SSU will close 17 days during school year

<p>Sonoma State University will be closed 17 days during the school year, including six Fridays in the spring semester when classes were traditionally held, as a result of the state's cost-cutting furlough program.</p><p>President Ruben Armiñana acknowledged the changed landscape at the Rohnert Park campus and elsewhere in the 23-campus California State University system in his 27-minute speech to faculty, staff and administrators who packed 475-seat Person Theater for the semiannual convocation to kick off the semester Monday.</p><p>Most students return to class Tuesday.</p><p>“The furloughs affect all levels of the institution and we can expect complaints from students and the public about things not getting done as well, or as much, or as fast, as they had been,” Armiñana said. </p><p>The school will be largely shuttered Nov. 27, Dec. 24 and 31, Jan. 8 and 22, Feb. 5 and 19, March 12 and 26, and April 5, 6, 7 and 8, May 7 and 21 and June 4 and 11.</p><p>Armiñana praised staff and faculty for agreeing to the deal which saved the school about $6.3 million and amounts to about a 10 percent pay cut, saying without the furloughs the campus would have suffered massive layoffs and slashed class offerings.</p><p>“Unfortunately, some classes will be cancelled anyway, but not as many, and others may have to make adjustments to the days and times in which they meet,” he said.</p><p>An approximately 30 percent increase in student fees will generate about $5 million and reducing enrollment by 450 full-time students over two years will save $4.7 million.</p><p>Those cuts will have lasting impact, said SSU professor and faculty association chapter president Andy Merrifield in an impassioned address to the crowd.</p><p>Many members of the audience held pottery “begging bowls” which they struck with chop sticks throughout the nearly three hour event.</p><p>“There is a lot of anger. There should be a lot of anger,” Merrifield said, saying Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Republicans and Democrats in the Legislature and CSU Chancellor Charles Reed deserve the brunt of the anger.</p><p>“We are not going to let the fascist bastards win,” he said in a union rallying cry that earned whoops of approval from some members of the audience.</p><p>In one of the few bright spots of the traditional gathering of hundreds of members of the SSU community to kick off the school year, Provost Eduardo Ochoa announced that the school has lifted the 16 unit cap last spring to keep expenses in check.</p><p>That cap will be lifted to 20 units so long as the student limit for particular offerings is not exceeded, Ochoa said.</p><p>“I think that has helped a lot with some of the anxiety that some of the students have,” he said.</p><p>Despite the somber tone of much of the convocation, Ochoa urged cooperation between members of the campus community to navigate not only the fall semester but the coming years marred by budgetary woes.</p><p>“We are entering into an environment that is likely to be permanently altered,” Ochoa.</p><p>“We have to avoid at all costs, circling the wagons and then turning our guns inward when faced with threats,” he said.</p>