From SSU to UIS

Archival documents

From SSU to UIS
Union-Busting
Collegiality, UI Style
Speech Restrictions
Cops on Campus

I began teaching at the University of Illinois at Springfield in 1988, when it was called Sangamon State University. It used to be an alternative to standardized higher education. No more.

I'm now retired, living in Massachusetts, and haven't revised or added much to this page since I left in 1998. The first item below--a description of the transition to UIS and the aftermath -- was updated in mid-2000. But most of the rest is out of date. Of course, I hear things have only gotten more depressing....

Another related and now out-of-date page: life in Springfield, Illinois.

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From SSU to UIS

• 2000: From "Radical University" to Handmaiden of the Corporate State (with Ron Sakolsky)
  • Illinois Legislature forces SSU into the University of Illinois system, kills the union, and accelerates SSU's "normalization" into training ground for state workers
  • issued as pamphlet by Teachers for a Democratic Culture and also published in Je ne sais quois #7, pp. 1-2, 8-15. [Version 3]
• 1998: From "Radical University" to Agent of the State (with Ron Sakolsky) Radical Teacher #53, 13-18 [Version 2]
• 1995: "Radical University" Celebrates 25th Anniversary and Dies. In RadPsyNews [Version 1]
• column the local newspaper wouldn't publish questioning the takeover of SSU (1/95)
• letter questioning the Journal-Register's objectivity that the newspaper wouldn't publish (2/95)

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Union-Busting at UIS

• the end of collective bargaining when our faculty union contract runs out on June 30th--one of the provisions of the UI takeover legislation!
• university administration's hired goons prevent us from distributing leaflets urging continuation of our bargaining unit (May 2, 1997)

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Collegiality, UI Style

• Merit Pay & Imposed Decisions Restructuring UIS governance, the Administration tries to get us to screw ourselves (Letter to UIS Faculty, November 3, 1997)

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Speech Restrictions

• No Chalk! No Bad-Taste Posting! No Mess! (9/97 letter to editor)
• restricting speech on campus (1996 memo on administration efforts)
• administration prevents union leaflet distribution & rejects complaint (May 2, 1997)
• memo urging Senate action on administration refusal to take complaint seriously (May 14, 1997)

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Cops on Campus

• Police Review Panel Chronology (and Memo 1, 4/97): university failure to establish police complaint procedure; chronology revised May 14, 1997)
• critique of Administration's unilaterally imposed complaint policy (Memo 2, 4/24/97)
• proposed Senate resolution (Memo 3, 4/28/97)
• letter to editor about problems with campus police force (1/96)
• unresolved issues (1995)

UIS now houses something called the Regional Institute for Community Policing "designed to provide training and technical support for police departments and communities" throughout the state and beyond. Considering the university's resistance to true community-based policing right here on campus, the prospect of UIS teaching other places how to do it is a bit of a farce.