Cutting Arts to the Core

This article was originally published in the February 27, 2008 issue of CANTA magazine.

Following a year-long review of the College of Arts and its Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree, the university has unveiled its vision for the future of the embattled college. Released at the end of January, the proposed future is a radical transformation of the college and, if approved, would see the loss of 21 full-time staff, a merger of several schools, and the closure of two entire departments—American Studies, and Theatre and Film Studies.

The proposal, self-described as “renewing the vitality and vision of Arts at Canterbury”, was mandated at the end of 2006 by university management, after years of growing financial pressure on the college. Although staff cutbacks were a strong possibility for the college—looking to slash $2.5 million annually from its budget—nobody expected the bombshell that entire departments would be swept away under the rationale that they were not “core” to the College of Arts programmes.

The college’s problems extend back to 2004, when a major restructure was undertaken to unite the university’s 40 disparate departments under four colleges—Science, Engineering, Business and Economics, and Arts (the School of Law remaining independent).

The restructure also introduced a new financial model for the university, based on “contribution margins”; under this scheme, each college (and subsequently, each department) must pay a percentage of their income back to the university in order to cover the costs of central facilities, such as libraries, computer systems, and marketing. The contribution margin for the College of Arts is currently set at 41.5%, which it must achieve by 2009.

The new financial model was designed to turn around the university’s poor finances, but instead plunged the College of Arts into years of financial pressure to meet its contribution targets.

I’ve really made draconian cuts to the operational budgets right across the college, and every programme, every school is really smarting … we’ve taken those other processes absolutely as far as they can, I cannot cut any more than we have.

—Ken Strongman

In 2005, college staff were told they had to make $1.4 million in cuts from the college budget. The pressure on staff and students dragged on for months and into mid-2006, with staff and students protesting proposed staff cuts on campus. At its worst, 23 full-time staff were on the chopping block; and despite an unexpected surplus in the university’s accounts, five staff accepted voluntary redundancy and a further eight positions were cut (resulting in the loss of the Islamic Studies programme).

The college faced similar trouble in 2006, when it was asked to make $2 million in cuts. Worried at the prospect of history repeating itself, university management put a freeze on staff redundancies within the college and initiated the Arts Future Project to review the college and its major degree.

“We have constantly cut operational budgets,” says Ken Strongman, Pro Vice Chancellor of the College of Arts. “For this year [2008], … I’ve really made draconian cuts to the operational budgets right across the college, and every programme, every school is really smarting … we’ve taken those other processes absolutely as far as they can, I cannot cut any more than we have.”

Unlike science and engineering, which receive substantial funding from external sources, the College of Arts receives almost all of its funding from its students—in the form of fees and Government funding. The Government funds universities based almost entirely on EFTS—how many students they have enrolled (also known as the “bums-on-seats” model). Consequently, the College of Arts has been hit hard by declining student numbers—from over 3,600 EFTS in 2004, enrolment has dropped to just over 3,300 EFTS in 2007 (an estimated loss of over $2 million in Government funding).

This model of EFTS funding and contribution margins has been heavily criticised by departments and colleges. In a memo attached to the BA review in April 2007, Dean of Science Lou Reinisch argued that the model encourages colleges to maintain EFTS levels, whatever the educational cost. Reinisch suggested that “if the current plans to disperse funds with contribution margins inhibit us from providing the best education to our students we need to examine and change those plans … we cannot afford to compromise our educational goals.”

The urgency to resolve the funding issue grows as the Tertiary Education Commission (TEC) seeks to cap EFTS funding, and try to promote courses that have greater relevance to the needs of the economy through funding of a long-term educational plan, and educational outcomes.

As part of the Arts Future Project, a review of the BA degree was conducted and a report was released in April 2007. This review was conducted by a separate panel from the group responsible for the change proposal, but fed into their deliberations. The BA review acknowledges that this “increasingly aggressive competition for EFTS to meet contribution margins has been … generally destructive of co-operation … in teaching across programmes and servicing student needs.”

Unless the university explores alternative options, capping EFTS funding places significant stress on small departments with low EFTS numbers and high operational costs—the BA review panel encouraged management to consider “the importance that disciplines with currently small numbers of EFTS might have to the core values of a set of liberal arts offerings within the Canterbury BA” and to explore other models of financing.

Ken Strongman is critical of the Government’s waning funding of universities, and says that the new funding model is “awkward” in that universities cannot improve their financial position by increasing student numbers, calling any funding outside of EFTS-based support to be “quite marginal”. In an editorial to The Press, staff union president, Professor Jack Heinemann criticised the university for not giving the new funding philosophy a chance. He suggested that the university dip into its $8.6 million surplus to bail out the College of Arts to avoid it from “wasting away”. Heinemann likened the university’s proposal to self-cannibalism—cutting back to ensure financial health in the short-term, but ignorant of the long-term repercussions of those losses.

These recommendations appear to have fallen on deaf ears. The change proposal for the College of Arts outlines a new funding model based on student:staff ratios (heavily EFTS-based). The proposal uses low EFTS and high support costs as the rationale for the “disestablishment” of the Theatre and Film Studies and American Studies programmes.

