Has the tea gone cold?

By RICHARD RIEHL -- For the North County Times | April 23, 2010

Has the local tea party movement reached its peak? Comparing this year's Oceanside event with last year's led me to that conclusion.

Last year's crowd, after being revved up by speakers at the Civic Center, marched to the pier to dump sandbags marked "tea" into the sea. It was a family affair, with lots of kids, a few of them in strollers. As they marched along, the angry crowd chanted "USA! USA! It was a festive affair, but the signs claiming our elected leaders were traitors were unnerving.

Organizers said there were at least 5,000 in attendance.

This year's event attracted only about 1,500 true believers to the pier amphitheater, according to police estimates, and produced a more sedate, sit-and-listen crowd. Promoted as a family-friendly affair with face-painting for the kids, I was struck by the shortage of children. On average, this year's partiers appeared to be about 10 years older than last year's.

The scheduled headliner, San Diego's favorite conservative radio talk jock Rick Roberts, failed to show up. A lesser known media personality, feeling the need to fire up his audience, repeatedly begged, "ARE YOU READY TO ROCK?" The tepid response indicated many were not familiar with that kind of rocking.

Despite the crowd's indifference to matters of municipal politics, a few City Council hopefuls showed up. When Oceanside recall survivor Jerry Kern breathlessly boasted of his victory over labor union attacks, the response was underwhelming.

Organized labor was not among the day's favorite targets.

Pandering reached its peak, though, with the arrival onstage of gubernatorial hopeful Steve Poizner. Dramatically declaring, "I don't like to pay taxes, do you?" he promised to cut taxes, put a stop to illegal immigration "once and for all," and sue the feds "all the way to the Supreme Court" to eliminate California's "man-made water shortage."

He failed to mention his Web site promises to make a "massive" investment in education and to build environmentally friendly water-supply infrastructure projects.

Less government spending, not more, was the red meat this crowd hungered for.

Here's what we learned about this year's tea party supporters from the recent New York Times/CBS News Poll:

-- 58 percent think our best years are behind us when it comes to good jobs.

-- 75 percent are over 45, including 29 percent seniors.

-- 89 percent are white.

-- 59 percent are men.

-- While 84 percent of tea party supporters believe their views represent most Americans, only 25 percent of Americans think they do.

Only time will tell, but I'd say a collection of cranky old white guys vowing to bring back the good old days is unlikely to have much of a political future in this country.

Union influence on teacher pay

Published in San Diego's North County Times, April 9, 2010

This newspaper's editorial board has issued an invitation for the community to engage in a discussion of how to improve our schools, narrowing the topic to five areas: teacher tenure, class size, school finance, union influence and leveraging technology. My thoughts about teacher tenure and union influence were shaped by five years of teaching high school English, followed by a 30-year career in public university administration.

Recent studies show that as many as half of all beginning teachers leave the profession in five years. I was a member of that group. When I left teaching it wasn't because of the pay, or that I didn't like working with students, or that I was a failure in the classroom. My principal offered me a pay raise to persuade me to stay.

I quit because I saw no career advancement as a classroom teacher and had no interest in being a school counselor or principal. Had there been a career track leading to a "master teacher" status, with a modified teaching load and responsibilities for mentoring beginning teachers, I might have happily remained in teaching.

Instead, I took a pay cut and an extension of my work year from nine to 12 months to accept a job working with students as a college admissions counselor.

I wonder if other former teachers have left the classroom for similar reasons.

My brief teaching career began in a small rural school in Washington in 1965, at an annual salary of $4,800. An online inflation calculator tells me that would equal the buying power of $33,000 today. If there was a teachers union at the time, nobody told me about it. But there is one today. This year's union-negotiated salary schedule in my old school district shows a first-year teacher's pay has risen to $34,000. Union influence over the years had boosted a novice teacher's buying power by a whopping $83 a month.

The Vista Unified School District's 2009-10 salary schedule lists a beginning teacher's pay at $38,771. That would be the equivalent of $5,450 in 1965 buying power. I'd say the ghosts of Sam Gompers and Jimmy Hoffa are not exactly exchanging high fives about union clout over teacher pay in those two school districts.

While most would agree today's teachers are not overpaid, some say unions are to be blamed for making it hard to get rid of bad teachers and impossible to reward the best. In a future column I'll have more to say about why I think blaming unions is often used as a smokescreen to hide administrative incompetence and a lack of financial commitment to school reform.

Hail to the Chief: A Survivor's Guide to Presidential Egos

By Richard Riehl, in College and University, the

Winter 2010 edition of the journal for the American

Association of College Registrars and Admissions Officers

I once was a student in a graduate seminar taught by the

president of the university where I was a mid-level administrator.

