USF (and other FL Universities) moving on down to the slums

[hightechbull]

The top robotics professor is leaving USF because of what?  Low salary and budget cuts.  She was the professor who gained national attention in the WTC rescue attempts and the recent rescue attempts at the Utah mine disaster.  Story Here.

These three paragraphs reveal the sad state of education in Floriduh:

"USF is a great university, and it will make it, but it's going to be harder," Murphy said. "And the truth is, I am getting older, and my opportunities to make a difference in this world are getting shorter. These are my prime-time years."

She said she cannot spend those years worrying about the cost of printer paper. Yes, it has come down to that, she said.

"We're down to the level here where they're saying you have to pay for your own printer paper."

It looks like Florida is achieving its new goal of becoming the most mediocre state in the nation.  No one wants to pay any taxes to save maybe $10 a year, well guess what?  Money does not grow on trees.  There is no magical "free enterprise fairy" that will wave a magic wand and pay for things like education, roads, firemen, or police.  Services are cut.

But that is OK.  We got foot-a-ma-ball and enough huge rebel flags (honoring the treasonous succession from the Union) to make people think we are in the Confederacy.  When some professional sports team owned by millionaires wants the citizens to pass a tax referendum to build a stadium with public funds, the two-toothed rednecks are sacrificing their virgin daughters on the alter of pro sports so rich people can get richer and poor can get poorer and stupider.

Keep the populace dumb and voting in the best interests of the rich class instead of themselves and others in their socioeconomic class - that is the goal of the leaders in Florida.

This news about the brain drain at USF is a sad day for USF and the other State Universities.

[Jihme]

not good for academics.  hopefully these budgets will stop getting squeezed.

[BullsWinBucsWin]

Or maybe our government can find a more efficient way to spend the ridiculous amounts of taxpayer dollars that are already sent to the aforementioned services.  I realize that probably will never happen, so I guess we will just be drilled more and more with higher taxes.

[USF_Grouper]

This is a major loss, Dr. Murphy was probably the most respected professor in USF Department of Computer Science and Engineering when I was a student.  Certainly we have brought in some big name researchers since then but she will be hard to replace.  I will donate enough money to cover her paper costs if she agrees to stay.

[Bull Martin]

This is a major loss, Dr. Murphy was probably the most respected professor in USF Department of Computer Science and Engineering when I was a student.  Certainly we have brought in some big name researchers since then but she will be hard to replace.  I will donate enough money to cover her paper costs if she agrees to stay.

I worked as a student assistant in the engineering department for a while.  She was an arrogant stuck up *****!  That woman was on so many restrictions and violated her grants so many times.  She complained one time because she had to pay back grant money she spent on food.  I know for a fact that the engineering department offered copy machines and printers for all things research based, but you did have to print them in the department offices.

She just was lazy and cut corners.  I was not a great fan of hers.  She always acted pissy to me because the first time I met her I had no idea who she was and asked.  I guess I didn't know the great celebrity she was.  Forget her!

[USF_Grouper]

I understand that she had a (deserved) reputation among students for being rude and difficult to work with, but she is a very famous reseracher in the field of robotics.  She brought in lots of grant money and publicity to the university and loosing her over what sounds like fairly trivial costs is unfortunate. 

[Bull Martin]

I understand that she had a (deserved) reputation among students for being rude and difficult to work with, but she is a very famous reseracher in the field of robotics.  She brought in lots of grant money and publicity to the university and loosing her over what sounds like fairly trivial costs is unfortunate. 

I worked in the Engineering Dean's office for a while.  She was constantly getting in trouble for spending grant money inappropriately.  I'm not sure if it was her, but I think she bought a flat screen TV with her grant money once and they got upset when she had to pay for it.  I'm sure what ever finally tipped her over the edge might have been trivial, but she brought it upon herself.  If it was over copy paper it was merely the last straw.  She may have been a famous researcher, but she wasn't very intelligent about rules.  She felt that she was above them.

[CyberBull]

We shouldn't make this personal. Most top flight researchers are 'high maintenance' and why successful universities don't cut corners in hiring the best compliance and grants management personnel to make sure things are done correctly and keep these folks in line. That hasn't always been the case at USF.

