In a summertime interview with the Chronicle, Group of 88 member Paula McClain, the newly elected chairwoman of Duke’s Academic Council, stated that
the consensus among many black professors that the University responded too slowly to the racial aspects of the case is “depressing and demoralizing for faculty.” No top administrator has met with members of the black faculty to explicitly address the issues broached by the lacrosse incident, she added.
But according to a University-prepared timeline of the administration’s actions, President Brodhead himself met with black faculty on April 3 to discuss the incident.
That meeting, it’s worth noting, occurred only three days before the Group of 88 issued its statement. No public record exists of what was discussed in the meeting, but it would seem as if McClain’s claim to the Chronicle was incorrect.
Indeed, the assertion that over the past 11 months, the Brodhead administration has paid insufficient attention to the recommendations of black faculty is hard to take seriously. The administration largely bowed to the demands of two black (Houston Baker and Wahneema Lubiano) and one white (Peter Wood) professors issued at the March 30 faculty meeting. Two of the five committees set up last April (the CCI and the Bowen/Chambers Committee) were explicitly oriented around a “diversity” agenda. The administration remained silent as Grant Farred preposterously alleged a “secret racism” among Duke students; it remained silent as Karla Holloway sent out an e-mail containing unsubstantiated, fifth-hand, slanderous allegations against Duke students.
Neither at the time nor since did McClain say what more she wanted the administration to do. McClain did not respond to an e-mail requesting comment.
47 comments:
I don't understand why the G88 is given so much value at Duke. The public way they have been given status and power after an absolutely disasterous showing in this case is absurd. Is there an academic among the posters or someone else with knowledge that might be able to shine light on this for me. I'm sorry to let my ignorance on this show but to me it truly is baffeling
Administrators are terrified of the Angry Studies racists. All the G88, for example, has to do is accuse a University Dean of being a racist, and his/her career is toast. We saw the mainstream media follow the G88 lead when it was pile-on time, if Brodhead had not obeyed, they would have turned on him as they did to the Duke3. We have created a Frankenstein's monster by our politically correct velvet gloves in dealing with the Black racists in our society. It's gotten to the point where it does no good to say "you're full of s**t, so sit sown and shut up!"
Carolyn says:
12:05 - No, I don't understand it either.
12:22 - You're right. The Gang of 88 has produced enough s**t to fertilize all of North Carolina. And they're still squatting in their outhouse making more!
It appears that each time someone sends an email to any of these clowns asking them to address issues of fact that contradict their worldview, they do not respond. I've noticed the trend on this blog and also at JinC and Liestoppers.
One can infer from this a blatant dishonesty on the part of said clowns -- they enjoy the opportunity to tell lies, but when confronted with evidence to the contrary slink back undercover like the cowards they are.
To 12:22:
Indeed, it's reached the point where it's obvious that the G88 doesn't regard the fact they they were spectacularly wrong as in any way relevant to the discussion.
In a limited way, I sympathize with Brodhead: these bigots hold a lot of power and it's clear that if he ignores this he may find himself in seriously hot water. But he's suffering the fate of all appeasers: he's seen as lame, cowardly and inadequate by everyone involved.
For perpetually aggrieved people like McClain, nothing short of a public hanging of the lacrosse players (no later than April 1, 2006) would have been sufficient.
The best strategy for dealing with such people is to give them nothing. They will only become more outrageous in their demands. Trying to make them happy is a fool's game.
It doesn't make sense that black faculty would expect some sort of special access to Brodhead in the wake of this incident. The lacrosse players did not choose the race of their false accuser.
Brodhead needs a "Sister Souljah" moment. What is so hard about telling a few malcontents to get lost?
SAVANT
The N&O printed a little column today from one Barry Allen. It is an embarrassing suck-up attempt to rehabilitate Brodhead.
I just sent a scathing letter of reply to Allen's ridiculous attempt to cover up what we all have witnessed for a year now.
Debrah
I think it is g88 who need diversity training.
McClain has mastered the art of victimology.
Did white women professors request a meeting with administrators to "explicity address the issues broached" by the rape of the white freshman girl by a black Durhamite?
