The executive committee of the UConn American Association of University Professors opposes selective transparency regarding decision making and fiscal affairs of the university. We also remind the UConn administration that transparency alone is not enough. We seek full transparency and genuine, substantive, timely shared governance. It is not sufficient to share selective details after the budget and program decisions have already been made.
Take the Budget Transformation Initiative (BTI) as an example. Faculty had no role in the question of whether to adopt such an approach. Even now, when the administration appears to be moving ahead with the BTI, the faculty has little representation in the discussion. According to Devin Kennedy, the outside consultant hired by the administration, only “13-ish” of the 100 BTI committee members are faculty members. (Financial Affairs Committee meeting, Feb. 25, 2026)
We remain “dismayed that the UConn administration ignores our own UConn faculty in education, budgeting, accounting, pedagogy, institutional change, curriculum, and subject area knowledge.” (EC Statement, Jan. 9, 2026) Frankly, this low faculty representation and limited role in the BTI adoption process is embarrassing and counterproductive.
University officials seem to be under the mistaken impression that so-called town halls – often with pre-submitted questions and scripted answers – are a substitute for full transparency and genuine shared decision making. They are not. As one administration official noted at the aforementioned meeting, the BTI’s so-called town halls and listening sessions are “to educate the university community about this new model.” Note what was not said about the town halls: to receive input from attendees, to make changes based on faculty and staff responses, or to consider whether the BTI is even the right way to go in the first place.
Models like the BTI are not value-neutral, objective frameworks. They are built on the assumptions and ethics of those who construct them. Given that, we very much worry that the near total exclusion of many UConn constituencies from the BTI process – starting from the decision to even consider this model – is a deeply troubling move by the UConn administration. We were not involved at the most basic level, and we fear the people of this university will suffer as a result.
We echo an additional concern raised by the senate budget committee at its Jan. 29, 2026, meeting and relayed to the Financial Affairs Committee of the Board of Trustees on Feb. 25: The BTI has very little in it that stresses the quality of instruction. Think about that. As faculty, we believe quality of instruction is a crucial pillar of what we are doing here at UConn.
As we noted in our Executive Committee statement of Jan 9, 2026, “the AAUP and its members stand for research innovation, stimulating teaching and mentoring, and shared decision-making. We ask the administration to do the same.”
From the Executive Committee of the UConn AAUP