“Theatre and Film Studies is not core to the College of Arts Programmes,” reads the change proposal. The term “core” was not detailed or quantified in the change proposal—and has left staff and students affected by its use feeling angry that such a decision has been made behind closed doors. Ken Strongman explains this term as an evaluation of “how significant the subject is … historically and currently to university arts.”

“You could arrange them all [arts subjects] on a continuum, and Theatre and Film studies, some would argue—and American Studies, some would argue—are towards the other end of this continuum,” says Strongman. He rejects that this is purely a financial decision, saying that the panel looked at “measured research output, teaching ability, … everything else of that sort that we could bring in.”

Postgraduates from Theatre and Film Studies find this decision “incredibly insulting”. “They haven’t put out any reason as to why this department isn’t core, they say ‘it’s not core’, and that’s it. There’s no debate, there’s no discussion, thats it,” argues a furious George Parker, a Theatre and Film Studies PhD student, working under a Canterbury Doctoral Scholarship. “Who did they go and talk in order to find out that theatre and film studies research doesn’t exist?”

This change proposal, I would call it short-sighted, but that would mean that I thought they had their eyes open when they were making it.

—Sharon Mazer

Strongman admits that “consulting the departments was not part of the process. Why would one consult the departments?” A decision that many students and staff are both distressed and angry with. Theatre and Film postgraduates feel that university has turned its back on them and their research—that nobody making these decisions has any idea what their research is or the commitments they have to it.

“They didn’t ask! Nobody asked!” says a distressed Theatre and Film Studies head of department Sharon Mazer. “Nobody asked us. Nobody asked the College of Education. We’re providing Theatre and Film Studies, which is core to the national curriculum, years 1 through 13 … it’s ridiculous.”

Even after the release of the proposal, the university did not approach affected students—and those who tried to get answers were often met with closed doors. The feeling affected students are receiving from the university is that their research is not wanted at Canterbury.

“We can’t transfer this to anywhere else,” said one student. “[My research] requires a specialist in a combination of theatre and film, theory and practice. And you don’t get that at PhD level anywhere else in the country.” Strongman brushes these claims off, saying that “they [theatre and film studies postgraduates] may actually not be in the best position to know that.”

Theatre and Film Studies also operate three theatre spaces in the city, which would be lost in this change proposal. Mazer says that, “we use [them] for performances, exhibitions; fine arts students use it; members of the community use it; the Body Festival always hire it, there are dancers who love that space.”

Mazer doesn’t believe that the university has at all considered the implications of closing down the department. “This change proposal, I would call it short-sighted, but that would mean that I thought they had their eyes open when they were making it.”

Since the formation of the College of Arts, Theatre and Film Studies has been part of the School of Music, a decision Strongman says was made because “there was nowhere else for it to go” and does not regard it as a good decision—“there’s nothing particularly significant about that pairing other than [it was] by default.”

Mazer, says that this pairing has led to the conflation of the two department’s finances. “We’ve always been told, we’re too small to extract us from the centre for music and theatre and film studies; to extract theatre and film studies income and expenditure in solid numbers.”

“I’m repeatedly told, ‘too small to look at closely, and besides, any money that would be saved is insignificant’.”

Strongman denies that this is the case. “If theatre and film were to finish tomorrow, and all the students in there were to go, we would be saving four or five hundred thousand [dollars],” he says. “Because that’s what they’re costing us, over and above the income that they bring in.”

However, this conflicts with the figure of $200,000 he gave The Press immediately following the release of the change proposal: “If theatre and film studies came up with a private benefactor who could put up $200,000 a year, I would say ‘great’.”

“We have never, ever been told that we need to cut back,” says Mazer. “There isn’t a number that they’re presenting that isn’t suspect in at least two different ways.”

The timing of the proposal has also had disastrous implications for enrolment. Mazer said she has been visited first-year students, devastated that at the news that the subject they fell in love with in high school is under threat. “This passionate group of students is starting university in two weeks, with the news just hitting them … and I can’t help them, all I can say is ‘this is only a proposal’.”

But every signal that Mazer and her department are receiving from the university are telling them otherwise. Three potential theatre and film PhD students have been turned away from enrolment following the immediate release of the proposal—three days earlier and they would have been approved. And an alleged email from Ken Strongman to undergraduate students of Theatre and Film Studies encouraging them to explore other options for their major.

American Studies is receiving a similar treatment as to why it is being cut—“it is not core to the BA degree”, declining student numbers, and the lack of a “strong research profile”—losing 7.5 academic positions. Art History is forced to cut two full-time staff members. Several of the college’s 11 schools are merging together, eliminating eight administrative and technical staff.

With submissions due on the 14th of March, the university has intentionally given students only three weeks of term time to understand and challenge a proposal that has taken over a year to compile.

Those affected by the proposal are worried that this proposal could set a precedent for university management. The same clock and dagger procedure could be applied to any other department in the university. “It doesn’t breed an environment on which you concentrate on study,” says Mark Hamilton, another Theatre and Film Studies PhD student under scholarship. “Anybody could wake up to a dawn raid.” ❡