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Doge throws concerns, uncertainty of the Faculty of Florida University – the oracle

President Donald Trump, on the right, manages the government's efficiency with Elon Musk, on the left as a senior consultant, while governor Ron Desantis, Middle, which is managed in Florida. Oracle Graphic/ Will Rainsberger and photos of the US Air Force, Governor Ron Desantis's office and the White House by Wiki Commons

While the Efficiency of the government's Ministry (Doge) is with full speed at the federal level Agency sectionsA state task force that focuses on Florida universities has provided the faculty about the future of university education.

Governor Ron Desantis announced The creation of the Florida Doge on February 24, in which State University's operations are inspected and artificial intelligence (AI) is used to “lower unnecessary expenses”.

Steve Lang, President of the United Faculty of Florida, Although the governor has made “noise” about the initiative, it is “almost too early” to understand how this affects the universities.

“At the moment it's just a kind of imaginary,” said Lang. “I don't think the students or the faculty want someone to reduce the university system.”

Long The USF faculty has not received any instructions on how the initiative will evaluate expenses at universities.

“When something is going on, they didn't tell us,” said Lang.

The USF spokesman Althea Johnson told the Oracle that USF the review of the Executive order issued by Desantis and expected “further instructions” of the state.

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Aubrey Jewett, professor of political science at the University of Central Florida, said that there was a “wide problem” under Florida faculty that Doge was not a “legitimate” efficiency effort.

Jewett said that the faculty was concerned that the government could instead “attack and shorten” education.

The uncertainty about Doge is partly because Universities Still waiting for further clarification, he said.

“Will there be a kind of Elon Muschus who appears on every campus with a number of employees who go into the offices of all?” Said Jewett. “We don't know anything about it yet.”

Although Elon Musk does not have a cabinet position, the richest man in the world and CEO of Tesla and SpaceX worked according to which the “senior adviser” for President Donald Trump under Down Associated Press.

Trump created the federal dog on January 20, its first day in office to monitor the federal authorities and determine whether they are “efficient” according to the President Executive order.

The Doge founded teams in every federal authority, such as the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Health and Human Services, “to reduce excess regulations, reduce wasteful expenses and to restructure federal authorities,” said Trump in one opinion.

By February 24, the Ministry of Education had made around 900 million US dollars in cuts and had around 40 layoffs, so AP.

During the Desantis press conference He said about the Florida Doge that the state task force was “good” for students.

Jewett said this statement had given him the assumption that the governor does not subside according to university programs that help the students receive their training.

Instead, Jewett said that he thinks the initiative will pursue administrative programs that are not geared towards learning the students, such as supporting agencies and organizations.

Jewett said that he does not think professors have the risk of losing their work because they are “Frontline positions” for education.

“I would hope that there would be no importance in cuts and faculties if it is a legitimate effort to look at Florida's efficiency,” he said.

Related: Some faculties that are considering students to leave the state based on the DEI legislation

Derek Bambauer is a law professor at the University of Florida and researcher of KI, Cyber ​​Security and Internet Rights.

Bambauer said that part of the uncertainty behind Doges efforts was from the governor's statement that the AI ​​is used in financial exams.

Although the goal of using AI tools to help with audits seems “sensible”, he said that there is an obstacle – AI does not have the ability to search for “unnecessary” expenses.

“My concern is that the use of Ai is a bit of hand loop because it wears out a number of added value as to what the government should do by making it artificial, neutral, technical, and that is simply not the case,” he said.

Bambauer said that AI was “wonderful” to compare similar functions in various agencies, e.g. B. if one department pays more for paper towels than the other.

However, he said that it could not find out what is “unnecessary” because machines cannot identify “value judgments”.

“If you didn't want a legal faculty, the budget that is dedicated to the legal faculty would definitely look unnecessary,” said Bambauer. “In some senses, AI is a tool that reflects the added value of their designers.”

Related: Professors, students who are not sure whether AI software is helpful, harmful

Lang said he did not believe that the examination of the university budgets for waste or fraud was a problem, and experts could certainly “shave” some money from “every institution” the size of USF.

The question for him is how the government will do this and whether this will affect the teaching of the faculty and the learning of the students, he said.

“In Florida there are all sorts of nutty things,” said Lang. “If you want to stop waste money, don't start education.”

Clara Rokita Garcia, news editor

Clara Rokita Garcia is the news editor for the Oracle. It is an integrated public relations and advertising virtue, who twice with literary studies in English. She grew up in Brazil and moved to the USA in autumn 2022. She started in autumn 2023 as an intern of news correspondent in Oracle. It is highly motivated to write creative and helpful stories for USF students. Reach them at Clararokitagarcia@usf.edu.

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