I think lack of courage explains a lot.
I don't know about y'all, but when I was in school, you had to build a thesis on a solid foundation. On that basis alone, the G88 is an abject failure. They have built their entire case on the assumption that someone on the lacrosse team raped or otherwise sexually imposed upon a black stripper at an off-campus party. Their entire case is, therefore, without any foundation in fact since it has been proven, beyond doubt, that nobody raped nobody at no time and that the accuser is a stone liar and probably a skanky slut, if not a "working girl" - given the variety of men who contributed DNA to her body on that night - none of them lacrosse players.
The left apparently is all in favor of sexually libertine behavior (despite the diseases out there over which they consistently wring their hands), but not of zipping their lips - or even better, apologizing - when they have rushed to judgment.
And the University deserves any and all opprobrium heaped upon it for its gutless and sycophantic behavior vis-a-vis G88!
If people like Paula McClain continue gaining power in the academy, we might as well hand the keys to China and India. We will not be able to compete on any level. One engineer, scientist, computer programmer, or manager from West Point, Texas A&M, Annapolis, or even parts of Duke might be worth 100 graduates with majors in some aspect of race-class-gender, hate studies, but we just will not be able to turn out enough of those engineers, scientists, computer programmers, and managers. We also will not be able to pay the welfare bill (whether we call it welfare, government salary, professors' salary, or whatever) necessary to keep the race-class-gender, hate graduates from revolting and turning the vast majority of us into serfs.
Retired Lawyer/Professor
When did Brodhead meet with the white faculty at Duke after the most recent rape case?
Did white women professors request a meeting with administrators to "explicity address the issues broached" by the rape of the white freshman girl by a black Durhamite?
By not inserting "alleged" between the words "the" and "rape", you are no better than all the Rush To Judgement type of last March/April.
"..the University responded too slowly to the racial aspects of the case.."
This comment really illustrates the double standard when it comes to press coverage and public reaction to interracial crime.
When its white on black, the "racial aspect" is not only a legitimate issue, its usually the most important aspect of the case.
When its black on white, its taboo, or even racist to bring it up. The press typically downplays it or ignores it altogether.
This is such an obvious pattern, but some people still deny it.
McClain is correct. The incident occurred March 13. It had obvious racial aspects. Waiting until April 3 for any meetings with McClain et al was far too slow. It was, however, non-discriminatory, in that the administration seemed to be moving very, very slowly on all fronts, at least as seen from the outside.
If Paula McClain's frustrations are “depressing and demoralizing for faculty,” let's consider another aspect of University culture in general.
That's the fact that in the case of the Duke LAX legal abuse, the G88 is quite obviously driving the bus when it comes to Administration attitudes and actions.
Regardless of Professor Coleman's cogent analyses, and of the Economy department's signed statement, and other small voices that leak out from time to time, it's the G88 resentment-purveyors who are given the committee chairmanships, and are endlessly coddled and supported without question by Dr. Brodhead and his Administration. It is they who command the CCI, and demand that athletes (convicted in advance of wrong thinking and attitudes without evidence) be coerced through their mandatory indoctrinations.
This evidence is all too strong that the inmates are in charge of the asylum. And if that isn't "depressing and demoralizing" for those few who still believe in due process and the First Amendment, reflect for a minute on the fate of Larry Summers after he merely raised a question. Dr. Brodhead is either part of the Politburo or running scared, and it'll take far more resources than are currently available to reverse the savage 'activism' that has implanted G88 at the head of the table.
Insufficiently Sensitive
http://media.www.dukechronicle.com/media/storage/paper884/news/2007/03/07/Columns/Unprecedented.Opportunity-2762152.shtml#more
Paula McClain and Reparations
Thanks to KC for bringing all these people together for us to read. It is helpful for me to read them back-to-back. Quite a learning experience.
I think we misrepresent Paula McClain when we refer to her as a community activist.
Paula McClain is not an activist. She and her colleagues are the leader/teacher for activists across the world. She see her work as Advocate, Catalyst and Broker.
