Originally posted by: Maggie's Farm
"(out the door or back to the ranks). Great choice."

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If this is true, then USM might as well call off the SACS visit. This type of choice is perhaps the worst thing that can happen at a university where academic freedom and the spirit of inquiry should prevail.

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Originally posted by: Maggie's Farm
" And you would win that bet. Chairs and deans have two options. Say their piece as forcefully and civily as possible behind closed doors while at the same time attempting to protect faculty and programs in this climate (and get labeled the silent and wussy minority by boardees), or kick the President in the nuts publically and take retirement (out the door or back to the ranks). Great choice. Ask Steve Oshrin. Do you really think he will replaced by a better chair? If so, I have an even better bridge to sell you. And if you think council of chair meetings or meetings between deans are celebrations of the current regime, there is some swamp land in Georgia that I can let you have cheap. And if think that all faculty who take on admin tasks  relish coming to work in this environment... Oh, I forget, it's that big admin stipend and hunger for power that keeps us all going. Yee hah."

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So Maggie's farm, can we expect Deans to appoint outspoken faculty to the PUC (if they are can't speak for themselves)?  Can we expect Deans to exert their authority in the administrative chain of command on the gulf coast?  Can we expect Deans to police their peers when they violate ethical and professional standards of conduct as was done in the case of Dr. Stevenson? 

I understand Deans can't go public and remain in place.  But what consequences can we expect of their "secretly speaking" behind "closed doors" about their boss's mismanagement. It seems to me that "no consequences" of an action is the same as the action "not existing". 

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Originally posted by: Choosy Mother
"Nothing wrong with going back to the ranks. Any good administrator never really left the ranks in the first place. I, personally, would rather be part of the ranks and live with my convictions than further up the pecking order and not be able to sleep at nights. I seriously doubt that you'll be able to convince many on this board that silence best. Best for keeping an administration position, maybe, but not very good for the conscience."

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I totally agree--the sleepness nights and gastrointestinal nightmares lead me to believe that there is no personal reward for me in this--I don't view myself as an "administrator" or somewhere up a pecking order--just a schmuck faculty member who is taking a hit for the team for a short period. I came here to teach and to do research and to help build my program, and admin work distracts greatly from that. I have no intention of convincing anyone that silence is best--indeed I risk my job as a faculty member (not just administrator) by posting my thoughts here (many people reading this board know who I am). So you are encouraging me to write another letter to the HA and fall on my sword for a last time? At the moment this option sounds very attractive.     

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Originally posted by: Reporter
" So Maggie's farm, can we expect Deans to appoint outspoken faculty to the PUC (if they are can't speak for themselves)?  Can we expect Deans to exert their authority in the administrative chain of command on the gulf coast?  Can we expect Deans to police their peers when they violate ethical and professional standards of conduct as was done in the case of Dr. Stevenson?  I understand Deans can't go public and remain in place.  But what consequences can we expect of their "secretly speaking" behind "closed doors" about their boss's mismanagement. It seems to me that "no consequences" of an action is the same as the action "not existing".  "

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Many questions. Some answers. Some very outspoken faculty were appointed by some deans (TG comes to mind). Your coast question is complex and multifacted and depends on the college and other variables. In some cases very much so. In others not so much. Deans policing other Deans? Not in that loop, so I can't answer. Can private conversations create change? Yes, and there have been many such instances (I'll decline to specify for obvious reasons). However, I believe that a combination of factors can best effect change. Deans and chairs doing their thing as best as possible, an active AAUP and FS, alums and contributors speaking up, the SACS pressures, an active and informed student body, and so on.  

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Originally posted by: Choosy Mother
"Nothing wrong with going back to the ranks. Any good administrator never really left the ranks in the first place. I, personally, would rather be part of the ranks and live with my convictions than further up the pecking order and not be able to sleep at nights. I seriously doubt that you'll be able to convince many on this board that silence best. Best for keeping an administration position, maybe, but not very good for the conscience."

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In fact at the chair level there is not silence. There isn't necessarily a lot of publiuc vocality, but there is not silence. Think of this activity as termites nibbling at the foundation of the house. One more componant of of protest that may not be very visible but also has its uses. There is an innate tension in an administrative or quasi-administrative position between preserving the people andprograms you are responsbile for while at the same time fighting for them (and sometimes fighting for them means fighting for the greater good and not just the more localized good of a program). Not everyone is capable of this . . . by temperment or by desire. But those of you who have good relationships with your chairs probably have those good realtionships because you know and believe that they are tryung to walk that line.

And just so it is clear -- I don't view myself as someone who is particularly talented at this and it is one reason among others that I have accepted my own poisition on an interim basis only. But I accepted the position knowing full well that for the time I was in it I'd have to find a way to walk the line between risking personal integrity and acting to maintain my program; between keeping a high public profile of protest and working in a less public way to insert the underlying ideology of that protest into the routine of administrative activity.

I can speak for a number of chairs and directors when I say that a number of them are not afraid to step down and rejoin the ranks. But there are any number of departments in which the alternatives to the present chairs might not be so good. No one is expendable -- but some choices are better than others.

So the dichotomies as presented are not really accurate: many chairs are not silent; because there may not be visible public victories does not mean victories are not being won; people staying in chair and director positions are not necessarily sacrificing their convictions although they may be sacrificing the respect of some fellow faculty who are not aware of things individual (and sometimes groups of) chairs might be saying and doing.

I was a lot freer to say things in public when I was not a director -- I now toe the line a lot closer to protect my program. But I also have a lot more opportunity to share my perceptions with administrators above me than I did before. And occasionally those opportunities get translated into things that might not turn the battle, but add to the accretion of language and of actions that actually add to the mountain of small events that keep the the real powerbrokers from doing their worst.

