Reclaim
Last monday I witnessed what I had been missing for months: engaged Antioch students.
After weeks of bitchin’ and moaning about the lack of student involvement in al things revival, I saw 70 students coming together behind the student union organizing in ways that made it clear we are on the verge of something big.
Inform Yourself
Long ago seem the days that we still had a Dean of Students and a President who was actually allowed to call himself that. Adapting to new status quos, indeed has been quite the theme since I arrived here 13 months ago.
The recent dismissal of our president and the strong student and faculty reaction to Rick Daily’s presentation at the senior center made me think back to February when Jimmy Williams was made to leave.
Standard consultation processes were disregarded. students were outraged, screamed for transparency. Then Steve came in with the numbers, everyone was baffled and in the end the baby was thrown out with the bathwater.
In a different context but similar situation, students and faculty were alarmed after last week’s off-campus meeting with representatives of the college alumni board. Again there was legitimate concern. But If not addressed well, there again is a chance that the baby is thrown out with the bathwater.
I remember not being pacified by Steve’s presentation of the daunting numbers that led him to cut 20 positions in February. I regularly attended Adcil and was there when Lawry presented the need to restrict operational costs drastically. In between all that daunting reality, however, I never got past seeing the elimination of Jimmy Williams’ position as a welcome political move amidst a general decision driven by necessity.
Last Thursday, transparency of processes again became a concern. This time it was those who lead our (the college’s) crusade that were in deficit. Appearing in front of a community that’s been shaken and brused by a series of top down decision making and stripped of its self governing ability, and de facto saying “you will just have to trust us to watch the store,” shows poor understanding of the sentiments of the college community right now. Talking about military people assessing our buildings and the need to “make sure Adcil is relevant” hardly won him over the trust of the assembled community either.
Talking personally to the alumni involved, on the phone, by email or reading the intra list servs, I don’t believe there is malice or power lust on the part of the AB, but if the language does not become more inclusive, people will jump ship.
At the same time, it’s vital that students and community inform themselves beyond second hand information that is heavily editorialized by the time it reaches them (including this one). If rumor becomes our main mode of communication, we will fail. I don’t believe in liaisons, I believe in Gmail and speed dial and tackling people on the way to their car; Email Rick Daily, call Nancy Crow, chat to Ellen Borgersen while you help her move her boxes into her new office in Weston. Talk to Noreen Dean Dresser, a New York alumna who used to work on making lifeless military communities viable again. Ask questions, difficult questions if needed. But above all listen, to the lines and in between. Go to Adcil and ComCil. A lack of transparency is what brought us to this point in our history. If you are missing information, ask for it. Find it. If the front page article on the Antiochpapers shows you anything, it’s that it’s out there. -KJ
Dear Antiochians,
Last week, a handful of students made their way to the Yellow Springs Senior Center to listen to Rick Daily adress the Community. It was the first direct interaction we had with the Alumni Board since the August 25th Meeting, so as we sat on the floor of the meeting room, we felt eager to hear news from the frontlines.
But as we heard the dramatic events of the past weekend minimized as mere “mistakes,” and miscommunications, we started to look at each other with eyebrows raised. Our president was not allowed to set foot on campus, college staff were locked out of their own offices, all of which in the most suffocating silence, and the reaction of those who are defending our interests was to urge us to get over it and move on?
“I feel like he’s handling us” I wrote on a corner of my notebook to my right-hand neighbor.
Then, as we listened to diatribes about the “opportunities” that opened to us, and how Antioch could be made great in the future; as we listened to talks about developpers and army-lead operations in our buildings, we starting shaking our heads in disbelief. Talk about the new board’s vision and independance, yes, there was plenty. Talk about community input, none. Maybe it was not the time for this yet, so we swallowed our concerns and waited for the next part.
“I’m tired of this superficial pep talk, it’s not worthy of Antiochians” was my next message to my neighbor who nodded, looking as anxious as I felt.
Finally, we listened to our faculty members expressing some of our concerns, about transparency, democratic process and responsbility. But their remarks were dismissed as counterproductive, as if we were not allowed to question the process in which we are all involved in any way, because it will not bring pragmatic results. “We have to make sure that AdCil is relevant” was the last straw.
