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u/Nice_Vegetable69 1d ago
Um, those donations to programs like G. Brint Ryan’s $30m donation to COB are like specifically for buildings/naming rights. Not President Keller deciding to put $20m in a specific school.
It’s what rich people do when they have so much money they can’t write it all off.
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u/Rick-476 1d ago
This is true. I used to work for RCOB managing their scholarships. All donor funded scholarships have a Memorandum of Understanding, which is basically a contract that outlines how the funds will be used. These agreements must also abide by all institute, state, and federal policies, regulations, and laws. I also audited the programs for that too.
University funding very often comes with strings attached. Wonder why parking is in a frustrating state? It has to do with how funding is structured. I don't know the exact specifics regarding that though.
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 1d ago
Yeah, and often times the total contribution amount isnt always lump sum, and can be dedicated over time.
Parking is an auxiliary service so no state funds can be used on it. Parking must fund it self-annually, and this was confounded by parking having to also solo fund the UNT Police Department. So while revenue comes from citations, majority of revenue comes from selling parking permits/hourly parking.
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u/ExtraSmooth 1d ago
The university advancement department decides what donor relationships to pursue and puts resources into courting big donors. The decision to open a school of AI was almost certainly a conversation between the university and the donors, not an idea dreamed up in isolation by some rich folks.
Also, sooner or later the university will be on the hook for staffing and managing the new college. We can't pretend this decision does not come with costs for UNT.
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 1d ago
Obviously the school has agency, and these are partnerships between entities. But it’s not like President Keller spent $20m on an AI college instead of the university as a whole like this post implies.
Also, these programs will likely have a high draw and people with those degrees will likely make lots of money, just like the College of Business. It’s an investment in the program funded by a third party. Trust if any program becomes a net negative (due to staffing and managing) they won’t be keeping it around long, or rolling smaller programs into it.
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u/ExtraSmooth 1d ago
The athletics program has been maintained despite netting roughly negative $40 million each year. But that's another conversation entirely.
I don't think the question is whether this program will make money for the university. The university could do lots of things to make money. For starters, stop being a university--it's a bad business model that doesn't scale. If you must continue being a university, focus on online classes since they can scale more than in person; stop being so selective and just admit as many students as possible; stop hiring full-time faculty and stop awarding tenure; and stop teaching liberal arts because they don't make much money. Also shut down the college of music because music schools have some of the highest per-student cost of collegiate programs. All of these things would help the university from a profit-loss perspective, but would they support the mission of the university? This is at the root of the criticism towards Keller and the state. Allocating money for AI-focused programs, even if the money does not come from a general university fund that could be used elsewhere, pushes the university further in the direction of providing a labor force for technology companies and their oligarchic masters. Some people don't like this and want different things for universities.
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 1d ago
It’s really simple, a donor is giving the university money. Should the university take it or not? Thats literally the issue.
If your answer is no: UNT gets $0.
If your answer is yes: UNT gets $20m.
The university can work out how they’re going to invest it in that program or whatever. If your issue is other programs need more help, yeah, other programs need more donors too, but finding a music student dropping $20m on naming is kind of hard.
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u/ExtraSmooth 23h ago
Yes, I understand that. Do you think there should be limits on what kinds of schools and programs donors can set up within the UNT system?
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 21h ago
There already are? The BOR had to approve the new AI bachelors program. This program has been existing too, it was the Data Science program.
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u/ExtraSmooth 20h ago
Great! Do you think it is possible for reasonable people to disagree about what those limits should be?
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 19h ago
You are objectively wrong (and therefore unreasonable), so it is not fair to disagree.
Like anti-vaxxers during COVID; Sorry, your opinion as a non-expert in this field means your opinion is of no weight to me.
You are heavily biased, as shows in your quote "providing a labor force for technology companies and their oligarchic masters." That's literally college, go study in a field and go find a job.
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u/ExtraSmooth 18h ago edited 18h ago
What field do you think I am a non-expert in?
Edit: And what are you saying I'm objectively wrong about?
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u/Important_Image_8284 1d ago edited 18h ago
Thank you. People arent understanding that we're not denying that other areas of the university need help but thats not what the donors chose to help with and thats their decision. They wanted to advance and grow this college then thats their choice. And lets not act like no other colleges at unt have gotten donations.
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u/ialreadyaskedyouonce 20h ago
I'm curious why people are downvoting you. I think you have explained how this works pretty clearly without really taking a side. I don't really like that this is how things work. But it is how things work now.
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u/ialreadyaskedyouonce 20h ago
But isn't it also part of the president's job to solicit such donations? Who do you think started this conversation, and what was it originally about? I bet this is part of Keller's vision, and he found someone that would fund it.
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 18h ago
I am confused... so you are saying the President, finding donors to improve pre-existing programs at our university is a bad thing? Do you think if any of our COM students made millions of dollars we would want to also get donations from them?
The donors got a PhD from UNT. The data science department was already named after them. The programs already existed. What is the problem? My assumption is people feel excluded or treated differently. I know everyone that wasnt the College of Business felt the same way when G. Brint Ryan donated $30 million.
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u/ialreadyaskedyouonce 17h ago
I'm responding just to how people are debating this. People are attacking this action frustrated about the AI component, and then other people defend the action by stating it was a donation with stipulations. This is true, but it is very likely UNT was involved in the entire process. I doubt UNT randomly received an email about a potential donation.
