Tag Archives: education

When Speech Isn’t Free

Posted in Education, Uncategorized by

In January, Mount Saint Mary’s University, a small Catholic college used to living a quiet life in the country, burst ingloriously onto the national media stage.

Student reporters for the University’s newspaper, the Mountain Echo, broke a story about a plan designed by school president Simon Newman to cull at-risk freshman, based on their responses to a legally-dubious questionnaire. I wrote about it as an alumna, along with dozens of other alumni and higher education reporters.

The story started out bad, and it has only gotten worse.

In the time since the Echo published its report, the newspaper was temporarily shut down. Its faculty adviser was fired — for no specified reason other than “disloyalty.” Another faculty member who contributed to criticisms against Newman’s plans was also fired for “disloyalty,” despite having tenure. An entirely new advisory staff for the student paper– approved, of course, by the president — was installed.

Faced with an untenable situation in which not only their academic freedoms, but their livelihoods, were threatened, faculty met and voted 87-3 to urge President Newman to resign.

Newman did not resign. He countered by reinstating the faculty he fired as an act of “mercy” — though the faculty themselves were not immediately informed what their “reinstatement” involves or even allowed access to their university email accounts.

He handed out doughnuts to the 70 or so students that showed up at a rally held to support him. He touted a student government survey that indicated a majority of its respondents believed in his mission, as if it were some sort of referendum. He vowed that he wasn’t going anywhere and he brought back the Mountain Echo.

It’s a version of the Echo, however, that reads like a state-sanctioned student newspaper out of North Korea.  Its return was announced with a list of letters to the editor, which were, as a whole, supportive of Newman’s approach. And its home page looks like a catalog of pro-Newman propaganda.

Looking at the newspaper from an objective point of view, you might actually believe that Newman really is, on the whole, embraced by the overall Mount community.

He’s not.

At least one other letter to the Echo editor was not published, despite being scheduled to go out in last week’s edition. The letter was critical of President Newman, but it served as a respectful request for him and the rest of the administration to listen to the voices of those who differ from them in opinion.

I know this letter was withheld because, with my fellow alumnus Nunzio D’Alessio, I wrote and submitted it. Clearly, our request to be heard was denied.

There are many stakeholders who have the best interest of Mt. St. Mary’s University at heart. Students, faculty, alumni, and the Catholic community of which the Mount has been a part for 200 years. We are not, by any means, universally supportive of President Newman or the Board that has consistently backed him up.

Alumni who criticize President Newman have been vilified by other alumni. We have been accused of trashing the school we (falsely) claim to love and damaging the Mount name. The bad press is our fault.

The student reporters who broke the story have been harassed and intimidated. Students who oppose President Newman are afraid to speak out. Some faculty will only use private email servers to discuss Newman because they are certain their emails are being read.

Today, FIRE (Foundation for Individual Rights in Education) announced its 10 worst colleges for free speech. Mount Saint Mary’s is at the top of the list. And until drastic changes to its leadership are made, that is where my school belongs.

From the first time I visited the campus, Mount Saint Mary’s has felt like home. What it is going through now is painful to see — it’s like watching a family fall apart. But I love the school enough to know that disloyalty isn’t speaking your dissent– it is staying silent when injustice and poor leadership threaten to destroy something sacred.

Krista Threefoot,
Class of 2001

Click here to support struggling freshmen at Mount Saint Mary’s.

The text of the letter that was not published in the Mountain Echo is below:

February 10, 2016

Dear Editor,

We, the undersigned, are alumni of this university who have for some time been concerned with the general direction and current state of affairs at our beloved alma mater.

While the precipitating cause of this letter is the recent debacle surrounding the so-called “retention program” (known among us as Bunnygate) and its support by President Newman and the Board of Trustees, we judge this most recent event as evidence of a much deeper problem.

Initial reports of President Newman’s retention plans were shocking. Even in hindsight, the program comes across as misguided. The language President Newman used to describe the culling of 20-25 “at-risk” freshmen, as bunnies to be drowned, was even more disturbing – it hints at a lack of respect for the constituents of the school and the faculty who were attempting to serve their students’ best interests.  

But, thanks to our Mount education, we are able to look past President Newman’s unfortunate choice of words to assess the issue on its own merits. It is in looking past his choice of words, however, that we find our source of concern.

