Held Hostage In Illinois: Memes Help Me Cope With Captivity
I’m a native of Texas. When I moved to Illinois to take a teaching position at Eastern Illinois University, one of the first Illinois jokes I learned was “In other states, governors sign the license plates. In Illinois, they make them.” The joke refers to the infamous tales of corruption and the fact that four former governors have been convicted of felonies.
But none of those who’ve served time behind bars has come close to the amount of damage that we’re witnessing right now at the hands of the current alleged Governor Bruce Rauner (Twitter, Facebook).
Once Upon A Time In A Land Called Illinois
The state has gone without a budget for 276 days, as Rauner has vetoed budget and funding proposals submitted by the Democratic-majority Legislature. In January, he spoke about his proposals for a 2017 budget despite there being no budget for 2016.
The only thing that’s prevented the entire state government from collapsing has been the judicial branch forcing the state to provide funds for 90 percent of the state’s responsibilities.
That sounds like something one could grudgingly accept. But for the fact that the OTHER 10 percent of the state isn’t receiving ANY state funding.
That 10 percent includes the entire public system of colleges and universities, as well as programs for the homeless, elderly, mentally ill, addicted, and some law enforcement expenses (like testing rape kits).
The only hope now for funding appears to be a legislative override of the governor’s veto, which is 2–3 votes short of happening (we might have a vote this week)
I’m in that 10 percent. I teach at Eastern Illinois University, a small-ish public university founded in 1895. EIU has received exactly $0 from the State since July, 2015. We’ve watched staff get laid off, administrators laid off or receive furloughs (a nicer name for unpaid involuntary leave), and the union representing faculty members recently accepted a pay deferral to provide the university with $2 million in cash flow through the end of the year.
Other state universities are no better off, nor are our community college colleagues. Northeastern Illinois, Western Illinois, Southern Illinois have all announced similar measures. Chicago State took the unprecedented move of cancelling Spring Break so they could finish the semester before their on-hand funds ran out in May. They are preparing for more layoffs.
I wish to emphasize that none of this is the fault of profligate college administrators or lazy, pampered professors. Eastern is a very efficient university. Other smaller schools in the state system are likewise not known for extravagant spending. All of them have provided a superior educational experience to their students this year despite the state’s budget impasse.
But the cracks are showing, and we cannot continue on forever without funding from the state. Every single layoff, pay cut and furlough day can be laid squarely at the feet of the governor, who has refused to budge on his “Turnaround Agenda” being included in any budget, despite that agenda having nothing to do with funding the operations of the state. This is not a case of “Both Sides Do It.”
The uncertainty is causing damage not only for our current students, but for future students considering where they should attend college. And who could blame them? Would you want to send your child to school in a state where the government doesn’t show evidence of giving a damn about college students?
One does not simply make one meme
It’s been frustrating to watch. About 50 days ago, I started posting my own memes on Facebook, counting up the days without funding for higher education.
The first ones were easy. You can see all of them in this Facebook album. When I started, I still had a naive hope that the situation would end. But my naivete has faded. Now I continue the memes because it gives me somewhere to channel my energy. I cannot go to Springfield (the state capital) every day and yell at legislators. The governor seems completely unconcerned with the needs of this constituency, not to mention the other agencies and their constituents who are falling through the cracks (WBEZ public radio has a series, “Caught In The Middle,” about these individuals I encourage you to listen to).
So I make these memes. I’ve learned way too much about the proper use of the Impact font, and which meme generators have the best images. I’ve spent too much of my personal time gauging which memes I could post without hearkening to offensive sibling-memes.
And I would gladly give it up today. But I can’t. Not until my friends and colleagues are back on the job. Not until students receive the funds they’ve been promised for MAP grants. Not until future college students can be assured that the state means to maintain its higher education system for the future.
Friday, April 1, I had the opportunity to attend the one-day rally/strike in Chicago along with thousands of other citizens of the state.
I actually made myself into a sort of meme during the rallies. At Chicago State, a photographer from Catalyst Chicago magazine tweeted a photo of me holding my protest sign:
To date, the photo has quite a few shares, and I posted it on Facebook and shared elsewhere. Others took photos of the sign throughout the day, so it might have made its way further through the Internetosphere. I was in the background of a live TV segment on Univision Chicago.
I’m glad the sign got some play, not because I’m a camera hog, but because I want others around the nation to hear about what we, the citizens of Illinois, have been going through for the last nine months. What’s sad is that it took a strike by the Chicago Teachers Union to focus the nation’s attention for a few moments between coverage of Donald Trump’s gaffe-prone presidential campaign.
Illinois’ citizens are being treated horribly by their government. We are not statistics. We are not numbers in a ledger. We — students, staff, faculty, administrators — are tired of being used as a bargaining chip, as if our lives and the proud traditions of these universities are cheap pieces of plastic in some kind of game.