Murphy like a lot of other researchers at USF and UF are leaving b/c they are being offered more space and resources. That is really what it comes down to for most of these people. USF will never be able to compete against the Ivies, but we should not lose our best faculty to Texas A&M. It's a fine school but not leagues better than USF. BTW...we have also lost a lot of good faculty who didn't have attitude problems. Heck....we lost an up and coming faculty member to Georgia State....for crying out loud!!!

What is troublesome to me, is that USF is allowing monies that should be going to the main campus to be siphoned away to these out of control branch campuses that really hurt USF at this point more than they help us attain AAU eligibility.

[Bullpride08]

We shouldn't make this personal. Most top flight researchers are 'high maintenance' and why successful universities don't cut corners in hiring the best compliance and grants management personnel to make sure things are done correctly and keep these folks in line. That hasn't always been the case at USF.

Murphy like a lot of other researchers at USF and UF are leaving b/c they are being offered more space and resources. That is really what it comes down to for most of these people. USF will never be able to compete against the Ivies, but we should not lose our best faculty to Texas A&M. It's a fine school but not leagues better than USF. BTW...we have also lost a lot of good faculty who didn't have attitude problems. Heck....we lost an up and coming faculty member to Georgia State....for crying out loud!!!

What is troublesome to me, is that USF is allowing monies that should be going to the main campus to be siphoned away to these out of control branch campuses that really hurt USF at this point more than they help us attain AAU eligibility.

What dollars are going to St. Petersburg campus?  It is a completely autonomous campus as requested by a certain legislator and it is responsible for it's own budget, facilities, and hiring.  USF is only a consultant and a hand holder no meaningful dollars from Tampa to go St. Pete.

The issue is with the legislation.  Come on this has been an issue plastered across the papers for the past 6-8 months especially now that budgets are being cut so heavily.  This is not a USF issue it is a FL University system issue, and inspite of the massive budget cuts the state is still not allowing any of the FL schools institute any meaningful tuition increases.  It's almost insane.

TAMU is rated much higher academically then USF, and many more schools will leapfrog USF and UCF, and others when we're forced to artificially cap tuition, and the state continuing to cut our operating budgets let alone facilities improvements.

How about a state approving TWO Medical Schools in a state that was having trouble filling one up at the time (FSU).  Those schools are a decade away from being fully self-sufficient and where do those dollars come from to operate?  The same pool of dollars we're all getting cut at as we speak.

The villian here is not branch campuses which by and large have to feed from the same trough as USF, and if USF pulled out of those branches a UCF, or UF would jump in immediately grab that regional campus, the villian is a state legislation that can't seem to get out of the way and let these Universities run themselves.  If they'd let these BOT's run their schools and raise tuition and improvements as they're needed things would govern themselves much more smoothly.

We have no business being in the AAU when there are community colleges outside of FL where it costs more to go to school then USF.  Until that get's remedied and dollars can truly go into these universities the system is flawed.  Hell there are actually branch campuses outside of FL that have better educations than USF or UCF...but the tuition is also twice as much so it's easier for those schools to provide a top flight education.

[Bull Martin]

We shouldn't make this personal. Most top flight researchers are 'high maintenance' and why successful universities don't cut corners in hiring the best compliance and grants management personnel to make sure things are done correctly and keep these folks in line. That hasn't always been the case at USF.

Murphy like a lot of other researchers at USF and UF are leaving b/c they are being offered more space and resources. That is really what it comes down to for most of these people. USF will never be able to compete against the Ivies, but we should not lose our best faculty to Texas A&M. It's a fine school but not leagues better than USF. BTW...we have also lost a lot of good faculty who didn't have attitude problems. Heck....we lost an up and coming faculty member to Georgia State....for crying out loud!!!

What is troublesome to me, is that USF is allowing monies that should be going to the main campus to be siphoned away to these out of control branch campuses that really hurt USF at this point more than they help us attain AAU eligibility.

I don't mean to make it personal, but I'm just saying it wasn't paper that made her leave.  She's probably getting a bigger lab, or better pay.  She's leaving, but it's not because of paper.  That just shows her character.  She's obviously making excuses to justify her leaving.

She was a top flight researcher and it’s not an improvement to let her go, but it’s not the end of the world.

And since she’s gone we might as well look optimistically at it. So, I’m glad that USF is down one stuck-up ***** of a professor.