Lawmakers aren't the only ones who question faculty efficiency. Voters assume the worst, too, when professors don't spend 40 hours a week in the classroom. The eagle eye of the legislature, it seems, is trained on higher education in the everlasting hunt for greater cost savings. This is a very conservative state. We dislike tax increases, and we like to keep our budget balanced.
Some legislators regard bonding and borrowing as deficit spending.
Those attitudes are unlikely to change. University officials have responded by studying the successful tactics of Utah public school teachers. In recent years, school teachers have personalized their budget requests, demonstrating widespread needs with public polls and anecdotes from students and parents affected by funding shortages. Dry statistics and dull graphs are translated into lost opportunities for children. Not that they aren't sincere, but their views won't carry as much weight with us as the neighbor who stops us in the grocery store to express his concerns.