Wasting Money on Mushrooms

I won't have my computer back for another week, but I'll try my best to do some blogging from the library or friends' computers.

As Cornell continues to cut valuable programs like Dutch and Turkish, while closing libraries and leaving positions unfilled, the university should be looking to save money wherever it can. This is why last week's fungi episode was a little hard to swallow.

In the early 20th Century, a Chinese professor maintained a collection of rare fungi. When Japan invaded China in the late 1930s, the fungi were "smuggled by ox cart to Indochina and then by sea to the United States, eventually arriving at Cornell in 1940, according to the Associated Press."

"In a repatriation ceremony in Weill Hall [last Monday], Skorton presented a high-ranking delegation of Chinese government officials with a mushroom called Lentinus tigrinus and a letter expressing Cornell’s intent to return the fungi."

This is a somewhat cool story and it seems like the decision to return the specimens was the right one. But...the Chinese delegation consisted of a huge number of scientists and political types. They occupied the top two floors of the Statler and ran up a hotel bill totaling more than $250,000. I'm sure they also incurred tens of thousands of dollars in travel expenses, while Cornell undoubtedly paid for receptions, food, and things of that nature while the Chinese delegation was in town.

I realize that it is fairly typical of the Chinese government to spend a tremendous sum of money on showy things like this. But Cornell is making cuts across the board and it seems wrong to arrange a huge ceremony for mushrooms while the university cuts academic programs at the same time. However much money Cornell had to pay to put on this gaudy event, I can't help but assume that it would have been better spent preserving the programs that make Cornell a top university.