Dissent the Blog

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Ranking Reveals World's Top Countries for Higher Education (click on link)

3 comments:

Anonymous said...: What's the evidence for this assertion? I thought we were behind in math, engineering, some sciences?; 4:58 PM, May 15, 2012
Roy Bauer said...: Click on the link. The methodology is explained (to some extent): "The range of measures is grouped under four headings: resources (investment by government and private sector), output (research and its impact, as well as the production of an educated workforce which meets labour market needs), connectivity (international networks and collaboration which protects a system against insularity) and environment (government policy and regulation, diversity and participation opportunities). Population size is accounted for in the calculations."
4:58, you're confusing two issues here.; 5:40 PM, May 15, 2012
Anonymous said...: Sorry, Roy, but I had not checked the link before writing my short questions. Makes a bit of sense since reading the Market Watch piece but it's not terribly illuminating.; 10:13 PM, May 15, 2012

15+ years ago!

From Dissent, January 26, 2000

Teddi Lorch might accept an apology for sticking her head on a pterodactyl

LA Times:

Former trustee may sue college district

Teddi Lorch, who served until 1998, claims Irvine Valley teacher defamed her using school equipment.

By RENEE MOILANEN

A former trustee says she may sue the South Orange County Community College District, charging that a faculty member used district equipment and facilities to produce defamatory newsletters that caused her emotional distress.

Teddi Lorch, who served on the board from 1993 to 1998, claims Irvine Valley College professor Roy Bauer launched a “conscious, willful and malicious campaign to defame” her in newsletters distributed regularly at Irvine Valley and Saddleback colleges.

The district denied Lorch’s formal claim Monday night. Her lawyer, Chandler Bartlett, said that his client is now “considering her options” to file suit.

In the claim, Lorch names three trustees and Chancellor Cedric Sampson as witnesses, but wouldn’t say whether the former colleagues had previously agreed to speak on her behalf.

Lorch believes Bauer used district equipment to produce his anti-board newsletters, an allegation that he denies.

“That’s utterly false,” Bauer said. “I have never used the equipment on campus. I do all that stuff at home.”

Lorch is seeking damages exceeding $10,000. She said, however, that she may accept an apology from Bauer.

In her claim, Lorch points to four newsletters beginning in February 1998 and ending last June. Of these, an April 1998 newsletter contained a cartoon titled “In the Lorch Wood,” depicting two characters resembling Tweedledee and Tweedledum with Lorch’s head superimposed on both.

“Only reasonable minds can conclude that the demeaning and defaming content and duration of his newsletters ... were maliciously designed to intimidate, ridicule and degrade me and others in leadership positions who were not of his liking,” Lorch told board members in a statement Monday.

She said she decided to file the claim after the June newsletter, which came out nearly six months after she gave up her seat on the board.

That's Teddi on the right, above Johnny

“If one is serving on the board of directors, it’s a different capacity than if one is no longer on that board,” Bartlett said. “It may have been a factor in the filing of this claim.”

Bauer admits that he often lampooned Lorch, even after she left the board.

“I think she’s a public figure,” he said. “When I refer to people in newsletters, it’s in the context of something they’re doing relevant to the district.

Last year, a federal judge ruled that Bauer’s newsletters were protected under the First Amendment.

Lorch listed eight witnesses in her claim, among them trustees Dorothy Fortune, Steven Frogue and John Williams, with whom she was closely aligned during her board tenure.

Trustee Nancy Padberg said she’s known Lorch’s family for “15-plus years” and would “have no problem being a witness if she needs me.”

No trustee can remember any problems or rifts when Lorch left the board.

“Something has to be said about values,” Lorch said, referring to Bauer’s newsletters. “Someone else has to take him to task.”

Past post: "several large bowels of pasta"

"Several large bowels of pasta"
January 30, 2010

Yesterday, the NYT’s “Schott’s Vocab” zeroed in on malapropisms. Having been raised in an immigrant family, I own a brain that is hard-wired with dozens of malapropistic configuroons. I think I even got some of ‘em through the umbiblical “chord,” though, really, that’s a mute point at this stench in time.

First, the malapropism upon which much of my parents’ fame rests:

“He died because of a blood cloth.”

Sometimes, I will look right at them and say, “There is no such thing as a ‘blood cloth.’ You mean a ‘blood clot.’”

Always, they look right back at me with immediate and utter incredulity.

Here are some examples offered by Schott’s readers:

HE'S VERY EGOTESTICLE

• Someone I know is a genius at this. She spoke of a woman who had her hair up in a buffoon; saw my new shoes and said, "My, aren't you the fashion plague"; and recently spoke of a man who is very egotesticle.

• my favorite poem is "allergy in a church graveyard".

• My aunt always said, "I can't have anymore children because I've had my utopian tubes tied.”

• My father, noting the first hint of fall in the air, sighed and said: "Soon it will be time to fart stars in the fireplace.” [This seems to be something of a Spoonerism.]

• A busy woman: "Sometimes I get so stressed out I have to go to my room and decompose for an hour."

YOU DRIVE MY NUTS!

• A co-worker's little son announced that "you drive my nuts!" My daughter once wrote that our cat Butter Boy jumped on Frenzy when she was "least expectant." My grandfather deliberately invented examples like astosbestos for asbestos and nutneg for nutmeg. Another relative admired the singing of Ethel Murmur and the talents of Shirley Dimple. This becomes a way of life. It's dangerous to be exposed to it when young! [God, this sounds like my upbringing. Pretty whackitudinal!]