Despite the explanations and justifications the administration has rushed to put forth, we still find little to reassure us that this retention program was intended to be as constructive and supportive as President Newman has recently described.

The Mountain Echo reporters have offered enough evidence to suggest that President Newman did indeed intend to encourage a set number of “at-risk” freshmen to leave the school by a certain date. The fact that this date would have enabled Mt. St. Mary’s to favorably manipulate their retention numbers is not, in our opinion, coincidental. Why would the faculty have refused to submit the data to the administration by that date if they had no concerns about how it would be used?

We are further distressed by the tone of Mr. Coyne’s Message from the Chairman of the Board of Trustees from January 22, and its attempt to cast doubt on the objectivity and methodology of the Echo reporters who broke the story. The Echo has been admirably transparent, providing more details than should be necessary on how they researched and verified information for the retention plan story. (See their Jan. 19 Editorial Note.)

We are alarmed by Mr. Coyne’s blatant attempt to discredit the students, alumni, and faculty who contributed to this story. Mr. Coyne’s letter appeared to suggest that any and all criticism of the President’s methods and motives is the propaganda of some sort of cabal of malcontents actively working against the best interests of the school.

This week, our concern has turned to outrage as we have learned that Mr. Coyne’s letter contained more than just vague accusations and idle threats. The demotion of Provost Rehm and the firings of Professor Egan and Doctor Naberhaus have been made public, along with a well-founded suspicion that their firings were the result of their opposition to President Newman’s agenda.

And it is here where we reach the heart of the matter we find most disturbing: Mount Saint Mary’s shines as a school in the liberal arts tradition where open discourse between people with differing ideas and opinions is welcomed and encouraged. The administration’s suppression of dialogue, its retaliation against those who speak out against it, and its unwillingness to address legitimate concerns about the direction of the school belies everything for which the Mount stands.

We write today cognizant of the many challenges currently facing the Mount as an institution of higher education. We are fully aware that the President and the Board are working hard to save a school facing serious – potentially catastrophic — financial difficulties. We recognize that these financial problems are President Newman’s inheritance, the result of his predecessor’s prodigious spending that increased the university’s debt substantially. We respect President Newman and the Board for their commitment to making the Mount flourish in a changing world.

But we worry that the administration’s unwillingness to engage in constructive dialogue with its critics is symptomatic of deeper problems besetting the University. Contestation and critique are vital aspects of a thriving liberal arts education. When the administration stifles the voices of those who question it, how can we trust them to preserve the Catholic liberal arts learning environment that has so profoundly enriched our lives?

We fear that in its push to make the Mount marketable, the administration is exchanging discovery, dissent, questioning, and critical thinking – the highest virtues of a liberal arts education — for an expanding quest for rankings, prestige, retention, and greater tuition and grant dollars.

Today, we address the Mount administration as academics, bloggers, nurses, therapists, educators, writers, television producers, scientists, journalists, business leaders, community leaders, mothers, and fathers. We are writing as the generation of alumni poised to lead society through the next decade, and we want you to know that the core, liberal arts curriculum and the vibrant spirit of community which characterized our Mount education are critical aspects of the unique contribution we are able to make in our world. The education we received at Mount Saint Mary’s 10, 15, 20 years ago is even more relevant now than it was then.

We ask that you respect our ideas, opinions, and concerns. We ask that rather than dismiss or discredit those in our Mount community who criticize your decisions, you respond openly and with transparency. We don’t want to be told what to think – our Mount education taught us to ask for more from life than directions to follow.

Our Mount education also taught us to speak out against injustice, whenever and wherever we see it.

We see injustice now, in the actions the administration has taken to punish those who refuse to toe the line. We ask that you understand that we will not stay silent.  

Above all, we ask that you work as hard as you can to preserve what we treasure most about our mountain home: its cohesive identity, rooted in the ever-curious, ever-seeking spirit of Catholic, liberal arts education. The future of Mount St. Mary’s University does, indeed, lie within the foundations of its past. On this point, we agree.

