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March 26 , 2008
Campus rapes, O.D.S. visits, dropping enrollment, parking “tension,” and budget cuts… oh my!
The UIS campus has had to deal with quite a handful of problems over the last two semesters, with varying degrees of success (and failure).
Recently, the Faculty Senate introduced legislation that would form a committee to provide oversight of the Office of Enrollment Management.
Last month, Marcel Yoder, associate professor of Psychology, proposed that an advisory committee be formed to report on the activities of the Counseling Center.
This new trend of the faculty advising, overseeing, and possibly intervening in administrative and support matters has not been well received by all departments here on campus, many people feeling that the faculty is over-stepping their bounds.
We at The Journal feel that it is long overdue for someone to step up and address some of these issues.
At any university there is a corps of experienced, highly educated, professional faculty members that deal with students on a day-by-day basis. Why we have not employed this valuable resource in dealing with some of these recent problems is unfathomable. A continued resistance by administrative departments to this intervention, even if the resistance manifests itself in hushed tones and grumbles rather than official policy, is equally reprehensible.
The students of this university have invested their money, time, and trust in the campus leadership, and we expect results. When you do not provide the necessary resources for us to succeed, or allow infighting between various departments to reach a point where students do not feel they are being served properly, it becomes a moral imperative for these problems to be quickly fixed in a rational, logical, and compassionate manner.
Whether their feelings are justified or not, many students do not feel that their problems will be properly addressed by the services and personnel currently in place on campus. Student organizations, for the most part, have done little to organize and advocate about these problems. The administration has proven distant and impotent when dealing with the complexities and issues of a growing university. Several key student service departments have, through their incompetence and in-fighting, driven away those who they should be serving.
Faculty members are in a unique position to assist students since they see them on a daily basis and have already established rapport with them. Their intervention into administrative affairs is both natural and much needed.
But faculty, take heed. While your assistance in these matters is welcome, if this trend of placing yourself in these oversight roles continues, then you will share in the responsibility if these programs continue to fail.
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