• i cannot decide which music i like better, R&B or flip flop

• "lead us snots into temptation...."

• My grandmother was famous for her malaprops; when asked if she would like to take a flight in her friend's new airplane, she gasped "Absolutely not, I like it right here on Terra Cotta";

• At a restaurant: Clams on the half shelf and a cup of chino.

• ". . . government takeover and mandation of healthcare . . ." --Sarah Palin

• Here are selected favorites from my wife:

1. This is the tip of the ice cube.

2. Security in schools has been tighter since 7-11.

3. The right foot doesn't know what the left foot is doing.

4. The swine flu has reached the pandemonium stage.

LIGHT AT THE END OF THE TURTLE

• At work, our team had been working on a project that had been progressing at snail’s pace with no end remotely in sight. One day, we had a breakthrough, and one of my colleagues excitedly announced at our weekly meeting, “There’s light at the end of the turtle.”

• Our church secretary always refers to the annual report to the denomination as the Sadistical Report.

• A friend with a medical condition consulted a doctor at "Cedars Cyanide"

• "I am impressed by the enormity of the universe."

• I've been tracking these at work:

Someone who is frustrated: "I've been pulling my head out over this one!"

Working through a problem: "I'm just talking out loud here."

Suggesting something: "I don't mean to speak out of tongue, but..."

Rehashing: "I feel like I'm beating this with a dead horse."

Feeling a little disoriented: "At this point, we're running by the fly of our pants."

Is in a bad mood: "He's got a craw up his butt."

• "This is a bare-bones specification, let's flush out the details later".

• After a staff party at which pasta was served, we were reminded that several large bowels of pasta were left over in the refrigerator. None of us went near the fridge as a result.

HAD HIS KITCHEN FLOOR POLYURINATED

• A few years back my father, who is now nearing one hundred, proudly announced that he had recently had his kitchen floor polyurinated.

• The late Bruce King, governor of New Mexico for many years, was famous for having said of a legislative proposal that it would "open a whole box of Pandoras."

• One of my son's college roommates, an ROTC cadet, dropped out of the program just as the Iraq war was starting. "This is not a good time," he opined, "to be thinking about joining the Army corpse."

• "Be sure and put some of those neutrons on it." –While ordering a salad.

COULDA KNOCKED ME OVER WITH A FENDER

• "You could have knocked me over with a fender."

• "We cannot let terrorists and rogue nations hold this country hostile or hold our allies hostile." –George W. Bush

• Explaining lethal injection: "First, they give 'em a needle to seduce 'em; then they give the legal injection"

• Friend referring to his relationship with his wife, "...like two ships that go bump in the night."

• "Those kids were able to Flea-Bargain their way to a lesser punishment."

The many monikers of the SOCCCD

1. South Coast Junior College District

(during planning; district founded February 14, 1967)

Problems, real or imagined: "Um, what about inland? Ever hear of El Toro, Tustin, places like that?"

2. Saddleback Junior College District

(renamed during board meeting, March 13, 1967)

Problems, real or imagined: "They're not called 'junior' colleges anymore, cuz they do more than that."

3. Saddleback Community College District

(1970)

Problems, real or imagined: in 1979, the "north campus" is built in Irvine. By 1985 it becomes an independent college: Irvine Valley, and it's denizens take themselves awfully seriously. SCCD is now a two-college district.

So: "How come the district's named 'Saddleback' when only one college has that name?"

4. South Orange County Community College District

(1997)

Problems, real or imagined: "SOCCCD? Really? Maybe we should add some more Cs."

"Looks like this half-county ain't big enough for the both of us."

5. South Orange County Community College District

and

South Orange County Community College District North

(2020)

Problems, real or imagined: "El Toro Rd. is, and always has been, the borderline. Nowadays, students who wander across it must contend with lasar-armed drones and Del Taco rubbish cyclones."

Early Saddleback College history: "faculty wives club"

• “Saddleback College Bonds Approved by Wide Margin,” LA Times, Apr. 10, 1968:

“Midway returns in the Saddleback Junior College District showed voters were approving a $9.5 million bond issue Tuesday night.”

• “Architects Get the Go-Ahead at Saddleback,” LA Times, May 17, 1968:
—“Trustees of Saddleback Junior College District have authorized architects to proceed with specifications for temporary classroom buildings for Saddleback College.”

• “Saddleback's Campus Construction Starts,” LA Times, May 25, 1968:
—“The brand of Saddleback College was added to those dating back to the area's ranching days when ground for the college's interim campus was broken by trustees in a ceremony...”

• “'Instant Campus' Takes Shape for Saddleback College,” June 21, 1968:
—“Transformation of a graded field into a college campus started Thursday with the assembling of the first steel classrooms for Saddleback College.”

• “Saddleback College Chief Rejects Offer of 3-Year Contract: College Head to Leave Post at Saddleback,” LA Times, June 26, 1968

• “Saddleback JC Picks New Superintendent,” LA Times, July 3, 1968:
—“Dr. Fred H. Bremer, 45, dean of instruction and vice president of Saddleback College, will become district superintendent and college president on Aug. 1.”

