For reasons that I have never fully grasped, PIC seems to have always been under attack since I first joined the program. The particular reasons the program is under trouble has changed each time, but there is always some new excuse for trying to close down PIC after the program addresses these issues. Over the years we have had our funding lines (once up to 12) completely slashed, so that now PIC doesn't have a single funding line not connected to outside grants and funding. While the slashing was originally justified due the economic situation, no other program was so effected. Recently PIC had some very good news in terms of our ranking by the National Research Council (in it the program was ranked number one in terms of diversity, for example). But that hasn't helped, as the newest issue is an over a decade old filing error that suddenly threatens the entire program's continued existence.
I could go on. It is ridiculous. I will probably make further posts on this issue as I know more, and probably do some begging of letter writing and petition signing on behalf of PIC.
The agony of the rat or the slaughter of a calf remains present in thought not through pity but as the zone of exchange between man and animal in which something of one passes into the other. - Deleuze and Guattari, What Is Philosophy?
