The administration wants to appear as an intellectual force beating back destabilizing waves of political correctness that have rocked college campuses. But the focus of student protests hasn’t been the lack of trigger warnings and safe spaces. Instead, many protesters want the university to evaluate how it invests its money, improve access for students with mental illnesses and disabilities, support low-income and first-generation students, and pay its employees fair wages. They have been pushing for more transparency in the school’s private police force, which has resisted making most of its policies public in the face of complaints. The university is also under federal investigation over its handling of sexual assault cases.
Yet, the administration has refused to meet with student groups who have asked to discuss these issues, and it has threatened to discipline students who staged a sit-in protest. The university even hired a provost who specializes in corporate crisis management and dealing with “activist pressure.” While the university accuses students of silencing opposing voices, it continues to insulate itself against difficult questions.
In this context, it’s hard to see the dean’s letter as anything other than a public relations maneuver. While students are being depicted as coddled and fragile, the administration is stacking bricks in its institutional wall to avoid engaging with their real concerns.
As many of us felt when the letter came out, the writer agrees it was mostly a PR move.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/11/opinion/trigger-warnings-safe-spaces-and-free-speech-too.html?_r=0
In related news, This is the first in a series of dispatches by college students, professors and administrators on higher education and university life.
- I've rather missed the Times' college coverage.
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