She studies secret racism and sexism...both...and she studies both at the same time. Paula is the source of knowledge for dissenting political groups across the world with respect to sexism and racism.
Duke University is a good place for her to work. The external community is small, relatively poor and devoid of anyone who would want to compete with her for a leadership position. Duran itself, if you squint your eyes a little, appears to the rest of the world to be ...part of the Antebellum South or at least the myth of the Antebellum South.
Paula also learned from Angela Davis. Paula has no intentions of sitting in a large urban jail while her supporters chant FREE PAULA and the President of the United States prepared to fire her from some position of influence.
Paula works from the wholesale level...not the retail level of political dissent as did Angela Davis.
She develops the political products for those who take the political fight to the community...the activists.
In order to survive Paula must craft political issues that will become salient for the great middle class that touch on (1) race and sex together (the 'Rex' example as per the previous KC posting from Anonymous 01:35 AM) and (2) violence against mothers.
Paul McClain seeks to be a central figure in the world for political dissent activities that will result in reparations or perhaps a better term might be ...SETTLEMENTS. Think tobacco settlements.
There are four types of settlements that are on the front burner at the moments for Paula and her followers within the United States.
1. Expand the Social Security Program to provide a pension for Moms...especially those
Moms who were abandoned by their significant others.
2. Primary Health Care for Mom's and their children paid for by a settlement with business organizations that
pollute the air, water and earth. That includes companies that manufactured lead paint.
3. Free Education (Vocational and College) for people of color paid for by a settlement with universities and
the federal government who failed to halt secret discrimination in educational institutions.
4. Cash settlements for people who were harmed by men who are obsessed by sex and race (Reference:
'Rex' in previous post).
KC's guidance in the organization of his posts, helped me see a little clearer. When all of the writing were together for me to read, I could see finally, that Paula and the Gang of 88 demonstrate one curious behavior for professionals...They Do Not Talk About Prevention of Problems.
Professionals prevent problems but leaders of political dissent at the wholesale level ... enable problems...they would never prevent problems. That would be self defeating for the leader of political dissent.
The LAX players were just part of the design of a political dissent strategy that could be promoted to community activists across the USA... who need to vilify wealthy, white, boys with mean looking helmets.
I will be interested to learn if the Duke faculty and administration are going to allow Paula to be a leader of political dissent in the nation while taking NO position of the PREVENTION of problems at Duke.
GP
I don't understand, was the alleged rape against Paula McClain and the black Duke professors? Do they feel personally connected to each and every Duke related crime? If so, did McClain make sure there were special white faculty meetings that were held after the rape of the white Duke student? Has anyone told them about the secret racism/sexism that exists against white male athletes at Duke?
Let's keep our
eye on the ball--the indictments should be dismissed.
The academics like the group of 88 are going to keep up this charade until the Duke administration takes some action to rein them in. Not likely.
When the case is dismissed (hopefully) the 88 will continue to howl and bewail all the fictions they have created this past year. There is no remedy for this in the near future. Keep up the pressure to dismisss this heinous case
Thank you Gary Packwood.
Thanks again.
To 1:53 pm: My comment was a rhetorical question meant to be ironic, and reflect the way that 88 did not refer to the March 05 rape as alleged. Sorry the irony was not clear.
Random Thoughts
The short-lived era of the identity-politics shakedown artists/racists is quickly coming to an end, sorry Jesse. I'll give the G88 credit for not marching with the New Black Panther Party, but that's about it. Being one step down on the crazy scale from Victoria Peterson isn't something to be proud of.
Kim Curtis...mentioning anything about CGM: mental history, drug and alcohol use, river of semen of unknown origin flowing from every orifice ==> ATTACKING THE VICTIM/PROMOTING OF RACIST, SEXIST RAPE CULTURE...actively trying the guy would was knocked out at the Cook-Out restaurant shortly after March 13, 2006 AND explicitly asserting that one of her students was covering up a rape ==> SERVING THE PUBLIC GOOD. WHAT A HYPOCRITE!