• “Saddleback Trustees Reject Bid for Delay on Dress Code,” LA Times, Oct. 15, 1968:
—“A student request that the dress code, particularly as it pertains to boys' long hair, be suspended until the new Saddleback College has a chance to form an Associated Student Body was turned down Monday night by the Board of Trustees.”

• “Reagan Dedicates Saddleback, Cites Need for Viewpoint,” LA Times, Oct. 16, 1968:
—“Gov. Reagan told students at the dedication of Saddleback College Tuesday, ‘You are brighter than we were at your age, you are better informed and even healthier’ and ‘we owe you the right to want a purpose, a cause, a banner to follow.’”

• “Long Hair Ban Sets Tone: No-Nonsense Image Marks Saddleback JC’s First Year,” LA Times, Dec. 1, 1968:
—“Saddleback College is only two months old but already it has a reputation as a nononsense campus.”

• “Saddleback to Have More Than 1 Campus,” LA Times, Jan. 22, 1969:
—“Saddleback Junior College District eventually will have a second campus, trustees have decided, but the site won't be selected for three to five years.”

• “Saddleback Adopts highest JC Salary Schedule in State,” LA Times, April 16, 1969:
—“Saddleback College District has adopted a teachers' salary schedule which makes it the highest paying district in the state, at least $5,000—at top of scale—above any other junior college schedule in the county.”

• “Wives Plan Fantasy for Funds,” LA Times, May 23, 1969:
—“Astrologers are predicting good fortune for Saddleback College Faculty Wives as they plan their first major fund-raising event Saturday at the Revere House.

• “Permanent campus to open,” LA Times, June 27, 1969:
—“Saddleback College is on the move again—for the third time since its inception.”

• “College Trustees Slate Meeting,” LA Times, June 30, 1969:
— New trustee officers to be elected “Wednesday.” The meeting was in Crown Valley School. Since last July, Collins had been board pres., Backus had been VP, and Brannon had been clerk.

• “Dress Code Amended: Hair Below Eyebrows is Out at Saddleback College,” LA Times, July 4, 1969:
—“Saddleback College, the only junior college in Orange County with a dress code, is amending its regulations on men's hair styles to make them more specific.”

• “Tea Will Greet Faculty Wives,” LA Times, Aug. 28, 1969

• “College Adopts Speaker Policy,” LA Times, Sep. 17, 1969:
— According to the trustees’ new policy, programs open to the public must get pre-approval from the Board. Programs limited to student units (departments, classes, etc.) must get prior approval of the superintendent.

• “Trustees Maintain Dress Code, Say Economics Dictate Move,” LA Times, Oct. 29, 1969:
—“Saddleback College's no-nonsense image will continue, partly as a matter of economics.”

• “Student Editors Stir Concern—and Reaction,” LA Times, Dec. 7, 1969:
—Tells of new policy by Saddleback College board that governs the student paper, Lariat. The faculty advisor (who is also head of campus PR) is supposed to delete anything he judges not to be in good taste. Students cry "censorship."

Math/Science 1970

• “Avoid Complacency, Chancellor Urges,” LA Times, July 1, 1970:
— The chancellor of the CA Community Colleges warned during a speech to Saddleback College graduates that “complacency and lack of consideration of student rights” could lead to disorder on campus. He was alluding to the trustees’ restrictive dress code for students, which forbade long hair on men. The trustees also acted to deny students a “free speech area” on campus.

MORE old Saddlebackian stories

I think you'll like these historical factoids:

1. The "Sea Mountain Valley Community College District"?

Our district was founded on Valentine's Day, February 14, 1967. At the time, the notion of a multi-college district wasn’t on anybody’s mind, I suppose. Everybody was focused on building “the college.”

"Puttin' a college here, even a shitty one, would raise property values!"

"Yeah, that's good, as long as it doesn't cost us anything."

The original five-person board comprised Alyn M. Brannon and Hans W. Vogel of Tustin; Louis J. Zitnick of Laguna Beach; Patrick J. Backus of Dana Point; and Michael T. Collins of Laguna Niguel. Vogel remained on the board until about 1975 and often served as its president (SOCCCD website).

I get the sense that Vogel was a dominant figure in these early years. (Anybody know?) Evidently, it was through his connections that Governor Ronald Reagan (now: "Saint" Ronald) showed up for the Saddleback College dedication (at a site near what came to be Mission Hospital).

During planning, “the district was referred to as the South Coast Junior College District” (see district website), but at a March 1967 meeting, “the board named the new district Saddleback Junior College District.”

In 1970, it was renamed again, this time the “Saddleback Community College District.”

Then came the infamous “board majority” of 1996, a crew that was as hubristic as it was benighted. Naturally, they decided to change the name again. In February of 1997, they asked the public for help. Trustee John Williams favored the name “South Orange County Community College District,” but

Other names being considered [were] South Valley Community College District, South Coast Community College District, Sea Mountain Valley Community College District and Old Groves Community College District. (LA Times)

Sea Mountain Valley? Old Groves?

2. We don't need no stinkin' “Gauchos”

It appears that the original board was responsible for Saddleback College’s unfortunate mascot, the “Gaucho.” (What do South American cowboys have to do with the OC?)

