Rally Day - FLXIV Interactive

The Rally for Higher Education should be a great way to exchange ideas. Here are some of the ideas we've heard for stopping faculty cuts at LSU.

Add your own in the comments!

1. Administrators could take a voluntary 11 month salary spread out over 12 months. This would generate enough money for to keep foreign language instructors employed through the spring semester (the chancellor said that he would double whatever cut his colleagues agreed to).

2. Each one of the colleges at LSU-BR could adopt a foreign language faculty member for one semester so that the instructors could finish out a full year of service.

3. Other colleges with extra money from vacant faculty lines and other sources could voluntarily contribute to Humanities and Social Sciences (or be directed by the administration to do so) to keep faculty cuts from becoming a reality.

4. Increase out-of-state tuition. LSU could double the amount of out-of-state tuition and it would still be cheaper than in-state tuition in Texas.

5. The Athletic Department which is financially separate from the University could play the hero off the football field and contribute $270,000 to keep faculty from absorbing the budget cuts this year.

6.  The Chancellor could voluntarily act on the recommendations of the AAUP and the Faculty Senate to reinstate the Foreign Language Fourteen until alternatives to faculty cuts can be explored with full faculty representation.

FLXIV Interactive: What else can we do?

We've petitioned the administration to continue our contracts through spring, and they have refused "given the budget situation." We've written letters to the Chancellor, the Board of Supervisors, the Board of Regents, the Reveille, the Advocate, and the Chronicle of Higher Education. We've marched in the Jazz Funeral for Higher Education. We've met with the Faculty Senate and the AAUP.  We've set up a Facebook page and a blog. All of this has been to increase awareness that budget cuts at LSU are real and the administration is exacting its pound of flesh from the most vulnerable limbs of academia (the humanities).  
WHAT ELSE CAN WE DO? Leave a comment with your suggestions.

FLXIV Interactive - When did you first realize knowing a foreign language was cool?

Can you understand Japanese in an anime film?

Do you know that Spanish won't get you anywhere in Brazil?
Can you read Plato in ancient Greek?
Do you know what the German motto of Volkswagen means?
Can you translate the motto of Hogwarts into English?

Can you read street signs in Russia?

Can you successfully order (or avoid) ossobuco in Italy?

Do you get more out the Lion King because you know Swahili?

Can you read the Old Testament in Hebrew?

When did you first realize that knowing a foreign language was cool?  Leave a note in the comments!