Given the known evidence. I'm perfectly willing to assume that a rape occurred. I just don't see how it could have occurred at the lacrosse player's party or been perpetrated by the lacrosse players. I think that a viable theory of the crime would be that CGM was gang raped at some point during the 24 hours prior to the lacrosse players' party, and she was so detached from reality given her mixing of Flexeril and alcohol that she might have actually believed that it was the lacrosse players who raped her.
Nifong got in over his head and was too stubborn or scared of the uproar to stop it.
PATHETIC.
Appropo Brodhead/Summers and the power of diversity are three passages from The Weekly Standard, March 6, 2006, "Harvard Lays an Egg: The triumph of the diversity faction and the fall of Larry Summers.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=11910&R=EBA6
"Summers's transgressions began shortly after he took office, when he challenged Cornel West, a member of the Afro-American Studies Department, to pay more attention to scholarship than to making recordings of rap music-a seemingly appropriate and innocuous charge for a president to give to a faculty member. Yet West took offense, as did others on the faculty, on the grounds that Summers had been racially insensitive and had no right to chastise a member of the faculty about his research. For his pains, West was inundated with handsome offers from other institutions, and shortly headed off to Princeton."
"The diversity industry that has grown up around the campus asserts (without any evidence) that a departure from proportional representation in any field or department is, ipso facto, evidence of discrimination. This is why there exist preferential hiring practices for women and minority groups on every campus, and various scholarship programs, publications, study centers, and curricular offerings designed specifically for every designated group. All have created their own advocacy groups to press their claims, the most influential one on the Harvard Campus being the Women's Caucus of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Most intelligent people understand that these practices have been carried beyond the point of absurdity but have no idea how to rein them in. Summers, as it turned out, endorsed the diversity regime in the abstract (otherwise he could never have been hired) but, given his simultaneous belief in excellence, could not help but take steps or make comments that contradicted it."
"There are certainly many lessons to be learned from this debacle, but two immediately stand out: first, that our major academic institutions are run by their faculties, not by trustees or students, or by donors or alumni; and, second, that the activist members of faculties will not accept from presidents (or deans or provosts) any contradiction of cherished ideological assumptions, most of which revolve around the magical word "diversity." Presidents at other institutions, and administrators harboring aspirations for advancement to presidential posts, are bound to take note of Summers's downfall, and will certainly take steps to avoid a similar fate."
The Summers case shows just how out of touch and intolerant the Academic Left is.
If you utter an idea that differs with their orthodoxy, they are so closed minded and so unaccustomed to even hearing such ideas, that they might start gagging, wheezing, or even pass out.
We see this same close minded trait among the G88. They refuse to reconsider their position regardless of any new information.
They're also not accustomed to engaging anyone outside of their insulated academic environment. But now they've thrust themselves into the national spotlight with their irresponsible "listening" ad. They now find themselves being challenged by a broader audience. They're not used to it, and they can't handle it at all.
To 2:02 Retired Lawyer/Professor;
You have most it right, but your timing is off, perhaps due to the fact that you are retired and thus don't see the present work force first hand.
The keys already have been handed to India and China. I work in technology and see first hand that Indian and Asians have been much better prepared by their schooling for competing in the technology areas of the Global Economy. Many of USA schooled workers look stupid by comparison.
On the present course, the USA is about 10-15 years away from being a socialistic country resembling a third world country in many noticeable areas. We are ratcheting in that direction.
Our public school system deserves much of the credit for our decline, for they "train" our future. Instead of training focused on technology, our kids our filled with the PC diversity pablum. When not at school, they get it at home, just look at the Disney channel (or most any other). The stuff that passes as funny on many sitcoms is insultingly stupid to the well educated. Our reality shows are unrealistic. There is a deliberate dumbing down occuring in America. Books have been written about it.
Jobs go overseas because we not only can not compete with India and China brainpower (due to the above), but can't compete from a cost of business point-of-view. Our tax laws, Unions, and environmental laws deserve much of the credit for that. And don't forget that politicians have gifted China with technology that was developed and paid for here in the USA. Thank Mr. Clinton and his buddies at Global Crossing for that.
