| | LOCKDOWN??? DISCLAIMER: The following views are my own, based on what goes on within the two square feet inside my skull and what I personally have observed. They do not have any bearing on my professional capacity as adjunct professor in the Government Department at Gallaudet University.
::sigh:: I'd give anything to not have to write this entry. I much prefer to focus on national and international political stuff. But events that have taken place today have forced me to be introspective. I'm not sure how many people follow this blog, much less the daily happenings on Gallaudet campus, so here's the lowdown. Last fall, Gallaudet's esteemed president, I. King Jordan, announced his retirement effective January 1, 2007. The spring semester was abuzz with rumors of the selection process of the ninth president. So many names of candidates and rumors-of-candidates were mentioned ad nauseam. Then one fateful day, at the end of the spring 2006 semester, the Board of Trustees made their selection -- Provost Jane K. Fernandes. Immediately after this announcement, many students, alumni, faculty, and staff expressed concerns with the search process, myself included. It wasn't that I didn't want Jane Fernandes as Jordan's successor, it was simply that there were rumors that all was not as rosy as the "party line" insisted it was. "It was an unanimous vote." "But what about the rumors of two Board of Trustee members abstaining?" "What about the lack of transparency regarding the committee?" "What about the rumors that the Board of Trustees rejected -- or even ignored -- the Presidential Search Committee's recommendations?" After all, all Board of Trustee meetings were behind closed-doors. The precise criteria that the Search Committee used to eliminate names from their final list of candidates has never been, to my knowledge, released. In the wee hours of this morning, those still involved in protesting the selection of Dr. Fernandes as the ninth President barricaded Hall Memorial Building (HMB), the main academic building, refusing to let anyone in for any reason. Now, I will say for the record that I'm neutral regarding the rationale behind the protests. As an adjunct professor, I feel as though I have to be. Certainly, I support the right to free speech. However, what of students' right to an nondisruptive environment conducive to education? Jose Marti wrote that "... to educate the Deaf is one of the most sublime expressions of love." True. And taking action to interfere with that love only serves to interrupt (or perhaps I should say disrupt) the lives of students and faculty who are like me -- at best, neutral; at worst, interested bystanders. On Wednesday, there was a walkout staged. Fine. Students who actively choose not to attend class because they have 'something better to do' are certainly allowed to make a conscious choice to miss class as well as any and all pertinent information that is discussed that day. This isn't high school (or even a full-time job) in which attendance every single day is absolutely mandatory. Still, I gave my students who elected to participate in the walkout a zero for that day, as though they never showed up. That's my prerogative as a teacher. Now, about the lockdown... tensions since this morning have been very high. As with any stressful situation, mistakes have been made. The lack of clearheaded communication from both the Administration and the organizers of the protest is one. There's too much emotion on one side, not enough reactions to events on the other; and no clear information from both sides. People are yelling, nobody's listening. Case in point: Earlier this morning, there was an altercation when (as is my understanding) officers in the Department of Personal Safety (that's the campus cops, boys and girls) attempted to enter HMB to investigate a bomb threat. The crowd of students inside attempted to prevent the DPS officers from entering, and as a result, people got shoved. Allegations of Mace being used have been made, although they haven't been confirmed to my knowledge. So, mistakes on both sides have been made. As I said above, the First Amendment is sacrosanct. Every single person in the United States has a right to organize, participate in, and support peaceful acts of protest. Note that word -- peaceful. That means that those who participate in protests cannot actively damage property or the wellbeing of others. Once something is damaged or someone is injured, the First Amendment no longer applies. It gets even more sticky when you're talking about occupying private property. In the 1970s, a Native American group occupied the site of Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary in San Francisco Bay to get the people to pay attention to their cause. Throughout the Vietnam War, students took over administration buildings and R.O.T.C. buildings on campuses all over the country. Were these acts of protest "right"? Okay. So lets put the "is what the Gallaudet University Faculty, Staff, Students, and Alumni (Gallaudet FSSA) doing today ethical?" question aside. Let's talk about their message. In the beginning, it was simply a means of trying to determine if the Board of Trustees acted appropriately (so to speak) in selecting Jane Fernandes as the ninth President of Gallaudet University. Unfortunately, in my view, the central message has degenerated into a petulant "We don't like Jane Fernandes, and we're willing to disrupt the campus' daily lives until we force her out!" This isn't DPN, people. Even DPN wasn't about disliking Dr. Elizabeth Zinser as a person. It was about the Board of Trustees at the time clearly ignoring the will of just about everyone in the Gallaudet community and selecting a hearing candidate, although the other runner-ups were deaf. Yes, the Chair of the Board of Trustees at the time was personally disliked... but not because she picked the "wrong" candidate -- it was because she was condescending towards the Gallaudet community regarding what deaf people are capable of. Let me put it simply. For the groups on campus who have chosen to shut down the day-to-day operations to reject Jane Fernandes because "she's not qualified compared to _____", that's one thing. To reject her because "she's a total b*****!", that's something else entirely. And unfortunately, it's the latter statement that the world is seeing tonight. So how would I solve this situation? I seem to recall an episode of The Simpsons where the teachers went on strike and Principal Skinner refused to give in to their demands. Solution? Bart locked Principal Skinner and Mrs. Krabapple in an office and refused to let them out until they reached a compromise. Perhaps something along those lines would work here? Just my two cents. Background info: |
