Sketchy Foxconn deal the latest example of corporations skewing (and screwing?) the UW.

The Foxconn PR assault continued today, under the guise of a huge planned donation to my alma mater.

Foxconn CEO Terry Gou and ⁦@UWMadison⁩ Chancellor Rebecca Blank sign agreement, followed by playing of “On Wisconsin” pic.twitter.com/cDniQv8OIr

— Scott Bauer (@sbauerAP) August 27, 2018

Here’s Bucky with Foxconn CEO Terry Gau and ⁦@UWMadison⁩ Chancellor Rebecca Blank pic.twitter.com/XaMkAShf8w

— Scott Bauer (@sbauerAP) August 27, 2018

Sounds like a big deal. What are the plans?

Foxconn Technology Group will invest $100 million to UW-Madison that will go toward establishing an interdisciplinary research facility for the College of Engineering, the largest research partnership in the university's history.

The Foxconn Institute for Research in Science and Technology, or FIRST, will collaborate closely with the company's Wisconn Valley Science and Technology Park near Racine.

Foxconn CEO Terry Gou joined UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank for the Monday announcement, signing several agreements formalizing their relationship.

The gift is one of the largest in the school’s history, Blank said, and will help develop Wisconsin's research and engineering talent.

Sounds like a great deal. And if you were a low-info rube, you might be tricked by this. You shouldn't be.

First of all, given that Gateway Technical College has yet to receive the $5 million Foxconn and Governor Scott Walker’s Department of Administration promised it would get, if I was Chancellor Blank, I’d make sure the check goes through before implementing any changes.

This is especially true as you dig deeper into the arrangement Foxconn is making with UW-Madison. This comes from the joint press release between the 2 organizations.

With Foxconn’s lead gift of $100 million, UW–Madison plans to raise an additional $100 million as part of a $200 million fundraising subcampaign in the final two years of the $3.2 billion All Ways Forward campaign. The initiative will focus on supporting research that advances engineering, data and computer science and human health.

The bulk of the Foxconn gift will go toward a new interdisciplinary facility for the College of Engineering to replace 1410 Engineering Drive, complete details of which will be announced at a future date.

That's pretty vague. So One Wisconsin Now called up UW's contact person for the event, we got a few more specifics. And that $100 mil from Foxconn is far from a sure thing.

"Foxconn would not be obligated to complete the $100 million gift, unless UW raises an equivalent amount by the end of the campaign in those broad areas," UW spokesman John Lucas confirmed later Monday.

— One Wisconsin Now (@onewisconsinnow) August 27, 2018

And read between the lines of Gou's plans for what his donation will be used for.

"At Foxconn, we see our role as not only being a major investor in Wisconsin, but also a long-term partner to the community," Gou said. "The Foxconn Institute for Research in Science and Technology will provide funding on practical topics and capabilities in core areas that will become increasingly invaluable to the advanced technology hub, along with the artificial intelligence, 8K resolution and 5G wireless technology ecosystem that we are building in Wisconsin."

Foxconn gets to decide what the new FIRST center concentrates on, and gets an inside track on the talent that works on the products and processes that Foxconn has dictated. So Chairman Gou is openly admitting that a main focus of this new research facility is to use UW researchers and students in product development…that just happens to be the types of products Foxconn plans to specialize in. And Foxconn doesn’t have to pay for those people as employees to perform the R&D that Foxconn would usually have do on their own.

Let's also follow the dollars on this, shall we? Foxconn gets the promise of billions of dollars in subsidies from Wisconsin taxpayers, then says it’ll kick back a small amount of that to UW-Madison, reaping the PR benefits from such a “donation” from unsuspecting rubes and cheerleading media. And we should feel eternally grateful as a result of them using OUR MONEY to do this? Yeah, I don't think so.

There does seem to be one good sidelight to this UW-Foxconn arrangement, if it ever happens.

There will also be a focus on advancing research on human health in areas such as genomics, immune cell research, clinical data integrity and processing and medical imaging in cancer and related diseases. The two parties will also work together to identify and develop initiatives to promote technological advancement, education and scientific outreach.

You might think that cancer research is an example of Foxconn caring more about the big picture beyond its business. But more likely it is because Chairman Gou lost his first wife due to breast cancer, so it’s really more a personal thing than a selfless act (although it’s still doing a good thing, and that shouldn’t be ignored).

And that’s the bigger point here. When you move funding of a university away from taxpayers and into the pockets of donors, then the university will naturally gear itself to the wants and desires of those donors. Which might be nice if you believe that billionaire benefactors are altruistic and aren’t going to use the UW’s good name to boost their own bottom lines.

But it’s a risky if not outright awful way to run higher education – having it be dependent on a handful of oligarchs who have no responsibilities to the greater society, and can (ab)use their “high donor” status to turn away from what might be bigger priorities for the rest of the state or country.

You saw this play out in the UW budget request that passed the Walker-stacked Board of Regents last week, where all additional funding was intended to meet the wants and desires of businesses versus having a UW System that excels in all areas and allows a wide choice of study for students to take advantage of.

The two-year operating budget proposal calls for divvying up $82.5 million among the System’s campuses based on each institution’s performance on 16 measures developed by the Regents and distributed equally among four broad categories: student access, progress, workforce contributions and efficiency. Each campus determines how much weight to assign to each measure, but each category must be given the same emphasis.

The remaining $24.5 million would go toward expanding programming in high-demand fields such as science, technology, engineering and math.Investing in the System would help colleges and universities better fill workforce demands across the state, officials said.

Anyone see creativity or humanities in this list? Or in other types of research that might lead to results that corporations might not like to see (like climate change or social problems resulting from poverty)?

These policy choices by the UW is why UW Regent and Dem candidate for Governor Tony Evers voted against the System’s budget request last week. Evers cited UW President (and Walker lackey) Ray Cross’s decision to have additional money go to these business-centered measures vs. using the money to pay for tuition freezes and pay raises for staff as a reason he voted “No,” and he was right to do so.

Today’s sickening scene of Chairman Gou up on a stage with Bucky Badger as “On Wisconsin” played in the background is yet another example of how corporations are trying to capture the UW System (and higher education in general) for their own needs, and not take away the idea of education serving a greater good that helps all of us.

As I’ve said before, this song may be about S&M, but it sure sounds a lot like the endgame of corporate oligarchs these days. Where they get to RUN AND CHOOSE EVERYTHING, and we are offered no choice but to go along.