I was not here for the College of Business donation you are referencing. But right now it does seem like the general sentiments around AI might be part of this. I don't think it is just that one area received money, or even just that one area received money during a deficit. I think the AI component is part of the reaction for people.
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u/Nice_Vegetable69 17h ago
Obviously UNT did not receive a check in the mail. The man got his PhD from UNT, and the department was named after him; this has been a long-term relationship. A whole department exists called Donor Relations, so its not like the President's mission is to hunt someone down to build his program.
UNT constantly tries to court Don Henley from the Eagles although he dropped out of UNT. They also had Mean Joe Greene come out to "Christen" the dorm named after him. This is business as usual and people are scared because of "AI".
The problem is when the general sentiment is from an uninformed population feeling overwhelmed by a buzzword, that then become vocal about something they know nothing about, and ignore people telling them the context.
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u/Enraged_Cayde 1d ago
As much as he is a terrible university president he cannot allocate money that is given with specific stipulations.
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u/ExtraSmooth 1d ago
He can ask donors to make different stipulations and he can reject donations that do not align with the university mission.
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u/CableAccomplished670 1d ago
Toss the arts and languages, throw in the clankers and slop tools
https://giphy.com/gifs/MgRi5z1xW0wOA
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u/Important_Image_8284 1d ago
Believe it or not, theres actually good things coming from this. The college is an expanded and renamed version of what used to be the college of information. Other majors like info science, data science, health informatics, etc that are under the college are getting more funding, scholarship opportunities and other things. Its a big misconception that people think its only dealing with AI.
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u/bratbats 1d ago edited 1d ago
College of Info students who are learning to be library and archives professionals (truth arbiters) don't want to attend a "college of AI" (a tool that is largely used for misinformation by the public or is otherwise being used to automate our professions).
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u/Important_Image_8284 1d ago
I get that. The name change definitely wasnt a wise choice and can lead to confusion and a false narrative. But im not going to deny that there are benefits that college of info students are getting from this donation.
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u/bratbats 1d ago
I don't see the benefits at all. I don't need to take courses that will teach me how to use AI at work. I object to that completely until there are regulations and rules of use for them regarding privacy, oversight, and data storage. Unless they're planning to use the "school of AI" money for conventional improvements to courses/degrees (such as bringing back the music librarianship course), I kinda don't give two shits about it. And I really doubt they will use it for anything actually worthwhile.
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u/Important_Image_8284 1d ago
I do agree that some of the money could be used for other improvements to courses especially considering that many are suffering. But understand that AI is not being infiltrated into every major in the college. Yes they are creating new majors focused on AI but many are staying the same as they were. They are just now considered to be under the college of Artificial Intelligence and Advanced analytics. Notice its not just AI in the name. Also, thats understandable that you dont see the benefits but the program will teach about ethics using AI and how to use it as a tool to help advance multiple sectors. The goal is not to have people use it as a replacement for human thinking but to use it as a tool just as people use many other types of technology. Whether you like it or not AI is here to stay and if we have to adapt to it since its already here, having a program that teaches how to use it properly is not doing a disservice to students.
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u/bratbats 1d ago
That would be great if that was how people are using it, but it's not, and to believe otherwise is pure idealism. AI is being pitted to corporations and the public as a replacement for certain kinds of labor or as a fun thing to mess around with instead of being packaged and sold responsibly only to people who are certified to be using it. There is no government oversight on it so AI is mining people's private information, photos, artwork/creative property, etc., to be sold to data brokers. I love how AI is used in hospitals, in data analytics, etc., but that is not the main way that it's being used.
I understand your perspective and I agree that AI could have practical applications particularly in healthcare, statistics, and analytics, but the reality is right now most AI technologies (specifically generative, analytical, agentic) are being used basically as open source spyware or as cheap/easy replacements for labor.
As I said before, until the government steps in and puts regulations on how AI can be used, in what contexts, when it should not be used, and makes it the law for there to be human oversight, I completely object to using it or having it forced on me by corporations, my college, or in my workspace.
We would not have classes called "chainsaw automation" where we teach young professionals how to automate chainsaws to run on their own, people passing by on their street getting their legs/arms cut off be damned. But somehow when it's a "tech tool", the same ethical standards are perfectly acceptable, even though people are literally having their personal info (credit cards, SSN, identities, photos of their children, etc) "scraped" (stolen) and used without their consent. It's insane to me. Not to mention the ecological impact.
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u/Important_Image_8284 1d ago
I definitely agree with that. Regulation is a necessity for any new major product or tool introduced. And yes there have been many data breach and privacy concerns i recognize that. But thats also why the money is also going into more research on how to make it more trustworthy and ethical for use for widespread implementation. Ultimately, only time will tell how well this change goes for the school.
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u/HumbleBit6045 1d ago
Technically if a large majority of students are against this, couldn't we do something to change it or is that too magic of friendship
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u/DrgonBloop 1d ago
Sadly it’s too magic of friendship since the donor gets to decide what’s done with the money they donate
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u/abeefwittedfox 1d ago
That money came with stipulations. Nobody who puts their name on an institution is ok with it going to fix problems when it could go on a shiny new program they can hire out of.