You may or may not have heard/read that Geography at Salford has been closed
with immediate effect from September 2002 (it is not the only academic area
to be closed in Salford recently). Students applying for next year were
written to and told at the end of May. 2nd and 3rd years have been promised
some kind of course but with a reduction in staff of 50% this is seeming
more and more unlikely (only 2 human geographers are left to run an entire
Urban Geography degree!!) All this on the say so of a dubious financial
model that was not only as good as the flawed numbers put in but which has
also been shown to be unreliable when applied at a sub-school level ( to 11
staff).
A couple of geography staff have left voluntarily, bullied into submission
with the threat of a compulsory redundancy committee that was set up long
before the voluntary redundancy deadline. Out of the rest - a smallish
group of 8 geographers - 3 compulsory redundancies will be made (However
note that 2 of these 8 are profs. and 1 other has already been
'cherrypicked' to develop GIS courses - leaving the startling figures of
perm any 3 from 5)!
Salford's VC (Michael Harloe - you may know the name - he used to be very
critical!!) has been described as the kind of man to wear compulsory
redundancies like a badge!! Dissent at Salford (at least at managerial
levels) is none-existent due to the efforts of the VC in
removing/suppressing this over the last few years.
Note that the institution is to be nationally/internationally grey-listed in
the very near future and your support in spreading the message as to what is
going on at Salford would be very much appreciated. Today it might just be
geography, chemistry, physics, mathematics.... tomorrow who knows??
Pauline Marne
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