All democracies eventually fail. One must wonder how much life remains in our Republic.
"And the University deserves any and all opprobrium heaped upon it for its gutless and sycophantic behavior vis-a-vis G88!"
Instead why doesn't Duke find a leader, and then quit funding the hate departments? Lose the bigoted racists through attrition.
Duke has a chance to be THE leader.
Keep the pot stirred, keep the fantasy alive. If nothing's happening, a juicy lie will do the trick; and a complaisant media is always there on cue to lap up the vomit.
There are never any significant negative consequences for these class/race/gender purveyors of hate, and their odorous peers applaud such behavior. Anything is allowed, for "the cause" is always unquestionably just.
1.The professor stated that
"No top administrator has met with members of the black faculty to explicitly address the issues broached by the lacrosse incident" despite the fact that the president of Duke had, in fact, on April 3 addressed these very issues with the black faculty.
The allegations contained in paragraph 1 are admitted, but Defendant McClain denies that president Brodhead is a top administrator.
Defendant McClain denies that president Brodhead is a top administrator.
ROTFLM-T's-O !!!
Debrah
Please KC. Do this.
As one of your daily offerings--the hot wordsmith that you are--please touch on any coverage of the lacrosse case and Mike Nifong's demise that writer Hal Crowther of The Independant might be doing now, if any.
My guess is that he has put his sizable tail between his legs and scampered off. I don't check out his work often and we all might be amused to see how he has backtracked from his original stance.
IIRC, one of his close friends is a member of the Gang of 88. Don't know if it's Chafee or Peter Wood.
In any case, I remember reading an abominable column of his early on...as he, like many of his ilk, rushed to judgment.
Crowther spent that entire lengthy column revisiting the "jock culture" and he brought up every stereotype to slam the Duke lacrosse players that he could muster.
I called his paper months ago when it was clear that Nifong was toast and that everyone in the media had basically gotten it wrong; however, no one returned my call.
Crowther has done some good work in the past, but his coverage of this case has been worse than the early-onset craziness of Robinson Everette.
Again, please KC, do a follow-up on what Hal Crowther might be up to these days.
(BTW.....his friend from the Gang of 88 is a balding, chunky, gray-haired man as he was seen in the accompanying photo to Crowther's column months ago.)
Debrah
I think a new term has been coined: brodheaded: To be totally abandoned and thrown to the wolves by a witless, feckless cretin who has weaseled himself into a position of trust and responsibility.
Trinity60
This one is for chuckles:
http://www.newsobserver.com/opinion
A Calm and Resolute Objectivity
I've recently read Duke's mission statement and its strategic plan. There are statements about how hard it is to hire faculty to bring about diversity, how much of a priority this is, and how many special efforts are being made to bring "diversity" about.
I wouldn't have a problem with hiring patterns that resulted in more Chinese or Indian professors, or with more three-headed Martian professors for that matter, if it was based on merit. It has become abundantly clear how far from this we have come. The only way to get the numbers they are after is to create special departments, pay inflated salaries, and then put up with whatever acts are orchestrated by these professors.
Talk about biting the hand that feeds you! Nothing is enough. We are far down the slippery slope and in peril.
Where we live, no one is more active in local politics than the teachers. They are highly motivated to elect retired teachers, teacher's spouses, and other sympathizers to the school board. This way, they can soak the taxpayers and get all sorts of wage and benefit increases while avoiding any sort of accountability. And, they don't even have to strike. Meanwhile, they have eliminated civics and are actively indoctrinating the next generation in what I call mush-mind thinking.
In my view, this is the way things have gone since the 60's. We avoided societal breakdown, but at the expense of a more insidious societal breakdown. Organized crime not working out? Embed in a union or political party and get the gain, without the pain. Government regulation getting you down? Buy a politician or hook a political party on your contributions or ability to bring in votes.
We don't have an independent, objective press to expose the sort of manipulation that has become the norm. We too often have no good alternative. By manipulating perceptions and positioning so as to create a huge gap between what is perceived and what is actual, the electorate is divided very evenly by inflammatory issues of all sorts. This drowns out any discourse on real, substantive issues and puts inordinate power in the hands of those who can turn out votes to deliver power.