So as I listened to Rick Daily’s joke “we are consensually hijacking the campus”, I wrote to my right-hand neighbor: “I feel like our efforts are being hijacked for a plan that is not ours!” But when I turned to her for an answer, I saw that she was sobbing.
Maybe we were mistaken as to the purpose of that meeting was. For us, it was an opportunity to meet alumni to share information and insight for the first time since the Cincinatti meeting. Maybe it is too much for us to ask to be acknowledged in the language, as a very much alive, vibrant community, whose democratic governant bodies are relevant. Maybe people will turn to us later, when the “divorce is secure”, in Rick Daily’s words. But we have suffered from way too much top-down authority recently. And we hope that if we are to have an independant Board, it is to reclaim that long-lost power back for the community, not to put it in the hands of, –however concerned and dedicated– trustees to realize their Vision from yet another top-down perspective.
Because Antioch College today is not some kind of no man’s land, a shack to rebuild to its greatness. Antioch today is doing pretty damn fine, thank you very much, (except for one or two details). And I wouldn’t have prefered go to Antioch at any other time.
At the end of Thursday meeting, a member of the assembly asked for more transparent processes to be put in place. A faculty member added that faculty should be included. At that point, I cried out “ And Students!”
I hope someone heard me.
In solidarity,
-JK
Dear Community,
“I’m sorry,” “you understand my position,” “I’d rather not,” “I don’t think it would be wise of me to speak, right now,” “don’t quote me on that, I will lose my job.” This is a selection from the repertoire of answers a reporter at Antioch has to work with these days.
With the firing of Steve Lawry, the college CEO was moved off campus and fear moved in. Some Non-unionized staff openly admit they are afraid to loose their jobs, others have been bullied to the point where they stopped caring.
This is not to say people have lost their voice altogether, but they have become selective where to put it. The last two months have seen a collective move away from the University server. .gmail replaced .edu. and mobile phones ousted the office land line. It’s sad, it has come so far that workers can no longer feel secure in their own office. And as much as I want to understand the responsibilities administrators like Milt Thompson have ”in these times”, this feeling of discomfort is not solved by hiring an extra security guard or locking buildings at night.
Dear Community,
Nostalgia, for some a warm and fuzzy word that expresses honor for the wisdom of your predecessors and respect for the past; for others it’s a synonyme for backwardness and lack of adaptability to the new.
It is putting on a pedistole the imperfect because it conveys a feeling. It’s what fuels places like Cambridge, Harvard and Yale, where the the cherished traditions and glorifi ed experiences of the father become the promises of the son and his daughter after that. History and memory in these places are captured in historic buildings that never crumble. I can only assume that on a campus where the choice is between moving into Dickens’ or Byron’s old room, black mold and poorly done grafi ty is not an issue. Nostalgia is allowed, it seems, encouraged even when it is backed up with ever impeccable buildings and supplemented with state of the art new computer labs, as if to proove that one has not stayed behind.
But what if the buildings are crumbling? Recently, the media with willing quotes from those who should defend us, has all to often made a parody of Antioch. Our decaying buildings become indicative of our loss of academic rigour, piercings and tatoos a reason to declare our spiritual demise. What we are left with is nostalgia for better days long out of reach. If attending the meeting in cincinnati has done one thing, it is to counter this. Those attending showed that we are rich in thought and spirit, they were intelligent and compassionate, eloquent and creative and they hold on to what our predecessors have left us with because have made it our own and we value what it entails.
To speak with the words of alumn Larry Rubin “To say that our product is based on nostalgia shows a misunderstanding of what we are about and it shows a misunderstanding of what education is about. It is about collective memory, not condos.”
KJ
_______________________________
Dear Antiochians,
At Saturday’s Cincinnati meeting, many community members expressed their satisfaction at fi nally being able to meet the members of the Board of Trustees. The pleasure to be able to interact face to face with the people behind the institution was genuine and candid. An exterior observer might wonder why, considering the circumstances… But Duffy explained it well at the stakeholders session: “Antioch is an intimate place; our students care about intimacy”. “We want to have a relationship with you”, he declared to the Board in our name.
