<p>I noticed there hadn't been much coverage of this on CC.</p>
<p>I never heard much about this, other than seeing an article in the AJC at some point, stating that Emory wants to eliminate its journalism program and a few other programs, and will find places for those professors in other disciplines.</p>
<p>Yeah, so the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences just sort of woke up one day and was like “BTDubs, we’re eliminating the PhD programs in economics, interdisciplinary studies, and Spanish. We’re also going to eliminate the division of educational studies (grants minor, BA, MA, MAT and PhD), journalism, and visual arts. And we did this without any faculty, student, and alumni input at all.” The rumor is that many of these departments were just sort of slipped a note two hours before the public announcement (the first time they had heard of it). Tenured faculty will stay and be re-stationed in other departments, but all lecturers and tenure-track faculty members who don’t have tenure will be let go (a far larger number than the tenured faculty: 39 vs. 18).</p>
<p>The problem here is not the cuts per se, but rather the process through which they arrived at them.</p>
<p>Here’s the best part: “[The Dean] said the College’s cuts were not financially motivated in the present-term, but would allow for easier future expansion of its asset programs.”</p>
<p>If it wasn’t financially motivated, and was done clandestinely, what’s the purpose…?</p>
<p>Well, it’s always financially motivated; that is just saying it is not because Emory is desperately short on money. They have “plenty” of money, but they don’t want to spend it on the Econ PhD program anymore.</p>
<p>aigiqinf hit the nail on the head. It’s not the cuts so much as the process behind the cuts. The vast majority of undergrads will not be affected.</p>
<p>The university has been spending a lot of money to boost its image for years. This has failed to help it move up in the rankings, and the law school actually fell 10 spots in the ranking in one year a couple of years back. The school has to make changes to stay competitive. As it stands now, Emory really doesn’t deserve to be a top 20 school. They have a lot of famous professors, which boosts their rankings but they don’t measure up well on the other statistics that US News and World Report looks at.</p>
<p>@trex792</p>
<p>Failed?</p>
<p>I don’t know about failed. For most of its existence, Emory wasn’t in the “best colleges” conversation at all. The past decade has only been a slight disappointment, mostly due to unrealistic expectations of just how far money can carry you. Emory has all of the $ it needs, but no real identity to offer students. </p>
<p>It can’t market itself as a top-tier elite university because it isn’t.</p>
<p>It can’t market itself as a sports school because it isn’t.</p>
<p>It can’t market itself as a southern school because it no longer is.</p>
<p>It can’t market itself as a regional powerhouse because so many people in the south have barely heard of it.</p>
<p>What a lot of Emory students end up learning is that it takes time, time, and more time to build a truly lasting academic reputation. Emory markets its potential to eventually become the kind of school that UChicago is…but so far, it’s just potential. No amount of money can buy you class. The only potential disappointment here is that Emory could be farther along right now than it is. Blame the administration for that. President Wagner is a joke and needs to be fired. Period.</p>
<p>UChicago has had a huge increase in applications in the past few years. It has been known as intellectual school for years and has had a lot of famous professors over the years. Did they do a better job marketing or did more people want to come because they heard from friends that the education quality there is great?</p>
<p>Well that’s my point. UChi has an identity – top tier academic powerhouse , birthplace of Chicago econ, haven for physicists, factory of serious academic intellectuals.</p>
<p>They don’t need to “literally” market their image because they’ve succeeded.</p>
<p>Why should Wagner be fired? I don’t know how much he has to do with the day to day administration of the school, but the school has probably gone downhill in the last several years.</p>
<p>He’s been president since 2003, I can’t point to a single area of the school that’s grown in prestige because of him. All he did was write that damn mission statement and build some new buildings.</p>
<p>He hired the Dalai Lama and Salman Rushdie as professors.</p>
<p>Yeah but those titles are more honorary than anything else.</p>