Senate capers: a ray of sunshine—plus mo' MOU fallout!

Ray Chandos

     RAY OF SUNSHINE.
     Normally, I do not report on the actions and deliberations of the IVC Academic Senate, of which I am a member. Today, I'm making an exception.
     During the senate meeting of two weeks ago, senators were told that Ray Chandos, a long-time faculty member in the School of Math, Computer Science & Engineering, has "volunteered" to serve on the district Board Policy and Administrative Regulation Advisory Council (BPARAC). That's the committee that works to revise and improve all those BPs we keep hearing about.
     It's an important committee. Board Policies and ARs are important. Obviously.
     As things stand, Ac. Sen. Prez Kathy Schmeidler represents IVC faculty on that committee. She is permitted, however, to appoint another faculty member to serve in her stead.

María Guadalupe Villalobos Vélez

     Enter Ray.
     But here’s the problem. At least insofar as college business is concerned (Ray has been a prominent foe of development in Orange County, and I do not object to his efforts on that front), Ray Chandos is a stunningly corrupt fellow. I won’t provide a complete enumeration of Ray’s spectacular sins. I’ll mention two.
     First, Ray was a card-carrying member of the secretive group of “old guard” unionists who, back in the 90s, took control of the faculty union and pursued a series of disastrous actions that, by 1996, scandalized most of the rank and file. This group engineered the arrival of the notorious 1996 Board Majority (Frogue/Williams/Fortune/Lorch), dominated by Holocaust denier Steven Frogue, that initiated a district decline from which it has only recently started to recover. Then, in 1998, largely in secret, this group used union funds to pay for the campaigns of anti-union trustee candidates Don Wagner and Nancy Padberg, thereby bringing about the second Board Majority, one dominated by Don Wagner. (See The Board’s Unlikely Secret Allies.) Further, in 2000, the group fully supported (and helped engineer) the appointment of the rabid anti-unionist Tom Fuentes to the board. (As I recall, during the key board meeting in July of 2000, Ray, along with other Old Guardsters, spoke passionately in support of Fuentes’ candidacy.)
     So that’s one.
     Second, there was Ray’s remarkable conduct with regard to IVC’s 1998 Accreditation self-study. After Mathur appointed Ray the faculty chair of the report—against Academic Senate recommendations—the various standards committee chairs produced a draft that was replete with references to Mathur and the board’s disastrous and ruthlessness actions. Ray, as chair, simply bowdlerized those references, a cleansing so brazen that it attracted the interest of the LA Times and the OC Register, among other publications (See The 1998 IVC Accred White-Wash.)
     So, at today’s senate meeting, Schmeidler again mentioned Ray’s desire to join the BPARAC. Is it the will of the senate, she asked, to appoint Ray to that committee?
     I raised my hand. “It’s certainly not my will,” I said. I was prepared to say more, but, immediately behind me, another senior faculty member (Ms. F) spoke. She said simply, “Nor mine.”
     Not missing a beat, Kathy asked for a straw poll. How many want Ray appointed? Few if any hands arose. Next, she asked, how many want her to continue to serve on this committee?
     Hands shot in the air.

Roquemore

     MO’ FALLOUT RE ROQUEMORE’S MISBEGOTTEN MOU.
     For some reason, at today’s senate meeting, mention was made of the college's recently announced MOU with the University of Phoenix. You’ll recall that DtB objected loudly to IVC President Glenn Roquemore’s inexplicable decision to enter into an arrangement with this scandalous For-Profit. (See Clueless IVC Prez Glenn Roquemore smiles as he makes nice with the enemy.)
     From the discussion, I gathered that an administrator had asserted (to the Senate Prez, I guess) that "the counselors" backed this MOU idea. But the counselors at today’s meeting rebutted that claim. One counselor, evidently speaking for her colleagues, stated that she/they knew nothing about the MOU until the day it occurred (one of Roquemore’s grand photo-ops). Further, she seemed to say, the counselors are disinclined to encourage students to transfer to the U of P, given its track record. That led to a more general discussion, and it soon became clear that more than a few faculty at this college are scandalized by Roquemore’s noisy U of P MOU.

     I put in my two cents. In the end, a certain Chemistry instructor (who may or may not be married to a certain college president) spoke up and offered some sort of defense of this MOU business, but it was peppered with retorts by various senators. Also, a senator who is one of Glenn's vacation companions offered a defense. He suggested that, since we hire people with U of P degrees (that’s true; as I recall, Glenn’s pal Wayne Ward had a degree from that Cracker Jack Box), we can’t also complain about this MOU. –Something like that anyway. I think he said that, by hiring folks with U of P degrees, we benefit from something we seem to claim to object to.
     Well, that "reasoning" is just too ridiculous to merit a response.

Chirpy, vacant