Notes from an Arts-weary President

We had a successful set of outcomes from taking the UMPA Arts position paper to Uni Council, including the passing of the following motion:

"That Council:

• Recognises the importance to the University and the wider community of a strong and vibrant Faculty of Arts;
• Acknowledges the concerns expressed about the financial situation the Faculty of Arts is currently facing;
• Notes that under past and current budget arrangements the Faculty receives full funding in respect of the programs that it delivers and that, in addition, the Faculty will receive some $20 million in additional support over 2007-10; and
• Requests the Vice-Chancellor to:
• ensure that effective processes for communication with staff and students and their representatives are improved in subsequent implementation of the Arts Renewal Plan; and
• report to Council in July and October on further progress in implementing the Arts Renewal Plan, including matters raised in Council."

The real teeth are in those last two points, the final one which the Chancellor expressly said included reporting on progress relating to all of UMPA's recommendations in the paper. The Councillors were broadly supportive of students, and one even asked that the Faculty not only give a technical response, but perhaps an emotional one as well. I thought that was particularly helpful, given the morale issues around the Faculty. So that's the good news.

The bad news is that I continue to receive reports of students who are worried about being able to get tutoring at all as their lecturers are required in some cases to do all of their own tutoring, which students are reporting is impacting on their supervisors' ability to give them appropriate and timely feedback. In fact, I had two such reports today alone. Yet the Dean and Associate Dean (Research Training) both repeatedly claim that when they've investigated these concerns (particularly around supervision), they've found nothing. I would like to thereby encourage all of you Arts folks out there who have been writing to UMPA with your concerns to now write an email to the Dean and Associate Dean (Research Training), and cc the President of the Academic Board, the Vice-Chancellor, and me. Here's the list of emails:

Dean Mark Considine
m.considine@unimelb.edu.au

Associate Dean (Research Training) John Murphy
john.murphy1@unimelb.edu.au

President of Academic Board Pip Pattison
pepatt@unimelb.edu.au

Vice-Chancellor Glyn Davis
vc@unimelb.edu.au

Tammi Jonas
president@umpa.unimelb.edu.au

It seems they need to hear about your worries directly from you, and that our representations of those concerns are not sufficient. So I really do urge you to write the email. And do it before the 12th of June, when the Faculty is giving its response to us at TALQAC. Let your voices be heard - don't suffer in silence.

pax.