultants and serve in other capacities to add money to their base salaries. Some faculty members now take home over $1 million per year. President Jackson believes that her pay is in line with what the faculty members make.

The Resident Assistant stipend for next year will be $5,000, apparently due to financial shortcomings at the Institute. Room and board will no longer be covered entirely. There will be a uniform rate for all RAs and RDs. We are unsure if a meal plan will be required for Residence Life student staff. It looks like Learning Assistants (LAs) will be paid more in coming years.

Dan Horvath (GRAD) met with RPI's CFO last Thursday to talk about the financial situation. The Institute wants to maximize financial aid for students while limiting the coming increase in tuition for next year. The layoffs were done in part because "something had to give" in order to accomplish this. The RPI endowment is also down 23%, and in order to minimize the draw on the endowment, actions had to be taken now. Finally, the school had a defined benefit pension program earlier (before 1993). In order to keep giving those pensions to people who were employed prior to 1993, RPI needed the ability to pump more funds into that program. This is a program that RPI agreed to years ago and is contractually obligated to continue to pay into it.

Dan also wanted to report that the President asked the Board of Trustees to take a pay cut, but the Board denied her request because they feel Dr. Jackson deserves to be compensated to the level that she is now.

Michael Zwack (2011) heard from Robert Schlesinger (VP Institute Advancement) that 80 of the 98 "layoffs" were simply unfilled positions. He also heard from the Dean of the Lally School that over the past 4 years, budgets at the Institute have been reduced by 40%. Dean Gautschi believes that this will keep us "ahead of the curve."

Other schools besides RPI have had massive reductions in endowment growth - some have received as high as a 30% reduction this year due to the financial downturn.

The faculty will be meeting on Wednesday from 2-4 pm in LOW 4050. Any student can attend. The faculty will be discussing the financial problems and approving the constitution for the reinstated Faculty Senate.

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Updates from the Facebook Group:

• Over 900 signatures have been collected for the petition being passed around by the "Students Against Financial Mismanagement" group.

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Other Updates:

• Troy Night Out will be next Friday night. Once again, shuttles will be running from the Union Horseshoe parking lot down to Troy.
• The Union Executive Board reviewed all budgets for funded student organizations this past weekend. Overall, the approved subsidy requests were decreased 3.97% from what was given last year. Club appeals will be heard this coming Saturday.
• GM Kara Chesal has subscribed to a list-serv for presidents of national universities and will update us on information that is posted to that list.
• On the list-serv, Kara learned that one other school recently put up some white boards on which people could post suggestions, concerns, facts, questions, and other things. We may consider doing this in the Union shortly. Other student governments also have online forums. While we haven't had much success over the years with forums, we may try it out again.
• Jerry Matthews, Director of Public Safety, has moved to NYU. It is unclear whether he has been replaced.

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