Antioch is a place that favors intimacy; and the question has already been raised: if the college does stay open, how big should it become? Nostalgics of the late 1960s ‘golden age’ sometimes hold the 1500-2000 students model in reference. Toni Murdock, in her recent PhD Commencement speech, refers to her “dream” of a “virtual commons” as the university of the future. This idea goes in the direction of current patterns of globalization—as described by her principal reference throughout the speech, Thomas Friedman—in which the physical space becomes increasingly disregarded, at great loss for the local.
The Antiochian values of bottom up action, shared governance and community solidarity are contrary to that vision. They call for resistance against any such attempts at uniformization and dehumanization. They call for the recognition of the collective through respect for the individual, and the sacredness of personal interactions.
Whatever a future Antioch College may come to be, I hope that it will always remain an intimate community. The so often undermined power of intimacy sometimes resurfaces despite it all, and authentic interactions might still hold more value than is usually attached to them. We can look for proof in the outcome of Saturday’s meeting.
With Love,
-JK
Dear Community,
Nostalgia, for some a warm and fuzzy word that expresses honor for the wisdom of your predecessors and respect for the past; for others it’s a synonyme for backwardness and lack of adaptability to the new.
It is putting on a pedestal the imperfect because it conveys a feeling. It’s what fuels places like Cambridge, Harvard and Yale, where the the cherished traditions and glorified experiences of the father become the promises of the son and his daughter after that. History and memory in these places are captured in historic buildings that never crumble. I can only assume that on a campus where the choice is between moving into Dickens’ or Byron’s old room, black mold and poorly done grafity is not an issue.
Nostalgia is allowed, it seems, encouraged even when it is backed-up with ever impeccable buildings and supplemented with state of the art new computer labs, as if to prove that one has not stayed behind.
But what if the buildings are crumbling? Recently, the media with willing quotes from those who should defend us, has all to often made a parody of Antioch. Our decaying buildings become indicative of our loss of academic rigour, piercings and tatoos a reason to declare our spiritual demise. What we are left with is nostalgia for better days long out of reach.
If attending the meeting in Cincinnati has done one thing, it is to counter this. Those attending showed that we are rich in thought and spirit, we were intelligent and compassionate, eloquent and creative and we hold on to what our predecessors have left us with because have made it our own and we value what it entails. To speak with the words of alumnus Larry Rubin “To say that our product is based on nostalgia shows a misunderstanding of what we are about and it shows a misunderstanding of what education is about. It is about collective memory, not condos.”
KJ
Dear Antiochians,
At Saturday’s Cincinnati meeting, many community members expressed their satisfaction at finally being able to meet the members of the Board of Trustees. The pleasure to be able to interact face to face with the people behind the institution was genuine and candid. An exterior observer might wonder why, considering the circumstances… But Duffy explained it well at the stakeholders session: “Antioch is an intimate place; our students care about intimacy”. “We want to have a relationship with you”, he declared to the Board in our name.
Antioch is a place that favors intimacy; and the question has already been raised: if the college does stay open, how big should it become? Nostalgics of the late 1960s ‘golden age’ sometimes hold the 1500-2000 students model in reference. Toni Murdock, in her recent PhD Commencement speech, refers to her “dream” of a “virtual commons” as the university of the future. This idea goes in the direction of current patterns of globalization—as described by her principal reference throughout the speech, Thomas Friedman—in which the physical space becomes increasingly disregarded, at great loss for the local.
The Antiochian values of bottom up action, shared governance and community solidarity are contrary to that vision. They call for resistance against any such attempts at uniformization and dehumanization. They call for the recognition of the collective through respect for the individual, and the sacredness of personal interactions.
Whatever a future Antioch College may come to be, I hope that it will always remain an intimate community. The so often undermined power of intimacy sometimes resurfaces despite it all, and authentic interactions might still hold more value than is usually attached to them. We can look for proof in the outcome of Saturday’s meeting.
With Love,
-JK