The course focused on what it takes to be the chief executive

of a university. He was the only one of the ten presidents under

whom I served who embraced the role of a college administrator;

the only one with formal training in educational leadership;

and the only one to have risen to his position from the ranks

of student affairs. He believed that presidents must possess

unusually strong egos, since their power begins to wane upon

their second day in office. A new president has to have an

ego strong enough to withstand the criticism that grows

incrementally with each executive decision.

Although I never had the pleasure of reporting directly

to a president, I came to know over the years the size and

shape of their egos and how they affected my daily work.

Those of us in the trenches are well aware of how executive

effluent flows downhill.

You may recognize your own chief executive among the

four types of campus leaders described below, but you’re

more likely to find your president to be a hybrid. I regret

that I was unable to observe a more diverse group. All ten

were white males. (That explains my exclusive use of the

male pronoun.) I suspect that executive egos transcend

race, ethnicity, and gender, but the narrowness of my

experience necessarily limits the validity of my conclusions.

THE RELUCTANT ADMINISTRATOR

Reluctant Administrators (RA) consider themselves, first

and foremost, members of the faculty — displaced scholars

thrust into the most powerful position in the campus bureaucracy.

They long for the day they can return to their first love:

scholarly work. Whatever presidential miscues they make

can be blamed on the bungling of bureaucratic underlings or

on being distracted by the daily burden of administrivia.

I had three RA presidents in my career. The first rose

to his position after having been a scholar respected by

faculty colleagues and a teacher beloved by his students.

He ran into trouble when he hired a provost from a distant

state and charged him with combining academic departments

into “areas of inquiry” more “relevant” to the issues of the day.

It was the 1970s — the age of Aquarius, Woodstock, and waffle

stompers. What he didn’t realize was that dismantling academic

fiefdoms is as hard as moving graveyards.

His next mistake was to oppose the creation of a college

of ethnic studies. He asked his new provost to run inter-

ference on both issues, but that didn’t protect him from the

wrath of both tenured faculty and bell-bottomed undergraduates.

I had very little direct exposure to this president. So I panicked

the day the registrar, my boss’s boss, summoned me to his office

to tell me the president was not pleased I had given a telephone

interview to Newsweek the day my boss was away from his office.

(It was heady stuff for this rookie administrator to be interviewed

by a national magazine!) But when I read the article about the

assistant director of admissions who explained that budget

cuts could cause the layoff of up to 30 faculty members, I figured

I’d soon be returning as a high school English teacher to my

first love. I was relieved the president didn’t fire me for that

rather significant indiscretion. Instead, he informed me through

the chain of command that interviews with the national media

are what presidents do, not first-year administrators.

My next RA president, a scientist drawn from the ranks of

the faculty, called me shortly after he was appointed interim

president. He wanted my opinion of what his presidential

priorities should be. A geologist trained in England, where

universities have neither general education requirements

nor athletic departments, he was comparatively clueless

about the hot issues facing most American college presidents.

At the time, I was director of admissions. Though flattered to

have been asked for my advice, I was wise enough by then

to limit my response to splendid generalities.

My least favorite RA president was a literary scholar who

loved to complain about his bureaucratic burdens. His way

of solving the financial challenges caused by an enrollment

downturn was to gather his vice presidents, call in the admissions

director, pound the table, and shout that he wanted more students

NOW! The next day he’d greet everyone with a smile and

inquire gently, “How’s recruitment going?” A thick skin and

a short memory are the best strategies for surviving this type of RA.

THE SMARTEST GUY IN THE ROOM

Presidents who regard themselves as the Smartest Guy

in the Room (SGIR) have the most tender of all presidential egos,

often requiring self-administered stroking.

I served under two SGIR presidents in my career. One liked

to tell me how ineffective my boss — the provost — was.

It was then that I practiced my half-smile, glazed-eyes look.

I knew his tirade was a no-winner for me: to nod in agreement

would be not only disloyal, but I also knew he’d tell my boss

about it; to defend my boss would be to dispute the president’s

status as the Smartest Guy in the Room. By maintaining my

zombie-like gaze, I only risked being thought of as not the

shiniest penny in the drawer — which is the safest place to be

in the company of an SGIR.

My other SGIR stroked his ego by arranging to land the leading

role in the school musical, “The Student Prince,” giving rise to

suspicion among the deans about the size of the theater

department’s future budget allocations. He turned out to be

passably good in the part, but the balding 40-year-old looked

a little strange on stage amid the cast of 20-year-olds playing

his fellow students.

This president also had the distinction of being the shortest

administrator on campus. I once met with him one on one in

his office. Knowing he was about three inches shorter than I,

I was puzzled to find myself looking up at him as we sat across

from each other. Assuming the customary eyes-lowered

posture of a supplicant, I noticed that his feet barely reached

the floor: His lofty ego had been boosted by the height adjustment

on his executive chair.

