As the statewide deficit grows larger, the SF State Asian American Studies department has suffered some major cuts over the current and upcoming semesters, College of Ethnic Studies Dean Kenneth Monteiro said.

Monteiro announced last semester that due to vacant lines—where the department has not yet hired permanent faculty—the AAS department will suffer “a gigantic 52 percent cut of classes,” Associated Students Ethnic Studies representative and Concerned Students in Action group member, Cory Wong said.

Currently, the 52 percent has been reduced to 21 percent, due to funds provided by Provost John Gemello and Monteiro. These fixes, however, will likely be temporary, AAS department staff said.

“When we receive state cuts they must come from the vacant lines,” Monteiro said. “And the cuts made to the college were absorbed where we had them.”

Though the College of Ethnic Studies continues to grow each year, AAS has the highest number of vacant lines in the department. Therefore, it has the most searches open for new faculty and as a result, shoulder a greater burden than other departments, Monteiro said.

While some say there was also the option of cutting filled lines, Monteiro stated, “When the state cuts are faculty monies, firing tenure track or tenured faculty is not contractually possible.”

Yet members of the Concerned Students in Action group beg to differ.

“Those ‘vacant’ professor teaching spots are not vacant,” Wong said. “[They are filled] by replacement lecturers or part-time teachers.”

The group, made up of about 50 students, has come together since the announcement regarding the cuts was made in late September. The group’s goal is in fighting the cuts and they have been meeting weekly with AAS faculty. Their purpose is “directed toward bringing self-determination, shared governance, and transparency back to Ethnic Studies,” according to the AAS’ Faculty/Staff’s official Self-Determination and Shared Governance position paper.

Moreover, the Concerned Students group believes that “the burden of budget cuts should be shared equally across campus.”

The cuts will be equivalent to “up to 900 displaced seats for students, overly impacted classrooms, loss of valued part-time faculty and faculty teaching classes they’ve never taught before,” according to AAS staff.

At a meeting on Oct. 10, faculty, students and Concerned Students members met with Monteiro to resolve conflicts over the AAS’ right to self-determination and shared governance, which was mainly focused on decision-making.

“He said he will do a better job keeping the communication lines open between departments and himself,” said Aileen E. Pagtakhan, AAS studies major and Manalo Movement activist.

Monteiro stated that from now on, all the ethnic studies departments will be involved in some important decision-making, including the budget.

The dean also explained that his earlier “decisions were based on orders from the provost and other higher administration,” according to Pagtakhan.

Laureen Chew, associate dean of ethnic studies, stated her concern with the current situation by calling the cuts the largest she has seen in her 28 years at SF State.

Chew will be teaching for AAS next semester as part of the temporary fixes.

In order to promote awareness of the current situation, the Concerned Students in Action has also come up with “Save Our AAS” T-shirts and red bands.

“We do need to remember that SF State has the only Ethnic Studies College,” Pagtakhan said. “It’s a real treasure that sits in our backyard.”

For more information go to: http://asi.sfsu.edu.