I think any good movement needs poeple who are free to say exactly what they think -- to speak, to organize, to channel anger into public action. It also needs people on the inside who are effective at working from more compromised positions from within the power structure. Where do you think much of the information comes from that manages to find it way out from the dome and dean's offices and into the public where it can be analyzed and used?

What inevitably happens when protest merges into a genuine movement is that as the power of external protest grows, it allows those on the inside to become more visible and take actions that are more overt. This back and forth dialogue between external protest and internal actvity that is subversive is one of the ways in which inept or oppressive authority can be undermined.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in trying to come to grips with his impending decision to join the conspirators against Hitler, posited that there are times when the greater good requires that we work from compromised positions in order to act effectively. In his terms, that meant taking on the sin of taking another life in order to save a people. 

There are some for whom maintaining an uncompromising position of purity is important -- and it is important to have them as examples and orgranizers, and mostly particularly, as uncompromising voices that expresses clearly what is right and good.

There are others for whom trying to work closer to the heart of authority, to influence it even at the risk of losing their purity, is important -- and what they can do best.

There are more hidden allies in this than we know.  

 

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Originally posted by: stephen judd
"Incidently to David and members of the Board -- I am sorry that I brought this back to an off-topic discussion but I think it is relevent for students to know this as well.
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I heartily agree with the sentiment, Stephen, and this thread was the appropriate place in view of the earlier attacks on administrators. Students do need to know these things, and if they are more likely to read this thread, then the greater good is served. You expanded on an earlier post of mine and did so much more eloquently than I would have been able to express it. Hang in there, man!

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Originally posted by: stephen judd
"
What inevitably happens when protest merges into a genuine movement is that as the power of external protest grows, it allows those on the inside to become more visible and take actions that are more overt. This back and forth dialogue between external protest and internal actvity that is subversive is one of the ways in which inept or oppressive authority can be undermined.
 "

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I think many of us are frustrated at the lack of "external protest," and by that I mean protest external to USM. Everyone at USM is, to some extent, "on the inside." How long is it going to take for community members and the IHL to realize the extent of the problems? Yes, there has been progress, but it has taken disasters--the SACS probabtion--for this to occur, and even then, the progress is slow. How long?

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Originally posted by: foot soldier
" I think many of us are frustrated at the lack of "external protest," and by that I mean protest external to USM. Everyone at USM is, to some extent, "on the inside." How long is it going to take for community members and the IHL to realize the extent of the problems? Yes, there has been progress, but it has taken disasters--the SACS probabtion--for this to occur, and even then, the progress is slow. How long? "

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I agree with you Foot Soldier.  I remember last year when faculty criticized Thames publicly it seemed like everyone and their grandmother knew how a university works and attacked the faculty in the media.  I find it odd that now that Thames has got us into this situation, no one in the community seems to know how to run either a business or a university.  How did they forget so quickly?

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Originally posted by: David Johnson
"As half of the membership of the PC has now rotated off the council and will be replaced at the January 18 meeting, and given that the SACS news came after the last PC meeting, it will be interesting to see what the metamorphosis of the PC will bring. Ray Folse, on another thread, indicated he might attend the first meeting even though he has rotated off. I don't know that I'll be able to attend, but I hope that some of the faces that we saw at the first few meetings (attending as 'guests') will make their presence felt at that meeting."

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Good idea, David. Attending the PC is something students could do--the subject of this thread.  Folse also told me he might attend to listen to Myron and Anne Wallace, who hasn't exactly been shy.  It will be interesting to see who the deans appoint to replace the people who rotated off. 

 

Dr. Tammy Greer's term expires June 30, 2005.

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Originally posted by: HA archives
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And then there is Dana Thames. Hey people on the Coast, do you know what classes you are teaching tomorrow?

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Originally posted by: HA archives
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HA archives, Can you supply a link or reference?  I like to keep track of those letters.   Thanks.

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Originally posted by: stephen judd
"In fact at the chair level there is not silence. There isn't necessarily a lot of publiuc vocality, but there is not silence. Think of this activity as termites nibbling at the foundation of the house."

You have our respect, Professor Judd, and the respect of all good men and women who understand what is happening at USM. Your credibility has been firmly established. We would nominate you for sainthood were it not for the fact that, due to our merrymaking in public places, we have no more influence with the Vatican than we do with the Dome. 

That being said, we must respectfully ask some questions about what you posted regarding justifying the silence of the department chair lambs. We tend to view some of them more like sheep than like lambs - passive sheep being led by the herdsman. Even if that particular analysis is incorrect, it is undebatable that at least two members of a departmental flock were led to slaughter and another barely managed to leave for a greener pasteur in time. We've seen little public outrcy from the head sheeps, on or off campus. We've not even seen their public disagreement expressed about anything. I hope that are only muzzled, and are not fitted with blinders. Even if that group believes it should remain muzzled - for whatever reason - there are some rather innocuous things they could have done: (1) join AAUP, (2) contribute to the legal defense fund at the time it was desperately needed. We would find it interesting to know how many department chairs are AAUP members. At other universities, department chairs are active participants in that organization. The other information, legal defense fund contributions, would probably be more difficult to obtain, but that would also be interesting. Those sorts of data would help us assess on which side of the fence those sheep really stand.

NO QUARTER

Although I agree Jonathan Krebs is a smart, articulate person, I doubt he would be someone who would lead the students against the administration.  Where is the Concerned Students group?  Have they been active at all this year?