Race Not Only Mizzou Issue
Source: Wall Street Journal
COLUMBIA, Mo.—Racial tensions were merely the tip of the iceberg leading to the dramatic resignations Monday of University of Missouri President Tim Wolfe and Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin, according to professors, students, state lawmakers and others.
Both men made a series of enemies among faculty, graduate students and legislators, these people said. As students’ discontent over a series of recent racial incidents escalated, they found few ready supporters around campus, they added.
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Inspired in part by the students’ discontent, on Nov. 3, 26 members of the flagship campus’s English Department voted “no confidence” in Mr. Loftin. They wrote to the university’s oversight body, the Board of Curators, that Mr. Loftin’s 21-month tenure “has been marked by dereliction of duty in maintaining the quality and reputation of graduate education, violations of the bedrock principle of shared governance, and failure to defend the University’s educational mission against outside political pressure.”
Within a week, members of the Department of Romance Languages echoed the no-confidence vote and nine deans signed a letter asking the curators to dismiss Mr. Loftin, saying he created “a toxic environment through threat, fear and intimidation.”
Read more: http://www.wsj.com/articles/race-not-only-mizzou-issue-1447206995
This article talks in detail about a variety of issues that management had, aside from the obvious racial ones. Interesting to hear the additional issues involved.
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Social media is flattening the world and demanding ever more transparency. This trend will be especially troublesome for the archaic bureaucratic institutions like colleges.
It is hard to think of a more out-dated out-of-touch business structure than American colleges. The basic design has not changed since the 1850s -- lectures given in person, during daylight hours, in large halls, with some type of blackboard, you pay to attend and take notes, you are required to buy a certain book (usually one written by the prof), weeks of lectures, maybe a mid term and then one exam for about $3000 per course, around $100 an hour to sit in lectures with ~100 other customers. Goofy square black hats, choir robes, scroll of white paper. Absolutely ridiculous in 2015.
Looking at graphs like the one below make me think that colleges are cashing in on all of the biases of the larger culture. The people who value a college degree most seem to be those most likely to be discriminated against in the job market.
I am hopeful that college can be re-made and that people will ultimately be evaluated not by the brand name on their resume, their gender, color of their skin, etc, but rather by what they bring to an employer or organization in terms of skills, resourcefulness, attitude and experience.