According to the district website, “Saddleback College was officially named by action of the board on February 26, 1968. In June of that year, the board approved the Gaucho as mascot and school colors as cardinal and gold.”

But since (according to the website) the first students didn’t arrive until September, it follows (more or less) that students didn’t choose the “Gaucho.”

I bet it was these trustees.

3. Dress Codes, war protesters, phantom Hippies

We have among us an old-timer who can remember the early days of the district. John Williams. In a 2008 Lariat article (Through the decades), we learn that

Williams moved to Mission Viejo in 1969 when his brother David, a receiver for the St. Louis Cardinals, purchased a home and needed a caretaker while he was on the road. He registered for classes at Saddleback, competing in both football and track. … "During the construction of the lower campus, we watched as the portable buildings were brought in on trailers. In the fall of 1969, the sidewalks had not been poured and when it would rain, they would lay down planks to walk on."

Williams implies that he went to college to avoid the draft: "If you didn't go to college, you could get drafted," he is quoted is saying.

According to the article, there was some “political activism” in the early years, plus some classic OC fatheaded patriotism:

"Every day at 8 a.m. the campus had their flag salute," Williams said. "The national anthem played and students had to stop what they were doing."

Williams said the student government tried to organize a war protest, and didn't want the track team to get on the team bus. Another time, a rumor was flying around that some "hippies" were going to come to Saddleback to steal the American flag, so some of the football players stood around and guarded it. The "hippies" never showed.

Williams also noted the college dress code:

"There was a strict dress code in those days, almost as if it were a parochial school," said … Williams…. "It covered everything from how to dress to the length of your hair."

4. A mighty fortress is our Library

I happened upon, of all things, a cool Saddleback College in-service pamphlet (Fall, 2008) that is punctuated with interesting factoids and images from the college circa 1968—no doubt as part of the college’s 40th Anniversary celebration.

On pages 20 and 21, the editor writes:

Several years ago a reporter from The Lariat called. He wanted to know the “real story” of the windows in the library. Or actually, the absence of windows in the library. After all, the building sat on a hill and had an unobstructed 270 degree panoramic view which was hardly observable from inside. I told the reporter that I would try to find information. I did, but he never called back. I saved the information anyway, and now do present it here for your consideration.

The “information” turns out to be a newspaper article about the Utt library published in 1970. The article describes a meeting between the board and the library architects. The architects (and the college president) wanted windows. The board? Not so much.

Library Windows Asked. Saddleback Tells Architects to Review Exterior.

By George Leidal, Daily Pilot, December 15, 1970

Situated in the rolling hills of the Mission Viejo campus with potential for a 270-degree view, the Saddleback College library will be windowless. Trustees Monday night instructed the architects, Ramber and Lowery, of Santa Ana, to revise the exterior plans removing the second and third floor windows. [There are no first floor windows, aside from the entrance doors.]

The library, the first permanent structure planned for the Mission Viejo campus, is estimated at $3.7 million and is expected to go to bid next March.

President Fred H. Bremer, said, “From an aesthetic viewpoint I feel a certain amount of windows are desirable, even in a library. Otherwise the building would have a prison like appearance.”

Board President Hans W. Vogel of Santa Ana argued against windows in the library on two grounds, maintenance and insurance costs for possible breakage.

“A library is a learning center with a function to perform,” Vogel said, “and that function is best performed if there are no distractions. A student should be able to escape completely from reality. A fortress without windows is the ideal environment for library study since when you go to the library you are trying to reach the depths of your own mind.”

Vogel further argued that savings of maintenance and insurance that might be projected for a windowless library could be applied in fitting the building with more equipment.

Robert Lowery of the architectural firm noted trustees had already approved the interior floor plans for the library, which will initially house classrooms that later will be converted to library space. Noting the aesthetic value of windows “because human beings like to know what’s going on outside even if they only see a patch of sky or clouds,” Lowery suggested library stacks would not require use of outside walls. The plan submitted to trustees included slanted high windows on the second and third floors.

Alyn M. Brannon, trustee from Santa Ana, concurred with the breakage argument against the windows and added, “I’m opposed to high windows, they are hardly ever washed, anyway.”

The slant of the windows, Lowery said, was to discourage breakage by rock throwing.”

Brannon countered, that with the slant “they’ll just collect more dirt.”

Responding to a question by John B. Lund, Laguna Beach trustee, Lowery noted there would be little difference in construction cost of the library with or without windows. Vogel said it was not the construction cost that concerned him, but said “from a security standpoint I would question high windows and would favor solid walls.” [What happened to “maintenance and insurance costs”?]

Security precautions called for by trustees at an earlier meeting, Lowery said, had already been included in the library plan. [Gosh, had something happened in the meantime?]

“We cut out the second floor outdoor reading balconies,” he said, in order to eliminate the chance students will throw books down from them to other students as you suggested.”

The present plan requires students to check out books before going outside to outdoor, second level terraces, Lowery said.

Features of the plan acceptable to trustees were the beige, sandblasted concrete exterior that requires no painting.

“I should note that I have no recommendation about what you could do [if] a student decided to spray paint an inscription on the surface,” Lowery said. “But there will be considerable maintenance savings if it is never painted.”

Vogel said he hoped that such defacing tactics would not occur.

Lower portions of the façade will be done in adobe brick and an imitation quarry tile made of concrete will surface patios.