Invariably, this power is abused. In my view, the worst abuses are those that are most destructive to society -- particularly when they are disproportionately destructive to those who are fooled into voting for those who abuse them.
I'm starting to sound a little cynical :). I suppose it is time to close...
It seems certain that Larry Summers was deposed for his unplusgoodspeak about diversity. However, it's worth recalling that he was separately and deservedly unbeloved for his role in the Andrei Schleifer/Looting of Russia scandal.
Blogger Steve Sailer wrote,
"I've written maybe 10,000 words in defense of Harvard President Lawrence Summers's much-denounced speech last year on why women haven't achieved gender equality with men in elite universities' math, science, and engineering departments. But that doesn't mean he's without flaw. Indeed, it looks like Summers was peripherally involved in the Scandal of the Century, the looting of post-Soviet Russia, or at least he dragged Harvard through the legal mud in a misguided attempt to protect a close friend who had gone over to the dark side."
See Sailer's website for more detail.
Balding chunky gray haired man is Peter Wood, not Bill Chafe, who is impressively coiffed, and blow dried, and vain.
BTW, I think this is the N&O article someone tried to link above: A calm and resolute objectivity.
It contains this quote: Early in the unfolding of this story, on March 25 of last year, Brodhead stated that "The criminal allegations against three members of our men's lacrosse team, if verified, will warrant very serious penalties. The facts are not yet established, however, and there are very different versions of the central events. No charges have been filed, and in our system of law, people are presumed innocent until proven guilty."
If only this was the capsule synopsis of how Duke had handled things. They might have stood on principal, above all of the ugliness. Think how they would be percieved by nearly everyone at this point, had they only done so.
Instead, the G88 dragged their benefactor into a slime-pit of their own creation.
10:51
You've hit the nail on the head with that one.
re:"The keys already have been handed to India and China. I work in technology and see first hand that Indian and Asians have been much better prepared by their schooling for competing in the technology areas of the Global Economy. Many of USA schooled workers look stupid by comparison. "Mar 7, 2007 6:55:00 PM
How true. My son is finishing an Engineering Ph.D. at a top 25 in the world university. American students were in his Master's class but out of more than 30 who started the program he was the only one who was accepted into the Ph.D. program. In his field of mechanical engineering, exceptionally high level applied math skills are de rigour as [except for mechanical engineering design] numerical methods in abstract modeling* are the tools one needs to be able to exploit well to get offered a Ph.D. fellowship. Hence, all but a handful of Ph.D. students at my son's university department are North Asians ( Korean, Chinese and Japanese ) and are from actually Asia not 1st or 2nd generation Americanized Asians. There are a smattering of White males such as my son and American Asians but absolutely no females, Latinos, Blacks or South Asians.
What is the reason behind the dearth of American talent at that level. My son believes it is because of the NEA has controlled American primary and secondary education for generations. His experience in primary and secondary was a cake walk with little or no stress placed upon him. He was an athlete more than a student all through grade school and high school. My own experience in the 50s was much harder than his in the 90s and my high school was actually harder than college as I went to an all boys Honor High School competing against the brightest boys from all over the city. The competition in College for me was not nearly as cut throat. But, the NEA, Liberal Newspapers, Liberal Politicians, Race Hustlers and the Feminists put an end to TRACKING and Sex and Intellectual Segregation thus lowering the standards of the curriculum for the American youth from the 60s onward especially injuring the brightest youths. The Asians still track and teach their brightest students using tried and true methods demanding high standards not the teaching fads constantly being fed to the American students with the result that the Asian students come to America with skills heads and shoulders above even our brightest with only the super bright ( my son has an IQ over 160 ) being competitive with them in a field such as mechanical engineering at the Ph.D. level, at least at a 1st rate university this is true.
Our youth are the losers and eventually the USA will pay for this folly.
