May 2 coverage in Southern, and in the DE.
Showing posts with label May 2 Student Strike. Show all posts
Showing posts with label May 2 Student Strike. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 3, 2016
Friday, April 29, 2016
An administrative listening session
I managed to catch about 45 minutes of Thursday's "listening session" with Provost Susan Ford and the deans of campus colleges. This seems to have been a largely different group of administrators from that at an earlier such session. I think it's fair to say that the part of the session I saw was not a great success.
For me the most telling moment was when the assembled administrators were asked if they could define "diversity" or "inclusivity". The questioner noted SIUC's various mission statements fail to do so. Susan Ford responded with generalities about how many people worked on those mission statements, and how hard they are to write. That did not help. Nor did any of the deans and others on the stage made any effort to answer the question directly. That's pretty outrageous, come to think of it. Here was a moment to make a statement--which every one of them should have prepared for this meeting--about why diversity and inclusion matter, and what diversity means for them. At other moments during the event some of the deans showed some awareness of this, but none seized this moment, or indeed seized any moment.
This reminded me vividly of the meeting of the Faculty Senate four years ago at which it was revealed that no one in the room could define the term "Inclusive Excellence", a key item in the lousy strategic plan we were discussing. The people who were hawking the plan were only slightly embarrassed by this; and the senators' reactions (including mine) were more cynical than outraged. This is precisely the sort of lazy complacency that culminates in a meeting at which a dozen administrators from dean on up can't answer the most basic question about a crisis riling the campus. If you can't answer this basic question, if you can't show that you get it, that you understand that "diversity" and "inclusivity" aren't just buzz words, or nice ways of talking about increasing enrollment of minority students (= tuition $$$), you don't belong on that stage.
Now it would not be fair to say, after I'd attended only half of a single meeting, that none of these high administrators get it. But they certainly weren't showing much evidence of this during the 45 minutes I was there. Of course when questioned directly about a policy, or presented with a demand to take quick actions, the administrators had to respond to these questions. But I would think that the first goal of their remarks ought to have been to show that they hear the students, that they understand where they are coming from. They didn't meet this goal, or make much of an effort to meet it--not at least during the time I was there.
For me the most telling moment was when the assembled administrators were asked if they could define "diversity" or "inclusivity". The questioner noted SIUC's various mission statements fail to do so. Susan Ford responded with generalities about how many people worked on those mission statements, and how hard they are to write. That did not help. Nor did any of the deans and others on the stage made any effort to answer the question directly. That's pretty outrageous, come to think of it. Here was a moment to make a statement--which every one of them should have prepared for this meeting--about why diversity and inclusion matter, and what diversity means for them. At other moments during the event some of the deans showed some awareness of this, but none seized this moment, or indeed seized any moment.
This reminded me vividly of the meeting of the Faculty Senate four years ago at which it was revealed that no one in the room could define the term "Inclusive Excellence", a key item in the lousy strategic plan we were discussing. The people who were hawking the plan were only slightly embarrassed by this; and the senators' reactions (including mine) were more cynical than outraged. This is precisely the sort of lazy complacency that culminates in a meeting at which a dozen administrators from dean on up can't answer the most basic question about a crisis riling the campus. If you can't answer this basic question, if you can't show that you get it, that you understand that "diversity" and "inclusivity" aren't just buzz words, or nice ways of talking about increasing enrollment of minority students (= tuition $$$), you don't belong on that stage.
Now it would not be fair to say, after I'd attended only half of a single meeting, that none of these high administrators get it. But they certainly weren't showing much evidence of this during the 45 minutes I was there. Of course when questioned directly about a policy, or presented with a demand to take quick actions, the administrators had to respond to these questions. But I would think that the first goal of their remarks ought to have been to show that they hear the students, that they understand where they are coming from. They didn't meet this goal, or make much of an effort to meet it--not at least during the time I was there.
Thursday, April 28, 2016
May 2 schedule and updates
The anonymous "May 2 Strike Committee" has only one 'official' event, a 10:00 am rally by the fountain in front of Faner Hall. In a DE article published today, they say that they now hope May 2 events will focus on racial justice.
Various faculty are also planning May 2 events on campus, open to all. Info on the following can be found on the Facebook site for Teach in for Social Justice.
Various faculty are also planning May 2 events on campus, open to all. Info on the following can be found on the Facebook site for Teach in for Social Justice.
- 12-2 pm, Faner Breezeway. Open Forum with presentations, discussion, screen printing, music, film, other activitie.
- 2 pm, Library 752/54. Screening/discussion of Strange Fruit, a 2003 documentary about the famous Billie Holliday song, the Jewish teacher who wrote it, and the shameful history of lynching in America that inspired it.
- 4 pm, Faner Hall Humanities Lounge (Faner 2302). Open Mic Reading for Social Justice (featuring SIU creative writers, among others).
Tuesday, April 26, 2016
May 2 links
I've been slow to post the last few days not because nothing is going on but because too much is.
Website for the May 2 Student Strike.
May 2 Student Strike video. (NOT the racist video which made use of the same imagery but substituted vile racist language, defended Hitler, and called for use of baseball bat and lynching against blacks. I believe that video is no longer easily accessible online.)
Latest DE coverage of racist video.
Philosophy students continue sit-in demanding reinstatement of hire in Africana/African-American philosophy.
The May 2 student strikers are very articulate, and I am sympathetic to most of their points. They are certainly not wrong, in my view, to suggest that tactics beyond polite conversation with administrators and others in power may be required to shake up the status quo in higher education--which is more a slippery slope toward complete denial of access to the poor and minorities than a stable situation in any event.
I watched the racist video. It is astoundingly, openly, vilely racist. There's no coded language or argumentation--no rhetoric about special treatment of minorities, affirmative action hurting whites, police being handcuffed by post-Ferguson worries, etc. It's just an open call for violence against blacks in defense of white supremacy. I have to believe that it is more a sick effort to grab attention than a representation of any view with any significant hold on campus or the broader community. This does not mean it shouldn't be loudly condemned. I condemn it, and plan to be part of a anti-racism teach-in currently being planned for May 2.
Website for the May 2 Student Strike.
May 2 Student Strike video. (NOT the racist video which made use of the same imagery but substituted vile racist language, defended Hitler, and called for use of baseball bat and lynching against blacks. I believe that video is no longer easily accessible online.)
Latest DE coverage of racist video.
Philosophy students continue sit-in demanding reinstatement of hire in Africana/African-American philosophy.
The May 2 student strikers are very articulate, and I am sympathetic to most of their points. They are certainly not wrong, in my view, to suggest that tactics beyond polite conversation with administrators and others in power may be required to shake up the status quo in higher education--which is more a slippery slope toward complete denial of access to the poor and minorities than a stable situation in any event.
I watched the racist video. It is astoundingly, openly, vilely racist. There's no coded language or argumentation--no rhetoric about special treatment of minorities, affirmative action hurting whites, police being handcuffed by post-Ferguson worries, etc. It's just an open call for violence against blacks in defense of white supremacy. I have to believe that it is more a sick effort to grab attention than a representation of any view with any significant hold on campus or the broader community. This does not mean it shouldn't be loudly condemned. I condemn it, and plan to be part of a anti-racism teach-in currently being planned for May 2.
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