Vogel noted that he had used new libraries at Cal State Fullerton, UC Irvine and UCLA and found all were built without windows. “These aren’t old libraries.”

The in-service pamphlet editor reminds us that

a scant 10 months prior to this article, the local branch building of the Bank of America in the community of Isla Vista, Santa Barbara County, was burned to the ground by students on February 25, 1970.

Yeah, that was a big deal at the time. Everybody was talking about it. (Reagan called the protesters "cowardly little bums" and sent in 400 National Guardsmen.)

The editor notes that the title—Library Windows Asked—“doesn’t really make sense.” The article seems more about eliminating windows than asking for them:

It makes one wonder if someone got the title wrong. Should it have read: "Library Windows Axed"?....

Hans Vogel is still alive, living in Tustin—he’s 87 years old. He and his family came to America from Germany in the late 20s. During the war, he evidently distinguished himself, serving as an interrogator of prisoners of war (i.e., Germans) under General Patton.

He describes himself (he has two blogs) a Lieutenant Colonel, Retired.

After the war, he got his degree at USC and became a volleyball coach with that institution. The guy seems to be all about volleyball and war memories.

Scientists are baffled by the education community and their methods

Failure to Replicate (Inside Higher Ed)

…[P]sychologists are not the worst offenders when it comes to replication, it turns out. That distinction might belong to education researchers, according to an article published today in the journal Educational Researcher.

. . .

Only 0.13 percent [i.e., one tenth of one percent] of education articles published in the field’s top 100 journals are replications, write Matthew Makel, a gifted-education research specialist at Duke University, and Jonathan Plucker, a professor of educational psychology and cognitive science at Indiana University….

Makel and Plucker … found that 221 of 164,589 total articles replicated a previous study….

What’s more, 48.2 percent of the replications were performed by the same research team that had produced the original study….

More colorful "research"

Replications are an essential part of validating scientific knowledge. They control for sampling errors and weed out fraud. A replication might show, for instance, that an educational intervention’s effects are less pronounced than a previous study contended.

So why do so few replications appear in education journals? The article, “Facts Are More Important Than Novelty: Replication in the Education Sciences,” argues that education journals routinely prize studies that yield novel and exciting results over studies that corroborate – or disconfirm – previous findings. Conducting replications, the researchers write, “is largely viewed in the social science research community as lacking prestige, originality, or excitement.”

. . . .

Makel and Plucker, however, say that replication matters greatly. What’s at stake, they say, is education’s standing as a discipline. Dismissing replication, they write, “indicates a value of novelty over truth … and a serious misunderstanding of both science and creativity.”….

. . . .

“When I talk to my friends in the natural sciences, they’re just baffled by how this is even a question or a controversy in psychology and education,” Makel said. “Replication is such a normal part of the process for them.”....

10 Years Ago: Fuentes' contra Spain

“Spain has abandoned our fighting men and women, withdrawing their support. I see no reason to send the students of our colleges to Spain at this moment in history.” —Tom Fuentes

February 28, 2005:

Board Meeting: on this night, the Board is asked to approve a summer “study abroad” program in Santander, Spain. [I'm videotaping this.] Trustee Fuentes suggests that he will vote against the item in part because Spain has “abandoned our fighting men and women” by pulling out of Iraq. Four other trustees follow Fuentes’ lead with regard to the item, though they cite a concern for students’ safety, not Spain's politics. Student Trustee Poulton expresses concern about a “political precedent”—that is, rejecting a program owing to the politics of the host country. Program approval is denied on a 2-5 vote. (Milchiker and Lang cast affirmative votes, joining student trustee Poulton, whose vote is advisory.) Naturally, I caught Fuentes’ remarks on videotape. By the next morning, I produce transcripts of the remarks. Within a day or two, the transcripts and a DVD containing the video are provided to the Orange County Register’s Marla Jo Fisher. A columnist for the OC Weekly also receives the transcripts. Soon, Fuentes will find himself at the center of an embarrassing media firestorm.

March 4: In the online edition of OC Weekly, Gustavo Arellano reminds readers of Fuentes’ controversial history as head of the local GOP. He reports that the “vindictive” Mr. Fuentes has now launched a “campaign against Spain.” According to Arellano:

Fuentes unveiled his new crusade at the Feb. 28 SOCCCD Board of Trustees meeting, when he requested a discussion on Item 10…The item would have allowed Saddleback College students to study abroad in Santander, Spain, during the summer. It wasn’t expected to generate much controversy; the SOCCCD board has allowed Saddleback students to learn Spanish in the Iberian country for the past 15 years. But Fuentes shocked everyone in the audience when he began to assail his ancestral home. "One hundred ninety-five years ago, in 1810, my family arrived on this continent from Spain, so I have an affection for that land," Fuentes said. But he quickly dropped the amicable pretense, simultaneously attacking Saddleback College’s study abroad program as catering to "an elite" and as a death wish given the March 11, 2004, Madrid train bombings that left 193 dead. Terror wasn’t what disturbed Fuentes the most, though. "Now: something more," he intoned sternly. "Many of our students in this college, and of its sister college Saddleback and Irvine, past and future today, fight on the battlefield of Iraq under the flag that is behind us. Spain has abandoned our fighting men and women, withdrawing their support. I see no reason to send the students of our colleges to Spain at this moment in history."

