by Connor Harney
In a 2013 article published in the Guardian, Peter Higgs, the famed
Nobel Prize-winning Physicist, lamented at what he perceived as lack of
productivity within the context of the new academic culture. Higgs, who published only 10 articles after
his award-winning research on the process by which subatomic materials acquire
mass, stated that had he been held to the current expectations of publishing an
article a year: “It’s hard to imagine how I would ever have enough peace and
quiet in the present climate to do what I did in 1964.”[1] The
case of Higgs is merely anecdotal evidence of the larger problem within higher
education, which is that those in charge have succeeded in proletarianizing
academia—instead of real meaningful work, professors are judged by the quantity
of their publications, so that the administration can tout the productivity of
the faculty along with the litany of little worker bees that they crank out
every year like an assembly line. Many of our most brilliant minds are being
stifled by such a system, and choose to pursue less meaningful work over
substantiality because many of them are afraid of losing their increasingly
tenuous employment at their university.
These relations do not merely apply to faculty, but students as
well. More and more, a degree from a
university no longer symbolizes knowledge acquired through vigorous
intellectual pursuits, but instead an investment, with some having better returns
than others.
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| Portrait of Peter Higgs by Ken Currie (Photo source: Wikipedia) |
In the age of Neoliberalism,
governments around the world and the powers that they represent are slowly but
surely integrating all aspects of life into the marketplace. Human relations
are one by one being transformed into market relations and gradually alienating
human beings from one another. These
relations have been applied to the UNC system and public university systems
across the country and thus, higher education has become increasingly inaccessible
to those coming from low-income families as tuition has gradually become one of
the most important levers to funding these institutions. Rather than being treated as places of refuge
for the pursuit of knowledge, higher education becomes a business, as they
increasingly function not from state allocated funds, but from consumers
themselves, in this case, the students.
Ultimately, these students lose their role as students, and instead take
on the dual role of consumer and commodity. It does not matter that often times
these degrees become diluted and cease to mean that the student has acquired a
well-rounded education, but instead, has proved that they could be a vessel to
be filled with “facts” and “answers” day in and day out for four years, but
knowing just as much as they did when they came in.
Unfortunately, this trend does not
seem to be going anywhere. Despite the fact that, as David Harvey has noted, “the
closer the economy converges on its pure state, the deeper crisis will likely
become,” as long as the politics of austerity are championed by politicians
both of the liberal and conservative variety.
This means the more that public works continue to be privatized and the
less regulations are put upon private enterprise, the more detrimental future
economic crises will become.[2]
As long as what little social safety net and welfare is up for grabs, and the
tendency toward privatization remains intact, working people already suffering
will only suffer more the next time a crisis wracks our economic system. And,
in many ways, this crisis of overproduction is making itself felt, and as long
as many can no longer afford to consume given their current situation, there is
not enough spending to realize surplus-value in the market. In practical sense, this means that the
university system will increasingly place the burden of funding on students, as
the state slowly but surely privatizes the university system and turns it into an
industry that is open to the fluctuations of the market. This is evidenced by
the allocations of funding for the UNC system. For the 2014-2015 fiscal year,
around $1.7 billion went to fund Appalachian State and the 16 other universities
that make up the university system, while around $2.7 billion was appropriated
from tax revenues within the state budget.
In effect, the amount of funding through tuition amounted to a third of
the university system’s budget across the state.[3] It is no surprise then, that there is such a
problem with student debt in this country, and if the trend continues, this
onus put on the students will become more pronounced. Not only does this
phenomenon magnify the impoverishment of low-income students wishing to better
themselves through higher education, it effectively keeps them from fulfilling
their scholastic aspirations, due to their obligation to work in order to keep themselves
from sinking into insurmountable debt. Who knows what great intellect we are
depriving society of in this manner?
So then, what needs to be done?
Students could just throw up their hands and groan “That’s just the way it is.”
A cursory look back shows that things have not always been this way, indeed, an
examination of the flagship school UNC Chapel Hill’s budget for the years
1985-86 attest to this fact, as only 5.8% of the university’s funding came from
tuition and student fees.[4] With proper pressure from below, meaning the
faculty and the students, this breakdown can be made reality again. Across the
country, student movements are attempting to make their voices heard, and
Appalachian State is no exception.
This semester, a group called
Appalachian Student Power has organized large rallies in order to highlight the
seemingly misplaced priorities of the administration. The organization created a list of proposals
that they made public. It is a powerful document indeed, in that it suggests
ways that funds could be alternatively allocated in order to “create an
environment at Appalachian State University that puts the mental, physical, and
financial well-being of students, faculty, staff, and their families above the
preservation and propagation of Appalachian State as a brand, sports team, or
commodity.”[5]
This statement of purpose is essentially a battle cry against austerity and the
Neoliberal ideology behind it. As a long time student at ASU, it makes me proud
to see such momentum and action among the student body and can only hope that
it continues.
 |
| Author of this post, man in sunglasses holding a purple sign, protesting with the App State Student Power at a rally (Photo source: App State Student Power Facebook page) |
While I remain hopeful for the
student movement not only here on campus at ASU but for the wider movement
nationwide, there are some suggestions that seem more beneficial to the
continuation of this movement than others. First, if Mizzou has taught
organizers nationwide anything, it should be the necessity to utilize and
formalize collective bargaining as a means of challenging these currents in
academia.[6]
What does that mean in practice? students and faculty, especially tenured faculty,
as they have more respite from any tactics of retaliation that the
administration may employ due to the nature of the tenure system, must band
together in order to form a coherent means of making their voices heard. This means possibly forming a viable union
made up of both students and professors. Of utmost importance is the athletics
department’s support of such a movement.