We sign with sincere gratitude for our Mount community,

Chinenye Adimora

Stacey Margaret Allen ’01

Adaora Azubike

Sarah Pilisz Babbs C’06

Jason Bacon ’01

Amanda Blizzard ’02

Meghan Bolden ‘04

Patrick Bolden, ‘78

Ken Buckler, ‘06

Toni Burkhard ’99

Martha Ciske – ’01

Lizette Chacon ’02

Eryn Chaney ’02

Joe Creamer ’01

Nunzio D’Alessio ’01

Krishawn Demby ’02

Christy V. Emmerich ’03

Reggie Eusebio ’00

Paul Evans ’03

Jen McAlice Fellows ’01

Michael Fellows

Steve Finley ’03

Angie Gilchrist ’04

Katie Reilly Giusti ’01

Kelley Wilson Griffin ’02

Melinda Hatcher ’01

Fran Harrington ’03

Cindy Stanek Holsworth ’02

Alison Zabrenski Humphreys ’01

Kevin Hunt ’00

Cuyler Jackson ’02

Kristen Johnson – ’02

Kelly Klinger ’02

Jen Mabe ’00

Katherine Stattel Mach ’01

Steve Manley ’02

Leroy Masser ’01

Gina Woods Mastromarino ’02

John W. Miller ’99

Mary Saynuk Monroe ’01

Kelly Wallin Morin ’01

Nola Occhipinti ’02

Ekene Adimora Ogwu ’01

Chloe Mathus Oram ’02

Elizabeth Polit ’01

Katie Sherman Rawson ’01, MBA ’07

Katie Hopkins Repetti ’01

Eric Seebach ’00

Jen Wieber Schildkraut ’02

Rebecca Walker Shoemacher ’03

Nicole Sinclair ’01

Erin McCartin Smigal ’01

Elaine Streck ’00

Krista Wujek Threefoot ’01

Sarah Tucker ’00

Beth Smith Utter ’01

Kate Vancavage ’02
Darlene Kukura Wallace ‘04

Julie Varner Walsh, ‘01

Kate Muldowney Watkins ’02

Matt Watkins ’02

Catey Heimerl Williams ’01

Wendy Brinig Williams ’02

Erin Callahan Woerner ’01

Rebecca Pagan Zamora ’01

Melissa Ismey Zimmerman ’02

In Honor of Our Teachers

Posted in Children, Education by

This week is Teacher Appreciation Week, so it seems like a good time to put into words a post I have been writing in my head for weeks.

The state of our schools is on the minds of parents across the country. We hear about oppressive testing regimens, disinterested teachers, the much-maligned common core.  We hear far more complaints and criticism than gratitude and praise. More than that, we hear about a system that is broken, in which excellence is the exception to the rule.

***

On paper, our local school does not look promising. Our Great Schools rating has dropped from an eight to a four. Sixty percent of our students receive free or reduced price lunches – the highest percentage in our (wealthy) county. We have a significant population of parents whose first language is not English, so many of our students enter Kindergarten unable to understand their teachers.

If you look at just the numbers, ours is a school that some people would choose to avoid.

Some people would, but thankfully, we didn’t. Because numbers and metrics and the problems so many people like to discuss don’t tell the whole story.

***

For me, the story begins with our teachers.

When my daughter started Kindergarten last year, I was worried. She was diagnosed with Asperger’s when she was three. Since then, different doctors have agreed and disagreed with that diagnosis, but on one thing there is a clear consensus: she has some quirks. School, with its many transitions and social challenges had the potential of being really tough for her. Full-day Kindergarten looked, to me, like a minefield.

It wasn’t. My daughter’s teacher seemed to have an intuitive understanding of exactly what she needed to thrive. She made their daily routine clear and guided my daughter through transitions. She recognized the triggers that made my daughter especially anxious, and she made sure to work around them.

And she did all that while dealing with a class of 17 other children, who were all over the developmental spectrum. Some were struggling with the basics of reading, others were reading chapter books. Some came to school barely understanding English. Some had never been in a school environment, and several struggled with the restrictions of being in a classroom all day.   Her special understanding of my daughter wasn’t even special – because she had the same commitment to meeting the unique needs of each and every other student in her classroom.

And this teacher, as good as she is, is not an anomaly.

Back in December I had a meeting at our school to talk about my daughter’s handwriting, which was terrible.

Because her fine motor skill development was concerned, the meeting included her first grade teacher, the lead special education teacher, the school psychologist, an occupational therapist, and her principal.