Arellano notes the strangeness of Fuentes’ reasoning:

For the 2004-2005 academic year, SOCCCD trustees have approved study abroad to Cambodia, China, New Zealand and Vietnam, all countries with administrations that oppose the U.S. Invasion of Iraq. And Fuentes & Co. also permitted district-funded student trips to Boston, New York City and Washington, D.C.; last year, each of these cities passed resolutions condemning the Iraq war (and on Sept. 11, 2001, each was as dangerous as Madrid was on March 11, 2004).

Indeed, notes Arellano, two months after the Madrid bombing, a group of Saddleback students visited Spain, and not one solitary squawk of concern was voiced by the Board, including Trustee Fuentes.

March 5: On Saturday, an article concerning the “study abroad” decision appears in the OC Register:

"Spain has abandoned our fighting men and women, withdrawing their support," said trustee Tom Fuentes, who spearheaded the vote to end the 15-year-old program. "I see no reason to send the students of our colleges to Spain at this moment in history." …UC Irvine professor Jacobo Sefami, who runs the University of California's program there, said Spain is still a U.S. ally. "I strongly disagree with the use of politics as a motivating factor to disallow an academic program," he said in an e-mail from his Madrid office. Right now, 18 Saddleback College students are in Salamanca, Spain, on a spring semester abroad, Saddleback professor Carmenmara Hernandez-Bravo said. There are no plans to tell them to return. About 30 students had been planning to take the 37-day summer session to Santander in northern Spain to study Spanish civilization and language, Hernandez-Bravo said. The college is planning trips this year to Cambodia and Vietnam. … Marcia Milchiker, a trustee who took the summer program to Spain last year, retorted that two students were pistol-whipped outside the University of Southern California recently and that terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center in New York. "Why are you letting them dictate what we do?" Milchiker said. "Are you going to stay in your house in a bomb shelter all the time?"

In its online edition, the Register provides the video of Fuentes sternly explaining his vote against the program. The Register article broaches the question of Fuentes’ possible hidden motives:

Several faculty members alleged in interviews afterward that the vote was intended to punish Hernandez-Bravo, the trip's organizer, for past criticism of the board, particularly Fuentes…. Fuentes said it was "absurd" to suggest he was trying to punish her. Hernandez-Bravo said she didn't think the board's refusal to approve the annual trip was directed at her. "No one would do that, disappoint the students, just to get back at one person," Hernandez-Bravo said.

In an article that appears in “Inside Higher Ed,” more light is shed on Fuentes' possible “punishment” motive:

[Some of Hernandez-Bravo’s colleagues believe] that Fuentes was punishing her for suggesting in a television interview last year that she would have flunked him for comments he made complaining about faculty members' light workload, "because before you speak in my class, you have to do your research." No doubt, Hernandez-Bravo's "flunk" comment was a response to Fuentes’ remarks in a TV interview in 2004 in which he asserted, falsely, that SOCCCD faculty have a "36-hour work week" and that their average pay is $100,000 per year. (See Dissent ARCHIVES, October 28, 2005.) The charming Ms. Hernandez-Bravo's criticism, made at a Board meeting in Fuentes' presence, was both strong and rhetorically winning. (She is a former diplomat.)

March 6: On Sunday, the LA Times weighs in:

"Spain has abandoned our fighting men and women, withdrawing their support," said trustee Tom Fuentes…Fuentes, former head of the Republican Party in Orange County, said he also had concerns about student safety…When asked why students were allowed to go to Spain just three months after the Madrid bombings, Fuentes replied, "I think the terrorist situation is all the more prevalent and obvious today." Professor Carmenmara Hernandez-Bravo, who runs the study-abroad program, said she was stunned by the board's decision. "I'm still in shock," she said. "I cannot believe a community college can put this much politics into academics." …In deciding against sending students to Spain, board members also cited high program costs and potential liability to the school district. "I think it's an affront to the working-student community who often utilizes the junior college system to propose a program of five weeks of study that is nearly $5,000," Fuentes said in a telephone interview Saturday. The cost of the 37-day trip to Santander, Spain, is about $4,400 including meals, housing, transportation, books and airfare, Hernandez-Bravo said. But while rejecting the $119-per-day Spain trip, she said, the board approved a 14-day trip to Florence, Italy, costing $204 per day without airfare and some meals.

March 7:

On Monday, the Chronicle of Higher Education reports on the “Study abroad” matter:

[Hernandez-Bravo] said the students were safer in Spain than in parts of Los Angeles. "I feel a little more concerned," she said, "when I take my students to South Central LA when I take them to the Museum of Tolerance."… And she said that the board had approved other trips at the same meeting that were more expensive and that included countries that have not sent troops to Iraq. "I'm confused," said Ms. Hernandez-Bravo. "I don't know the real reason" for the decision. Mr. Fuentes could not be reached for comment on Sunday. Ms. Hernandez-Bravo has sent an e-mail message to the college district's chancellor, Raghu P. Mathur, protesting the decision. She said she also plans to forward the message to Spanish and U.S. officials. "Whatever Trustee Fuentes believes about Spain and its role as our ally, his personal political beliefs should have no part in determining the fate of a long-standing, successful, academic program," she wrote in the message. "It is irresponsible for a public official to make such remarks at a board meeting, because by doing so he is politicizing the educational process."