It was not until the football team at Mizzou came forward in support of
student activists that the administration acknowledged their demands. At ASU
that means possibly changing some direction—as noted above, it is not so much
the allocation of funds to athletics, but rather the way that the university is
funded. Thus, when discussing the role of students in this union, this must
also mean student-athletes as well. The
onus should be on the state to provide education, not the young adult students
entering the adult world for the first time who can ill afford to pay for their
degrees without major financial assistance. This means addressing not only
inconsistencies in this neoliberal logic on campus but across the state and the
country as well. The faculty has made
some attempts to address this through a resolution passed through the Faculty
Senate, which called into question the recent appointment of Margaret Spellings
as president of the UNC system, and noted their “serious reservations” on the
legitimacy of a woman who has not only made disparaging comments toward the
LGBT community but was also the Secretary of Education in the Bush White House
and was most responsible for the No Child Left Behind program being put at the
helm of the university system.[7]
 | |
|
The faculty is right in questioning
Spellings credentials, as her past only reflects the politics of privatization
addressed above, but the students and the faculty must do more than pass
resolutions—they must demand change. Of
course, this coalition of students and professors is undeniably important;
however, there is another crucial component that has been often overlooked, and
that is the role of the community. If this coalition could garner the support
of the community at large, it could give real power to the movement. How can
the student movement rally the large community in Boone and the wider Watauga
county area? First, this would entail a massive program for community
outreach.
Many working people in town resent
the presence of the university largely due to the process of gentrification that
the unprecedented growth of the school has brought and the dislocation of many
of Boone’s traditional inhabitants to the outskirts of town. There is also the
aloofness with which many students show toward the townspeople of Boone. In
order to rectify this situation, any student movement would need to think of
ways to address the gentrification of the town and ways that the university can
help to alleviate the worst instances of poverty in the community. Not only
that, it needs to be stressed that a reprioritization of how universities are
funded would make these institutions more accessible to low-income families.
Instead of constructing luxury apartments that are well out of the tenable
range for most working people and students, such as the newly constructed Lofts
that start at $750 a month in rent, the students and the citizens of Boone
should influence developers to create housing that is both affordable and
sustainable (here's looking at you Meadowview).[8]
 |
| (Photo source: App State Student Power) |
Finally, while it seems that many
movements across the country are resistant to allowing a formal leadership, due
in large part to a desire for a democratic resistance movement, in practice, it
often leads to scattered priorities and a lack of clear objectives. Hopefully,
this fear can be overcome, and a more coherent movement will emerge to
challenge the politics of austerity in higher education. The coalition outlined here may mean that
many activists will have to learn to work with elements that may take them out
of their comfort zone, but this is a hurdle that needs to be overcome. It will be interesting to see how the battle
against Neoliberalism will play out across campuses, but it is important to
remember that the United States has a long history of student movements, of
which this movement will hopefully be the next chapter.
Connor Harney, 24, is a second year graduate student in the History Department at Appalachian State University. His specialization is in Latin American History in particular The Cuban Revolution. After his tenure at ASU, he hopes to attend UNC Chapel Hill and complete a dissertation on the role of ideological pragmatism and its relation to the continuation of the Cuban Revolution. When not engaged in coursework he enjoys all things fitness related, binge watching Netflix, and reading social and economic theory.
[1] Decca Aitkenhead, “Peter Higgs: I
Wouldn't Be Productive Enough For Today's Academic System,” The Guardian, 6 December 2013, accessed December
3, 2015, http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/dec/06/peter-higgs-boson-academic-system.
[3] Pat
McCrory, The Governor’s Recommended
Budge, 2015-2017, March 2015, accessed December 3, 2015, https://ncosbm.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/documents/files/BudgetBook_2015.pdf .
[4] UNC
Chapel Hill, Fact Book 1986-87, 1st
edition, April 1987, accessed December 3, 2015, http://oira.unc.edu/files/2012/03/fb1986_1987.pdf.
[5] Appalachian
State Student Power, “Proposal from Student Power,” accessed December 3, 2015, https://www.docdroid.net/6KiEtUL/proposalfromstudentpower.pdf.html .
[6]“UM System President Wolfe Resigns
MU Chancellor to new role; UM Board of
Curator announces significant
diversity and inclusion initiatives,” Inside
UM System, November 9, 2015, accessed December 7, 2015, http://www.umsystem.edu/ums/news/leadership_news/news_110915/.
[7] Stancill,
Jane, “Appalachian State Faculty Raise Concerns About Spellings,” The News and Observer (Raleigh, NC),
December 3, 2015, accessed December 4, 2015, http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/politics-columns-blogs/under-the-dome/article47868485.html .
[8] The
Lofts at University Hall Drive, “Apartment Pricing and Details,” The Lofts at University Hall Drive,
accessed December 7, 2015, http://www.loftsatuniversityhall.com/#!pricing/c7cs.
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