The SGIR is often the target of the hallway whisperings of

lower-level administrators and support staff that “the emperor

has no clothes.” And regardless of your place in the administrative

pecking order, the SGIR will keep you captive with stories

about his own achievements and the failures of previous

presidents and other administrators. But do feel free to send

irate students to the SGIR. Those with whom I worked were

unlikely to give such a student the time of day.

THE GOOD OLD BOY

The Good Old Boy (GOB) is comfortable in his own skin,

often giving the impression of being dumb like a fox. His folksy

ways should not be mistaken for weakness, however: GOBs

take pleasure in being underestimated.

Some GOBs crave to be loved by all. They hate to say no,

often getting others to say no for them. Whenever possible,

avoid sending an irate student to a GOB—that is, unless you

don’t mind having your decisions overruled.

I served under three GOBs. The first was a very large man,

a Texan reminiscent of Lyndon Johnson. Once, during a

faculty Senate meeting, he became the target of a barrage of

criticism in response to his plan to create a school of technology.

He simply smiled and nodded through the entire attack.

After the smoke had cleared, he drawled that all the criticism

leveled at him might be valid, but he was the guy in charge

and his decision would stand.

Another of my GOBs was a president straight from central casting:

square-jawed, tall, and white-haired, with a perpetual smile

and a warm southern accent. His ego was fed by never turning

anybody down. When it came to competing interests among

faculty and staff, he believed in social Darwinism.

“The best will rise to the top,” he told me during my job interview.

He was fond of giving hugs to women — especially the support

staff he encountered in the halls and offices. He once

brought to my office a student to whom we’d denied admission.

With his arm around the student’s shoulder, he told me with a

broad smile, “I’ll bet Mr. Riehl can help you.”

My third GOB infuriated the faculty by siding with students

on every issue. He was a short-term interim president,

so the faculty held their collective breath until his appointment

ended. Not one to believe in written speeches, he’d wing it.

Literally. In his first speech to the community, he busted a

Charleston dance move, featuring the famous exchanging

hands-on-knees bit. It was a pretty weird sight. (“Dancing with

the Stars” had not yet made its television debut.)

Just don’t make the mistake of thinking the GOB is your pal.

Underneath all that surface warmth is an ego needing

constant attention.

THE COMPLEAT ADMINISTRATOR

I served under two Compleat Administrator (CA) presidents in

my 30-year career in enrollment services. My favorite was a

scholar of organizational leadership. He relied on data to

make decisions and was a careful planner. Best of all, he

knew how to handle people. He made his subordinates

want to work harder while not pressuring them with anything

but expectations for excellence. He openly admitted he had

a substantial ego, but it didn’t get in the way of his decision

making. He was never apologetic for being an administrator.

He believed the quality of administrative leadership could

either enhance or hinder teaching and learning.

He also understood that even the most skillful of campus

leaders cannot succeed without the support of their academic

communities. If they don’t make hard decisions soon after

being appointed to office, they’re unlikely to make them at all.

In his case, proud of firing an incompetent vice president

early in his presidency, he regretted not eliminating the football

program, a perennial loser on the field and in the budget office.

By the time he gained the courage to kill the program, he’d

lost the clout to pull it off.

The other CA was not so warm and fuzzy. The essence of his

plan to build a more diverse student body was to add a

minority recruiter to the admissions staff. I suggested to my

vice president that it would be better to bring in a higher-level

administrator responsible for helping to create a campus

climate that would both retain and attract more minority students.

When I got word that the president wanted to give me money

and wondered why I didn’t want it, I agreed it would be best

to add another recruiter to my staff.

Presidential egos come in all shapes and sizes.

Here are a few survival strategies:

· Never bend the truth, either to make your president happy

or to make yourself look good.

· In the company of a president, there’s room enough for

only one ego.

· Propose at least two alternatives in response to a crisis.

That way your president will be able both to take credit for

what works and to blame you for what doesn’t.

· Don’t make a habit of painting a bleaker picture than it is,

hoping that if things don’t turn out so badly everyone will

be happier. “Sky-is-falling” types soon lose their credibility

with ego-driven presidents.

· When enrollment is up, credit the faculty, not your nifty

new recruitment strategies.

· Be wary of becoming the president’s pal. (See above

regarding “space for egos.”)

· Make friends with a chief of staff who has the ear of the president.

Most important, keep your perspective. Do not attempt to

make yourself the indispensable administrator. Cemeteries

are filled with indispensable people.

About the author: Richard J. Riehl is a freelance op-ed columnist for San Diego’s

North County Times. Throughout his 33-year career in higher education administration,

he was an active AACRAO member, including service on the College and University

Editorial Board.