March 11:

On March 10, a columnist for USC’s “Daily Trojan” opines that Fuentes’ action and his reasoning are “inappropriately political.” (Dozens of articles and commentaries regarding the "study abroad" decision appear both in print and on TV; I am here providing a mere sample. As far as I know, no one defends Fuentes' reasoning.) On the 11th, LA Times columnist Dana Parsons weighs in, emphasizing Fuentes’ controversial record as chair of the local Republican Party:

Leave it to Tom Fuentes to big-foot a situation. That was his calling card during the 20 years he ran the Orange County Republican Party, crushing enemies real and imagined. If you want a handle on how Fuentes saw his job, picture Orange County as a house and Democrats as termites. Even peskier than Democrats, though, were Republicans who dared to challenge the party orthodoxy. Fuentes' 20-year reign ended last year, and you'd think he might then have dropped from sight. Unfortunately, he's got the itch again, back as the apparent point man behind a decision to cancel a program that sends students to study in Spain. …To state the obvious: Safety is an issue for the students and their parents to weigh. Fuentes' lament about the cost would make sense only if the district paid the bill. As for terrorists, the Basque separatists have been fighting the government for years and Islamic terrorists have shown they can strike any country in the world. No, the only new factor is Spain's decision to pull its troops from Iraq and the year-old Socialist government's opposition to U.S. policy.

Parsons notes Fuentes’ effort to distance himself from his stated political motive:

I don't buy it for a minute. This is Fuentes playing politics again with the same high-handedness he always has, couched in the same high-mindedness he developed into an art form. It was a tiresome act that eventually led many of the county's rank-and-file Republican leaders to want new party leadership. Now he's taken his act to college. Same old Tom Fuentes. Looking for enemies and finding them.

March 13:

The Register reports that Hernandez-Bravo has become something of a folk hero:

These days Carmenmara Hernandez-Bravo can't go anywhere on the Mission Viejo campus of Saddleback College without being stopped and cheered on. "Are you going to Spain?" a dean asks. "Of course I'm going to Spain," Hernandez-Bravo responds with a hint of humor and defiance in her voice. Students, professors, support staff—everyone has an opinion. "That's all we can do, be there for each other," a professor tells Hernandez-Bravo after a warm embrace. Another colleague blanketed her office walls with bright yellow fliers reading "bravíssima," a play on her last name and her courage. Students have inundated her with e-mails, and everyone from ABC to NPR is requesting interviews.

In the article, Fuentes stands by his decision while distancing himself from his political motives:

"I reserve the right, as I'm sure any citizen does, to comment," he says. "The decision to cancel the program was on the basis of cost, safety and liability risk. My concern for fighting men and women in the uniform of our land was not the reason the board voted 5 to 2." So why bring it up? That's Hernandez-Bravo's question. Fuentes joins other board members in emphasizing the “safety” issue, but the Register reporter is skeptical: Hmmm. If safety comes first, why didn't Fuentes speak up last year when the summer study-abroad students arrived in Santander, Spain, just four months after the terrorist train bombings in Madrid? Hernandez-Bravo says that trip went without incident, and she describes Santander as one of the safest cities in Europe. Former Saddleback College student Brian E. Siedlecki said it best in his letter to Chancellor Mathur: "Having spent time in Santander, I can assure you it is as likely to be victimized by a terrorist attack as Modesto, California." And what about Saddleback's study-abroad students who are in Salamanca, Spain, this semester, as in, right now. Isn't Fuentes concerned for their safety? Fellow trustee Marcia Milchiker was quick to point out the holes in Fuentes' safety arguments, mainly that the U.S. is just as likely to be attacked, i.e. Sept. 11. But Fuentes brushed off her concerns and told me: "I don't think that such comparisons without full information is worthy intellectually."

March 18:

In his “Diary of a Mad County” column in the OC Weekly, Steve Lowery connects the “study abroad” controversy to Orange County’s struggles to overcome its right-wing “wacko” image:

[On March 10,] Spaniards observe[d] a moment of silence for the 191 people who died in a terrorist train bombing last year. One of those not observing silence or even on the premises is frequent OC house guest and prime minister at the time of the attacks, Jose Maria Aznar, who was in Mexico at the time, perhaps looking for his soul. Spain eventually pulled its troops out of Iraq, which eventually led the South Orange County Community College District, under the equally soulless thumb of former local Republican jefe Tom Fuentes, to cancel its study abroad program in Spain. While this will have little to no effect on Spain, it is yet another humiliation for Orange County, which seemed to be emerging from the hick/wacko shadow of the likes of Bob Dornan, Bill Dannemeyer, John Schmitz, John Birch and Wally George. In fact, Orange County’s reputation has taken such a hit that the likes of Mississippi is looking down on us. Missif*ckingssippi! Prior to this, the only place Mississippi has been able to look down on is pre-wheel Mesopotamia….

March 22:

At its March meeting, many people, including at least one soldier, address the board, passionately urging trustees to reverse the February decision. Virtually no one speaks in defense of the action. The board votes to rescind its decision of February and to approve the Santander trip--by a 5-2 vote with Fuentes and Wagner again casting negative votes. (Padberg, Williams, and Jay change their votes to approval, joining Lang and Milchiker.)

