The California Faculty Association voted to allow the union
to negotiate a furlough agreement with the CSU for two
days/month, resulting in about a 10% cut in pay. Problem is
now in the details. How do you give two days off to
university instructors? Do they get the same teaching load?
Or is it reduced by 10% also. At my campus we have a new
calendar of furlough days for staff (2 Fridays/month), but
it includes days when classes are in session. So faculty
will be teaching, but the staff will be gone...hmmmm. I
personally would have been happy to just all agree that we
were taking a 10% cut in pay and efforts will be made not to
increase class sizes.

Now, what I think will happen from a practical point of view
is that many faculty will take a different posture with
students who fail to show any sense of responsibility for
their studies or for following the curriculum. I think there
will be a lot less sympathy for students who ignore advising
(I am hoping that the upside of all this is better
enrollment management).

I am curious to see what happens to morale. I am basically
an upbeat person and do not like working in a negative
environment. It saps my energy. Fortunately, working with
motivated students perks me up...so my task is to see what I
can do to develop more of those students.

Anyone heard of any other campus plans for handling furloughs?

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