DK
*numerical methods in modeling: being able to program in a language such as C, be fluent in Calculus, Differential Equations, Linear Algebra (Matrix, Vector Algebra), and have more than a working knowledge of Mathematica and MatLab.
6:55 - so true. Especially in regards to the PC/diversity focus in the schools. I wish there was a clearinghouse that listed groups/sites that were devoted to things like fighting for free speech (given the G88's power at Duke, I am surprised to not have heard anything about repressive speech codes there), historical fact vs. PC fiction, academic standards vs. affirmative action, indoctrination vs. education, etc.
Limited to ones that rely on facts rather than agendas - and are NOT associated with fundamentalist or racist groups. (I checked out an author publshed on an innocuous website and was startled to find he was associated with such a group. Bookmark deleted. )
This group seems to fit the bill -
FIRE:Speech codes
Have we come to the point where college preparation should include this sort of information?
Given this, Duke Delenda Est.
Something must be done pour encourager les autres.
Debrah, bless your heart, Hal Crowther is not going to admit that he was wrong. Or that the Constitution should be used to defend those he despises.
And requesting that someone read his work or even pick up a copy of the Independent should be considered cruel and unusual punishiment. Writers at the Daily Worker think the Indy is biased.
Anonymous 12:05 Said...
I don't understand why the G88 is given so much value at Duke.
Probably because the administrators do not know how to anticipate and then manage what these people will probably do...in the name of diversity.
All universities should probably have a closer relationship with the residents of the town that is home to the university.
My background before I joined the faculty, was manager of employees who were members of many different labor unions.
I had (and have) no problem appearing at the local labor hall and talking with working people.
They tease me about living in a ivory towel and I tease them about not know what they want.
Most academic managers were at one time poets or musicians and economists and don't feel comfortable talking with non academic types who are ...in a snit.
The G88 are seen as the group that will set off the fire storm in the host community or the flood of criticism from other academics...in the name of diversity.
The trick is to know the interests of all of these groups and then how to craft a strategy of joint interests that will allow a plan to be developed.
It also helps if academic managers are prepared to 'sit on the dock of the bay' and fish if fishing is an interest of one or more of the groups.
The competency that needs focus ...is the WILLINGNESS to develop a statement of joint interests.
Re 09:30:00, "The competency that needs focus ...is the WILLINGNESS to develop a statement of joint interests."
Fine-sounding general principle from a mediator, but when you're up against the G88 do you simply acquiesce in their exclusive little purview as being the whole scope of "joint interests"?
The University's bigger than that. It even includes athletes, and certain hard sciences whose professors and students recognize that there exist facts (not mere 'texts') that can't be contorted by blathering into Orwellian caricatures.
So when G88 turns into a society for the denial of Constitutional rights to athletes - and conducts closed meetings whose proceedings are screened from recordings and videos by the unanointed - and whose members universally refuse to respond to questions submitted by outside investigators such as KC Johnson - what will you do to pursuade G88 to adopt a WILLINGNESS to develop a statement of joint interests with the rest of the University, the rest of the State and the rest of the country?
From where I sit, they're wholly unwilling to do such a thing, unless they are handed complete control of the 'process' and the deliberations are hidden from the rest of us. What would you do? Do tell.
Insufficiently Sensitive
9:30 "...The trick is to know the interests of all of these groups and then how to craft a strategy of joint interests that will allow a plan to be developed...
...The competency that needs focus ...is the WILLINGNESS to develop a statement of joint interests..."
It seems to me your suggestion is no different than;
1. Discussing wood rot vs. replacing rotten wood, and,
2. Ignoring that the root cause of the rotten wood is the leak in the pipe, and
3. The leaking pipe was built to serve an outhouse that is economically and functionally obsolete.
Instead of spending money to fix the wood rot, and the pipe, we should be questioning whether the outhouse is needed.
May I just ask, which Duke students are taking Paula McClains clasess this spring term. Are they nuts? I would want a refund. Is there any way to find out if enrollment is down in her and other G88 profs(?)
6:00 I would like to know that also. With 15 students for 33 professors, I doubt they are calling the police for crowd control,
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