ACTA's Must-Reads

If one relied heavily on the Washington Post and NY Times for information about the protest, it would certainly appear that the protesters did not have a coherent set of reasons. However, this only reflects the failure of most major news media to accurately cover the protest. If one goes to the the Gallaudet University Faculty, Staff, Students & Alumni (GFSSA) website, you can clearly and definitively read the arguments against the election process and Jane Fernandes' qualifications.

In summation, the election process was not transparent and seemingly quite fixed (especially when the leaving president,I King Jordan, announces his replacement before the Board of Trustees officially concluded the selection process). The selection process took about 8 months (of which only 4 months were candidates actually reviewed) where most university presidental selections take twice that. Only one of the three finalists, Jane Fernandes, had a PhD and it was in Comparitive Literature. Another candidate only held a master's degree. All of the candidates were white; the numbers of minorities considered for the position were relatively good at the start of the search (Gallaudet's website gives a statistic that %50 of the candidates were either minorities or women -- no actual breakdown beyond that), but most were dismissed early on. Further, I. King Jordan served as reference for Jane; arguably a conflict of interest when the current president is acting as reference for a candidate. There are many additional complaints with the search process, which have been well documented and explained on the GFSSA website as well as many other websites.

The issues with Jane Fernandes have quite a bit more history than the recent election. Every major news source seemed to miss this fact, but when she was first elected provost, she received a no-confidence bid from the faculty. During her reign as provost, the US department of education evaluated Gallaudet as "Ineffective, primarily due to inadequate progress in achieving its annual and long-term performance goals in the key areas of persistence, graduation, and post-school outcomes." -- check out ed.gov for the FY 2007 ED Budget Summary: Special Education and Rehabilitative Services for the complete report. The fact is that the majority of faculty and parts of the administration (particularly the Clerc Center) had vast grievances with her while she was provost. Again, you can see documented complaints on the GFSSA website and on many other non-Gallaudet affiliated websites that have covered the election process.

BTW I would like a more detailed explanation to the uses of the words: extortionate, illegal manner, and destructive. I'm very interested in what the author here is talking about specifically.

The way the protest is described here, I feel that our founding fathers should have been tried and imprisoned for their riotous, destructive revolt on the British. OK, Obviously I'm being sarcastic. However, to be so objectionable to the protest, seemingly over the essence of having a protest, confuses me. What was it about the protest that was so appalling to you (author)? Was it the idea of protesting against a Board of Trustees? Or, the manor in which it was conducted (if so, please give an example of an acceptable protest and what exactly about this protest you objected to)? And in describing your reasons, could you go into more detail than just using words such as destructive, manipulative, illegal? I feel these words have been tossed around by select media groups a lot in reference to the protest without any real application to specific events. I would appreciate a more detailed reflection on the protest.

Let me get this straight, ACTA condemns a board that is out of touch with its university. A board that has less than 51% alumni, a board that, for over 100 years operated on an 'hearing' agenda?

It really sickens me to see all these 'professionals' that come from all walks of earth proclaiming their opinions about whats right and not for Gallaudet. When these very professionals have very little (if any) understanding, education and credibility in the Deaf World.

For centuries, deaf people have NEVER had a land they could call 'home'. They still don't. And for any hearing person to come in and look at the Gallaudet situation and say its wrong; is an ignorant person.

So, ACTA, what is your background in understanding the deaf world? If you dont have any, shut up.

you claim to be a nonpartison group but this sure looks like partisan politics to me. It also looks like you simply have a difference of opinion with the NYT as opposed to actual knowledge of the facts. I think you should really do some research before you go publicly condemning decisions made, mostly of which you know nothing about.
the thing that really concerns me, though... If this is a union for trustees and "ALUMNI" then you have really got a lot of soul searching to do. The Gallaudet University Alumni Association was heavily involved in this protest. Faculty and Staff at Gallaudet and Clerc were involved in this protest. The National Association of the Deaf was heavily involved, over 80 cities on the global map pitched tents in support of this protest.
So, when the Board finally realized that they had a huge angry community on their hands, they made the best decision they knew how. And YOU...who claim to represent trustees and alumni are condemning them?!!?!?
This is absolutely ridiculous, what planet do you guys live on? This isn't politics, this is common sense. The old adage must be true...common sense is not so common.

This organization's strong and strident criticism of the recent actions by Gallaudet's Board of Trustees bothers me. I say this because ACTA is supposed to stand for people serving as trustees PLUS the alumni as well. It is clear to me that the ACTA did not take a closer look at the situation at Gallaudet, because if they did, they would see an administration that ignored the university's alumni.

Here is an excerpt from my post on a Washington Post blogsite:

"Now I would like to comment on one aspect of this complex situation, the alumni. I am an alumnus of Gallaudet University, having graduated with a bachelors' in mathematics in 1991. Like other colleges and universities, Gallaudet has an alumni organization, GUAA.

A little while after the selection of Dr. Fernandes, and the initial outroar, the GUAA board decided to issue a letter calling for Dr. Fernandes' resignation and reopening of the search. The problem was that the University's Alumni Relations had the database of the alumni's email and mailing addresses, and refused to let GUAA use it to email their own members. Last month, the President, Dr. Jordan, used the same database to email all alumni about the postponement of the homecoming and again to ask for support for the president-designate.

The decision to postpone all the homecoming activities was made unilaterally, without consulting the people planning the 25th and 50th reunions of Gallaudet alumni. The GUAA director was part of the class celebrating its 25th reunion, and he issued a call for all alumni to ignore Dr. Jordan's decision to postpone all activities. Two days later, Dr. Jordan send another letter saying that most activities were to be postponed but that "limited functions" such as the reunions would be allowed to take place.

A faculty member who was also an alumnus, did some investigating and found that GUAA had turned over many fundraising drives to the Alumni Relations office and kept just 4 traditional funds. In the fundraising letters sent out to all alumni by the Alumni Relations office, those 4 funds were omitted.

In another example of the administration's attitude towards alumni in general occurred at the National Association of the Deaf, one of the oldest advocacy organizations in the United States, where a significant portion of the attendees were Gallaudet alumni. Dr. Jordan had a golden opportunity presented to him in the form of the keynote address at the banquet. The speech was easily the most anticipated part of the night. Dr. Jordan had a chance to proclaim why Dr. Fernandes was the best, the most qualified person for the job. He had a chance to present Dr. Fernandes, who was also at the conference, to the audience and convince them of his belief in her. By now you all know that he did not do that. What he did was just say, "There is no crisis at Gallaudet", and that "The Board of Trustees' decision is final". That was about it. I was present at the banquet that night.

There was another opportunity that presented itself to Dr. Jordan and Dr. Fernandes when they attended the GUAA breakfast, and again, they did not seize it.

I find it hard to believe that Dr. Jordan blew those two opportunities to nip the protest's momentum in the bud. On Homecoming Day, the Park Police estimated that 4,000 marched to the Capitol, and a high percentage of those were alumni. I wondered if Dr. Jordan postponed homecoming mainly to avoid so many alumni joining the protestors.

I ask you, would most colleges and universities treat their alumni in the manner that Dr. Jordan's administration did? "

I'm very interested in ACTA's thoughts on the treatment of Gallaudet alumni by the university administration.

If there are no real thoughts, then ACTA should rename itself ACT instead of ACTA.