Who’s in charge?
It has been fun watching the revolution from the sidelines and even
including my own idiotic ideas, but….
What are the next steps?
Who makes the decisions?
Who sets the goals?
I am trying to understand what is going to happen to Gallaudet. I am
not certain that the future will be clear for years.
Indeed, appointing an interim president is probably the easiest
decision.
It is where the university goes from there that worries me.
INTERNAL DECISIONMAKING
Who is in charge? There are many competing voices.
Should the protesters have a say? Are the capable of making decisions
or just tearing things down?
Do people want Ryan Commerson, Noah Beckman, LaToya Plummer, other high
profile protesters making the decisions?
A quick review of Gallynet just today shows people proposing –
- Firing Jordan
- Keeping him on
- Getting rid of the public relations department
- Having the SBG work with the campus police to improve their policies
- Reconstituting the BoT – more deaf, less deaf, more alums, etc.
Etc. Should students be allowed to govern? Who filters these
decisions?
Will the Trustees accept the FSSA or SBG and work together with them?
What does that mean? Do representatives from these groups get one vote
or more on a new BoT?
EXTERNAL VIEWPOINT
Should people at Gallaudet be concerned about the off-campus view?
- The Washington Post said today,
Ms. Fernandes promoted a school that would welcome all sorts of deaf and
hard-of-hearing people; that would accommodate itself to improving
technologies, which in coming years will allow more and more deaf people
to function in the hearing world; and that would emphasize tolerance of
diversity. The protesters were promoting a university that celebrates
what they call Deaf (with a capital D) culture, prescribes American Sign
Language as the only acceptable medium of communication and relates with
suspicion to deaf people who choose to function in the hearing world. To
the extent the latter vision won out, it does not bode well for
Gallaudet’s future.”
Do you think any part of this is true? If people off-campus largely
believe this, it doesn’t matter because perception is reality.
EMPLOYMENT ISSUES
I worry about what the outside perception will do to Gallaudet’s
students and to the university itself.
Will employers think Gallaudet degrees are worth less or even worthless
because of events on campus? (The students dont’ go to class, the
teachers don’t teach, the degree means nothing, etc.)
Does this ultimately reduce the number of employed deaf people in the
future?
CAMPUS ACCEPTANCE
What is the future for the various populations?
Will some deaf people be unwelcome? I have been told by students that
there were groups of people who resented “outsiders” who had implants or
were oral, or those who were raised with Signed Exact English. Will this
become the rule of law?
Will this lead to reduced enrollment?
Will fewer people want to work on campus?
Who on earth would want to apply to be president after 1988 and 2006?
CONGRESS
Will Congress think this was a good and positive thing? Will they
decide to review funding? If Gallaudet loses some or all governmental
funding is that going to wreck the place?
Tough questions.
– The Gunsmoke
GALLYNET-L@gallynet.org
reprinted with permission by the listserv moderator
email contact: mishkazena@aol.com
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MZ, maybe you could enlighten us with your worldly Deaf Culture wisdom. Start with the Question of “What are the next steps” and work your way down. The plan that was in place is gone.
With all your wonderful wisdom you should apply for the president position.
But first lets see your answer to all these questions and your resume.
You seem to have all the answers so I sit and wait in unabiding attention awaiting your great plan.
Have you all wrecked Gallaudet?
Jim, the first step an open-minded and progressive leader willing to work with the Gallaudet stakeholders without practicing Management By Intimidation (MBI). Undo the damage Jordan and Fernandes have created on the university and promote deep cleansing of the corrupt system, including oppression, paternalism, audism, and racism, among other things. With the university on the right track, it can hopefully start healing.
The cleansing of oppresion, paternalism, audism and racism should be achieved no doubt. However it needs to start with the narrow minds of the students who feel people who are oral are somehow inferior. This is audism in the purist form being practiced by the majority Deaf Culture club.
You talk about MBI. What do you believe you and the ptotesters have been doing the last few months. What I see is the intimidating practices of the protesters are blatant. Let’s start here! Then you may have a chance.
I would like you to see your answers for the solution instead of to endlessly blaming others.
My answer would be to stop living in the past and move to the future admitting the faults by all in the protest. And having a university which does not claim to be for One Specific Culture but ALL.
Did you forget that I was an oral student? Many protesters came from oral background.
The protesters rebelled against the overbearing oppression they’ve experienced for years on the campus. They said “No More Oppression”.
Of course just like everywhere, we do have our share of people not behaving appropriately. There are people with audistic attitudes as well as people who reject oralists. However, most of the members of Deaf Community do co-exist peacefully and respect each other.
This is a big awakening up that we all must examine ourselves and address any internal prejudice we have toward each other. However, Deaf identity is not the reason behind the protest, so the administrators need to come clean with the public and remove the Not Deaf Enough Mantra. Any administrators who practices MBI needs to get, too.
We need to resolve the issues first, but there can be no moving forward unless the current leaders be held accountable for their misconduct. So far they hadn’t. Once they are out of the pictures, then we can move on.
I laughed at SBG that they would work with DPS to improve policies. Somewhat, I am disagreed with them. What about injured students? Injured students have bad memory of what DPS did done to. The best is to remove some DPS who did make bully to the students. Hopefully, it is time to teach sign language to new hires & nonviolent DPS.
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