I began the conversation discussing some of my daughter’s history, expecting to have to explain her quirks and how they affect her in the classroom. But I didn’t have to, because her teacher had such insight into her personality, her anxieties, and the way she learns that she was able to contribute more to the conversation than I was.

The special education teacher picked right up on what her teacher was saying, and put together a plan that was not only tailored exactly to my daughter’s needs, but which was creative and empowering.

Her principal looked over her handwriting samples, and understood immediately what our concerns were, adding in his own interpretations and recommendations.

Everyone in that room cared. They cared about my daughter as a person, not just as a student. They liked her. They wanted her to succeed in becoming her best self. It’s a gift beyond value — beyond any kind of measurement —  to have people like these in your child’s life.

***

Our teachers have an incredibly difficult job, especially at the elementary level. They aren’t just imparting knowledge. They are teaching our kids the basic skills that form the foundation of all the learning they will do in the future. And they are doing so for a classroom full of children with vastly different learning styles, family backgrounds, social statuses, and personalities.

My family is fortunate to be part of an exceptionally good school district and to be assigned to a school with excellent teachers and a strong community. I know how vastly unequal school districts across the nation are. I know that we are privileged.

But the story of our education system starts with our teachers. And if we want that system to be great we need give our teachers the support, the gratitude, and the respect they deserve.

So to all the teachers in my life: Thank You.

S

And Off She Marched Again

Posted in Children by

This time last year, I was overcome with anxiety over my daughter starting kindergarten. I was worried for her because public school can be a big, scary place, and I was worried for myself because my mental balance was disturbed by the fact that my girl was growing up too darned fast.

I found out this morning, when I sent her off to first grade, that letting her go off into the big wide world of school wasn’t really all that much easier this time around. Because it turns out that your first grade baby is still your baby, just a year older and even further removed from the tiny, helpless newborn she once was.

Would it be excessive for me to make her wear a label with this picture on it and the caption, "ATTENTION UNIVERSE: I USED TO BE THIS. So be nice to me. Or you will have to deal with that lady in the hospital gown."

Would it be excessive for me to make her wear a label with this picture on it and the caption, “ATTENTION UNIVERSE: I USED TO BE THIS. So be nice to me. Or you will have to deal with that lady in the hospital gown.”

In six years of parenthood, I can say with some authority that I have learned two things. First, I’ve learned that bringing your first child through her newborn phase will feel like the hardest thing you have ever done, and when people with older children tell you that it just gets harder you will want to stab them in the eyes with a fork. And second, I have learned that it just gets harder.

I used to think that, once my daughter could just tell me what was wrong, parenting her would be so much easier. It wasn’t. Because once your children start being able to tell you what is wrong and how you can make it better, they start demanding things that are impossible for you to give them. I will never forget the night my daughter, then two, begged me, sobbing, to make the sun rise up again after it had gone down. As much power as we parents have in our children’s lives, we cannot alter the functioning of the universe. My daughters still struggle to accept this fact.

As your children get older, their problems get far more complicated. They argue and defy you and do things that are bad for them. They struggle, and there is often nothing — nothing — that you can do to help them. The power you once had to tailor their world to fit them diminishes with every passing year.

For me, one of the hardest parts of parenting has been coming to terms with the overwhelmingly bittersweet feeling of watching my daughters grow up. I am awed by and in love with the people they are becoming. My girls are awesome, and their awesomeness just becomes more evident as they grow older. I’ve never experienced anything as satisfying as watching my daughters grow into the people they are meant to be — and the best part is that I have many more years to experience this phenomenon.

But as they move closer to the people they are becoming, they move further away from me. It is a distance that I feel, physically. My arms were once full of them; if they moved through the world it was because I was carrying them. And now they are moving through the world on their own, with my guidance and love behind them but not surrounding them. I love who they are, but I miss what they were.

I never knew that an adult could experience more angst about her children growing up than a teenager does who is in the throes of coming of age. But there you go. Parenthood is hard, and it is hard in so many ways.

Fortunately, as I struggle with letting go, my big first grader is delving into the new school year with her customary verve.

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She is pretty amazing, isn’t she?

