Unlike last week’s closed door faculty meeting, the authorties have agreed to let campus media in to report on the meeting. Innermostparts.org was granted a seat to report on the proceedings. I will give a full report on the meeting later, but I’d like to give a brief update while the Deans of IBS and Heller report.
The Faculty voted, by a margin of 104-11-12 to accept a resolution proposed by John Plotz and Elizabeth Ferry that would create a committee that includes all the relevent stakeholders to discuss the status of the Rose Art musem. This was a protest by the faculty against the shutting out of the community in the decision making process regarding the closing of the Rose Art. Some of the faculty who spoke in favor of the resolution were just as angry as we were and they made it clear that they wanted to have a say in the process.
It is becoming increasingly clear that the faculty are some of our greatest allies in the fight to have our voices heard.
Full wording of the resolution after the jump.
We the faculty move that:
Whereas the decision was made to close the Rose Museum was taken without the consultation of the relevant stakeholders in the university community;
And whereas the CARC’s mandate does not include the status of the Rose
We call on the Senate to create a committee that includes representatives from the relevant stakeholders in the University to explore various actions that may be taken with regard to the Rose Art Museum.
Moved by:
Elizabeth Ferry (Anthropology)
John Plotz (English)
You’re never going to get anywhere in politics if you start quoting the French, Adam, but I see your argument. I just am a big fan of accountability!
Nelson, I’ll say to you what Voltaire said on his deathbed when asked to renounce Satan: “Now, now my good man, this is no time for making enemies.” Even if the faculty did indeed want their Senate meeting to be kept private (and it seems like many of them didn’t), I still don’t think it’s wrong of them to want a private space to discuss these issues from their perspective (just as it wouldn’t be wrong for the administration, or the BoT, or the students). What we were protesting was not that one particular faculty meeting should be closed but that we had been left uninformed and without a voice in the entire process. On this issue, the faculty is overwhelmingly supporting us, and many of them felt just as much in the dark as we did (witness their surprise at the decision to close the Rose). We’ll get much farther by working with everyone who shares our concern than by casting as many people as possible as our opponents.
You didn’t need to bother to write staffmember – no student would be writing a response to this thread at 8am.
I don’t mean to be such a negative Nancy in a situation where help is certainly useful, but outside of the “academic world” we point out bullshit when we see it, and we judge people based on their records, not on their rhetoric.
I am happy to see the faculty has recognized the merit of inviting student activists to their meetings. I think that the faculty is just as guilty of blocking transparency as is the BoT, though, and their record illustrates that.
Professor Cohen spoke in front of my 9am “Foundations of American Culture” class on Wednesday and said that he was confident that the faculty senate would not be opening its doors to those students who wished to watch its proceedings. Student senate meetings are open, and even the calls for closing the meeting occasionally have dwindled over the last two years in favor of more transparency.
I tend to assign a fair amount of blame on the faculty and student representatives (mostly the student reps) to the BoT. Apparently, there were faculty members who were given up to three weeks notice of this and kept their mouths shut about it? I guess now faculty can understand why some students don’t want to speak their mind’s in classes – it sucks to have to decide whether you speak freely or you shut up and don’t get in “trouble” 😉
As a homework assignment, search the brandeis website for the Faculty Handbook and read it. Then tell me what group actually holds any power at Brandeis.
Answer: The Board of Trustees
Discussion: The President, Provost, and Deans hold some small amounts of power, but it is basically inherited from the BoT. In some places the rules call for the faculty to be *consulted*, but all power is in the BoT.
In truth, the faculty right now are scrambling to make their opinions heard by the BoT.
And yes, all the faculty I know do care quite a lot about student opinion. As do at least some of the staff.
As far as I understand it the Adam Jaffe was behind the decision to make last week’s meeting a closed door one.
In any case, I’ve been talking with faculty all week. To a certain extent, they’ve got our back. To a large extent, they’re on our side.
Then again, the Administration is on our side too, in their own way.
So..the faculty wanted us in. Who told us that students couldn’t get in, then? I mean, there were a number of students gathered outside, right? Did administration tell us we couldn’t go to the faculty meeting? Or was it facilities staff?
If the faculty ‘wanted us to be there’ we would have been in there without a problem. I encourage you to find as many allies as you can on your mission for more transparency, but acting as though the faculty are our allies in anything is a riot.
For those of us in attendance at the protest last week, when we spoke to many members of the faculty after the meeting, most of them had NO IDEA that we weren’t allowed in. I remember one professor asking me “The Student Union President wasn’t even allowed in??”
The faculty wanted us to be there, they didn’t know we weren’t allowed until after.
Dude – I look at the fact that students were excluded LAST WEEK.
I judge people based on their records – maybe it’s just the progressive in me that finds it hard to forgive and forget actions that took place so far in the past.
As one of the few students in the room, I can say that the faculty were genuine about including students in the process. The biggest applause of the day occurred when Adam Jaffe announced that two students would serve on the faculty steering commmittee.
The Faculty have our back. Believe it. Just look at the number of votes for and against this resolution.
The faculty were angry that they weren’t included in the process? Weren’t they the ones who excluded students from the process…last week?
ALLIES indeed! Couldn’t pick a better name to describe our relationship with the faculty!
Stop eating up everything the faculty says, guys. Don’t be so naive.
Wooooooooo!