View Point
THE University of Hawaii at Manoa is preparing for the latest in a six-year series of budget cuts. In previous years, these cuts have been distributed roughly equally over all sections of the university. UH must continue research
Across-the-board or "horizontal" cuts naturally seem the fairest and, as a result, usually constitute the path of least political resistance. Unfortunately, this particular path ultimately wreaks the most damage on a research university.
The first year or two of UH budget cuts were sustained by postponing less urgent spending and trimming away any fat in the system. But after six years, horizontal trimming is targeted mainly at muscle and bone.
Several more rounds of horizontal cuts will undo the work of decades, and reduce UH to a mediocre state university that can contribute little to the citizens or the economy.
Some people might think it doesn't matter if UH ceases to be a major research university, as long as it maintains its ability to teach willing undergraduates.
In reality, almost every university granting degrees that impart widely recognized prestige on its graduates is a major research university. The few exceptions tend to be small, expensive undergraduate colleges serving almost exclusively the children of the wealthy.
Those hoping that UH will help Hawaii develop high-tech industries (such as software, electronic and communications engineering, pharmaceutical research or biotechnology) need to recognize that Silicon Valley, North Carolina's Research Triangle Park and high-tech centers in Austin, Boston and elsewhere have grown around major research universities.
Additionally, some UH research -- such as that on disease-resistant fruits, termites, water quality and aquaculture -- is targeted at problems or opportunities specific to Hawaii.
This is not to imply that community colleges and teaching universities aren't important. But the contributions of a major research university are distinct from those of other educational institutions and, in Hawaii, only UH has this role.
A modern research university requires a sophisticated and constantly evolving physical and intellectual infrastructure. The infrastructure at UH, however, is damaged and deteriorating.
Despite recent efforts to reverse this slide, the UH library system has seriously declined over the last six years. The quantity and quality of its laboratory space are limiting UH's ability to compete with mainland universities for research funds.
It is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain the local matching funds necessary to secure federal funding for the latest scientific equipment.
Hiring freezes have prevented the adding of new expertise to the faculty in response to developments within the university and around the world, and from replacing people who have left.
UH also faces a problem common to other state and county institutions -- faculty and staff salaries are falling behind those available on the mainland. If this downward spiral is not broken, UH is going to lose significant numbers of its best researchers and teachers. This will further reduce its ability to attract good students and raise external funding.
Finally, there is a very real danger of UH losing its accreditation. This would be difficult or impossible to reverse.
It has always been recognized on campus that UH cannot hope to escape budget cuts while the state economy continues to deteriorate. What it needs, at a minimum, is a strategy for mitigating the damage associated with a long series of budget cuts.
The logical approach is to make vertical cuts and eliminate whole schools, departments or programs. Components of the university should be assessed on the basis of their cost as well as the benefits they provide to Hawaii.
The weakest entities should be axed entirely so the university as a whole does not suffer the death of a thousand cuts. This will require courageous and determined leadership.
It is essential that UH and not some external body determines which programs to cut, since the university is in the best position to understand all of the many trade-offs involved. The health of the research enterprise at UH must figure prominently in these considerations if the university is not to become indistinguishable from hundreds of minor teaching colleges on the mainland.
Perhaps the only benefit of the present fiscal crisis is that construction of a new UH campus near Kapolei has been put on hold. The present situation should make it clear that UH cannot survive as a major educational and research asset if part of its budget is diverted to fund the construction or operation of a new campus.
ARE we really going to strangle one of the best universities in the Pacific region to save some UH students the drive from one side of Oahu to the other?
The recent accreditation review of the UH campus suggested that its mantra should be "communicate, communicate, communicate."
Here is one professor's opinion: What UH really needs is the courage and determination to make vertical rather than horizontal cuts, and to oppose by every available means the development of a Kapolei campus until the state has a sustainable budget surplus.
Michael Bevis is a professor at the
Hawaii Institute of Geophysics and Planetology at the
University of Hawaii at Manoa.