 

 

 

 

Modern Elementary

Posted in Children, Humor by

Last Friday we went to my daughter’s first elementary school event, a PTA-sponsored ice cream social. I figured that we would go there, eat some ice cream and, you know, be social. My main goal was to meet the parents of the boys (yes, boyS) who, according to my daughter, have been trying to kiss her during recess. I expected a tame, grade school event that was no different or more exciting than all of the other events I went to when I was a kid in school.

What I did not expect was a dance party in the gym with an actual DJ. I didn’t expect to see a bunch of grade school kids dancing to “Cha Cha Slide” or “Gagnam Style” or “I’m Sexy and I Know It.” And I really didn’t expect them to be good — like, really good. The older girls seemed to know all the hip-hop moves, and some of the boys were actually breakdancing. Even my preschooler’s 2-year-old classmate was putting the grownups to shame with her skills.

Apparently, public school events in the 21st century are way different from the kind we had at Catholic school in the 1980’s. For starters, the principal was in attendance — and bobbing his head appreciatively — while music that included the word “sexy” was being played (loudly). Sister Madonna, my elementary school principal, was one of the loveliest women I have ever known, but I shudder to think what would have happened if any of her students had even whispered the lyrics to “Gagnam Style” within her hearing.

In fact, throughout most of the event I found myself either staring at the scene like an anthropologist who has just discovered an unknown tribal ritual (“what is that cha-cha thing they’re doing?”) or reminding myself that this was not 1999, I was not in college (there was no G&T at the drinks table), and it would be HUGELY embarrassing for me to break out my Elaine dance during “Cotton-Eyed Joe” in front of my daughter’s principal.

Yeah, that’s right, I said my “Elaine dance.” Because I’m old and I used to watch Seinfeld and, it would seem, I am totally unprepared for modern parenthood.

Because she is my child, my daughter spent the entire dance party running in circles around the gym. AS IT SHOULD BE. ;-)

Because she is my child, my daughter spent the entire dance party running in circles around the gym. AS IT SHOULD BE. 😉

De Colores

Posted in Children, Humor, Individuality, Motherhood by

When my older daughter was about two, I spent lots of time teaching her things. Like colors — I came up with engaging, educational games that were fun for both of us. And they worked — my brilliant little miracle learned her colors. I was pretty amazed by both of us, and I stuck that achievement on the front page of my mental brag book.

Shake a butt

Who needs pants?

Then came my second daughter. As with most younger children, she got a much more faded, jaded, tired version of me. And now that she is two, most of our one-on-one time involves me chasing her around the house with a diaper and a pair of pants while she screams “no mommy! No dipey! No pants! I be naked!” She is lucky if she gets a couple of half-hearted minutes with a depleted set of her big sister’s flash cards.

So you can imagine my delight when, while she was sitting in the ball pit at our mommy and me gymnastics class, she picked up an orange ball and said, “yook, mommy! Orange!”

It was a miracle! Somehow, I had managed to teach her colors without even trying. I was better at this parenting thing than I had thought.

Then she picked up a blue ball and proudly exclaimed, “blueberry!” She not only knew her colors, but she was also associating them with fruit! The kid is a genius. I picked up a red ball and said, “Look! An apple! A red apple!”

“No, mommy,” she said. “No red. No apple. Strawberry.” Then she picked up a yellow ball and said, “And lemon. Dis one lemon.”

And then it dawned on me. Orange. Blueberry. Strawberry. Lemon. She wasn’t talking about fruit, and she had only indirectly learned her colors. She was talking about characters from the television show Strawberry Shortcake. The new one, with characters that are much less child-like, and much more Barbie-like than the quaint version we moms grew up with. The one that she watches excessively, with the obsessiveness that only a two-year-old can attain.

I have achieved no miracle of parenting. My child officially watches too much TV. She still doesn’t acknowledge the words “red” or “yellow.” But do you know what she does do? Whenever she sees something purple, she says it is “plum.” She asks for her baby doll’s blueberry dress, and calls all shades of bright pink raspberry. This is what we call vocabulary building.

So next year when she is in preschool and her teachers are holding up that yellow card my child, the poetess of the class, will raise her little hand and declare that it is “lemon.”

And I will be proud.

Hey, it works.

Hey, it works.

Y por eso los grandes amores
De muchos colores me gustan a mí.
     Y por eso los grandes amores
De muchos colores me gustan a mí.

~ De Colores