March 25:

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that

A community college in California that canceled a study-abroad program to Spain this month for political and safety reasons has reversed its decision. Trustees of the South Orange County Community College District initially voted three weeks ago to close the program...One board member...said it would be unpatriotic to send students to Spain after that country's decision to withdraw its troops from Iraq (The Chronicle, March 7). But on Tuesday the trustees changed their minds. Worries about cost and liability were sorted out, according to the district's chancellor, Raghu P. Mathur. And the trustee who brought up Spain's position in Iraq subsequently dropped that issue, Mr. Mathur said, though news reports indicated that the trustee still voted against the program….

April 1:

OC Weekly’s Gustavo Arellano writes a mock letter to Fuentes:

It’s been a bit more than a year since you stepped down as chairman of Orange County’s Republican Party, a position you held for 20 years. Now you sit in the Siberia of politics known as the South Orange County Community College District (SOCCCD) Board of Trustees. What happened? I’m reminded of the story of Pyrrhus…That’s been your political career, Tom. As you led the Orange County Republican Party to dominate a region in a way unseen in local government since the days of Tammany Hall, you also ensured your political doom. Petty fights, bizarre grudges, besmirchments: if you had avoided all of that, you’d still be the pontificus maximus of the county GOP. Instead you’ll spend the rest of your political days doodling on agendas through another stultifying SOCCCD board meeting and dreaming of the Balboa Bay Club.

Arellano then provides a bulleted summary of Fuentes’ remarkable political career, which ends with this item:

Feb. 28, 2005: You persuaded four colleagues on the Board of Trustees to cancel Saddleback College’s summer study-abroad program to Spain because the country had pulled its troops from Iraq. The decision drew national ridicule and outraged the locals; under heavy pressure, the SOCCCD board rescinded your decision on March 22 by a 5-2 vote. And, again, Latinos laughed at the GOP.

UPDATE: October 24, 2005:

At it's October 2005 meeting, the Board votes to approve Saddleback College's study abroad program to Salamanca, Spain for Spring 2006. There was no discussion. Fuentes and Wagner, offering no explanation, voted against the item. (See ARCHIVES, Oct. 25, 2005.)

How accreditation works

¶ Here’s how accreditation works. Your college labors to compose a self-study that’s dutifully written according to the Clueless Educationist Style Sheet, which is guaranteed to produce prose that impresses Paranormal Fans and fifth graders but that sends all literate people into paroxysms of laughter or dismay. Then the Accreds show up, go off to dark corners, and talk to everybody, including every crank and jackass within miles; next, after shaking their heads and making glum academic faces, the Accreds go home and get bitch slapped awhile by Babs Beno. That process ultimately yields a report that slams the college for not having enough “student learning outcomes” imbedded in its “mission statement” or in the seats of the new Performing Arts/Soccer Center—or for a failure to pursue digital delivery rubrics and co-curricular, asynaptic assessments. –Something like that.

¶ Yeah, then the college gnashes its teeth and wails for like six months, spiraling into an institutional depression; next, it labors mightily (and earnestly) to compose a follow-up report, which ‘splains how the college is taking all the accreds’ semi-confused criticisms super-seriously and running “at least” fifteen new committees to ensure that everybody’s on board with the “process,” which yields “do tasks,” which, naturally, are ugly and unrecognizable as anything any sensible person would ever do. College leaders sign it with their own blood and collapse into another corner. More tears. Everybody frets, muttering, “remember Compton.”

¶ So, anyway, accreditation self-study and follow-up reports often end up being perverse and artificial monstrosities, full of Orwellian creepoid verbulosity plus profound self-deception—and a dollop of flat dishonesty. I mean, if the Accreds show up and say that you’ve got yourself a nasty “plague of despair,” then you don’t do something sensible, like fire the source of said despair—usually a Chancellor or President or Vice President (or Board, but you can’t fire those people). No. Not in Accred World. Instead, you set up a committee to concoct “rules of civility,” such as, “smile and say ‘howdy do’!” or “respect all others and honor their feelings, even if they’re psychotic, and then draw a hand and tape it to your back.” (Patting yourself on the back. Get it?) –Stuff like that.

¶ Yeah, and when the Accreds tag you for the hideously unhealthy relationship between groups A and B, but then things change and so A and B are now, like, dating or something—and, in the meantime, C grows to fear and loathe B, threatening districtular collapse.... –Well, in that case, you make up some crap about how you’re “taking vigorous steps” to get A and B together. But, natch, you just let the C and B vexation fester beyond all recognition, cuz it's not relevant to the present accredular demands.

¶ Yeah, that’s the ol’ accreditation do-si-do. It’s very processular. It’s, um, measurable and, uh, based on factoidal and empirical data (probably pulled out of somebody’s a**).

¶ With that in mind,

• If it were MY NEIGHBOR'S COOL BOXSTER, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were KEN KESEY'S BUS, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were MY BRO'S ULTRA-UTILITARIAN COROLLA, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were an old silver DUNE BUGGY, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were a SEXY RED FERRARI, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were a SLEEK AND AGILE TEN-SPEED BIKE, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were SOME PUNK KID HANGIN' IN THE LIBRARY, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

• If it were A PAIR OF SENNHEISER HD 800 HEADPHONES, a college’s accreditation report would probably look something like this:

ETC.

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Sunday, May 13, 2012

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