Teach-In: A Critical Panel on the New Badger Partnership

Join sponsors Badger Impact, Student Progressive Dane, and Student Labor Action Coalition for a critical and analytical teach-in on the New Badger Partnership and the Biddy Martin/Scott Walker proposal to split off of UW-Madison from the UW System.

Thus far, the public forums on the manner have all been held on the basis of Chancellor Biddy Martin's Office fielding questions on the Partnership and addressing concerns--in short, making the case for the Partnership. 

Now, at a critical point in time, with the Partnership written into Gov. Scott Walker's Budget and $250 million dollars in cuts to the UW System looming in the next two years, a six-person panel Teach-In will be held to address the multiplicity of concerns for this proposal, from a historical, sociological, socio-economic, international, and national perspective on the New Badger Partnership, with a Q&A to follow.

Panelists include:

-Adrienne Pagac: Graduate Student in Sociology Department, and Steward for the Teaching Assistants' Association (TAA - AFT Local #3220). Pagac will discuss how the New Badger Partnership is harmful for graduate and Ph.D students, particularly those in the social sciences and humanities.

-Allen Ruff: Madison community activist and historian (U.W.-Madison, Ph.D., History, 1987); Author of Forward - A History of Dane, the Capitol County (2001), Ruff, from the lens of a historian, will discuss how the New Badger Partnership is the antithesis of the WI Idea.

-Ben Manski: Executive Director of the Liberty Tree Foundation for the Democratic Revolution. Manski recently ran on the Green Party ticket in the 77th Assembly District of Wisconsin, located on the west side of Madison, in Nov. 2010, capturing 31% of the popular vote. Manski also recently co-founded "Wisconsin Wave," which describes itself as, "a force independent of political parties and partisan elected officials. It is an awakening of Wisconsinites independent of --but not exclusive of-- whatever other political, union, faith, or organizational affiliations we each might have."

-Steve Stern: Associate Vice Provost for Faculty and Staff Programs works closely with individuals in administrative offices, deans of schools and colleges, and other units across campus to address issues of concern to faculty and staff. Stern is also a history professor who works in the Chicano and Latino Studies Program and the Department of History.

-Sara Goldrick-Rab: Assistant Professor of Educational Policy Studies and Sociology, as well as Associate Director for Research, WISCAPE, the WI Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education and co-author of the blog "Eduoptimists," which she maintains alongside her husband Liam Goldrick. She will discuss how to use pragmatic idealism to save affordable public higher education and give a socio-economic critical analysis of the current proposal based on that premise

-Chad Goldberg: Associate Professor in the Sociology Dept. and Vice President, United Faculty & Academic Staff (UFAS), AFT 223. His primary research interest is the "comparative-historical and political sociology of citizenship, broadly understood to include the development of citizenship rights and duties over time, changing levels and forms of civic engagement and political participation, and shifting patterns of civil inclusion and exclusion." He will discuss the harmful effects the New Badger Partnerships could have for academic faculty in their ability to collectively organize.

Please join us for what should be an enlightening panel on various critiques of the New Badger Partnership from a scholarly perspective, many of which have yet to see the light of day here on-campus!