For the past month, students, faculty and staff alike have had the opportunity to scour the task force reports and pass judgement on their recommendations for retooling the University. With the exception of the Libraries Task Force Report — which garnered some heated feedback due to its bold proposals to cut costs — the task force reports have stimulated little debate and disagreement from the community, and that which has occurred has been, for the most part, civil.

Yet it is the very civility of the recent discussions — sparked by the banality of the reports, concerned primarily with defending individual strengths over proposing radical change — that has us worried. Now is the time for innovative ideas and progressive ploys, no matter how many feathers they might ruffle.

Looking at the reports prepared by individual colleges, we have seen broad proposals to retrofit departments and majors. But absent from many of the reports are concrete plans to significantly cut costs. As would be expected from such a self-reflective assignment, the colleges’ task forces were cautious of proposing cuts that would threaten each individual college’s standing and strength. And as a result, these timid reports suggest much less drastic plans of action than those that we expect will be rolled out by the provost in the coming months.

The School of Industrial and Labor Relations Task Force Report, for instance, insisted that the school had already reduced its workforce in 2008 and restructured its budget when New York State cut funds for the college. The report made no mention of shrinking faculty size, altering course offerings or further cutting back on administrative funding. Similarly, the College of Human Ecology clung to its past, asserting that the college has already succumbed to cuts of $2 million per year to offset the costs of major construction projects.

Over on the Arts Quad, the College of Arts and Sciences Task Force quivered at the thought of cuts beyond the scope of administrative costs, putting forth the idea that across-the-board cuts would not suit the college well. The report did go as far as endorsing the “Dartmouth-plan” of overhauling the academic calendar to enroll more students year-round, but it has since been made clear by administrators that such a plan would not be viable for a school like Cornell.

In the College of Engineering, the task force report recommended that the school allow its faculty to naturally shrink by attrition. But in the field of engineering, faculty size should downsize strategically, keeping cutting-edge fields of research as strong as they can be.

Day Hall’s decision to create task forces to recommend the most efficient ways of trimming millions from the University’s budget was a noble one. But few of these proposals realistically reflect the severity of the cuts being faced.

We hoped the academic task force reports would have generated more innovative ideas for generating funds and looking across colleges for opportunities to collaboratively cut costs. We fear that the toughest most controversial cuts are only to come, and we thus urge the community to continue to vocalize their concerns and suggestions to the University.