Call to Action on Accreditation (Inside Higher Ed)

The drumbeat of support for changing the U.S. accreditation system has played out here in recent months and years in many realms; it’s playing out at Congressional hearings, in the Obama White House, and at think-tank panel discussions. Accreditation, in the eyes of reformers, needs to change to put higher education on a path of booming innovation that will expand access and lower costs….

Teddy and the kids on a lovely Tuesday evening

Everybody seems to love Young Theodore. The Bauer kids sure do.
Here's Sarah feeding Teddy a Dorito. He licked it but didn't eat it.

Teddy caught in mid jump. He enjoys pouncing.
As far as I know, he's never actually killed anything.

Sarah is amused by Young Theodore's antics. Adam, too.

What could be better than a fluffy sweet cat?

FU of Phoenix

Protecting Our Veterans From Domestic Enemies (Jerome KohlbergHuffington Post)

     …One deplorable practice that epitomizes the triumph of greed over the greater good is the exploitation of our returning Iraq and Afghanistan veterans by predatory players in the for-profit "education" industry. Many operate with questionable academic credentials or lack proper accreditation, often leaving veterans and their families heavily in debt with little or nothing to show for it. For-profits account for half the nation's student loan defaults although they enroll 13% of the country's students. More than two-thirds of students attending these for-profit companies don't graduate.
     These for-profits businesses – I will not call them colleges – target veterans, because they are eligible for GI Bill and other federal education benefits.
. . .
     For my colleagues who are still considering the wisdom of remaining in a declining business that is predicated on marketing over morality, I would ask you this question: if you help create a generation of under-educated, unemployable Americans in order to make a quick dollar, who will be able to buy whatever else you have to sell? There will be no middle class left in America. The engine that made our country prosper after World War II will have been sold off for parts.

Wendy Gabriella's 73rd AD opponent, Jesse Petrilla, has an arrest record

     You’ll recall that our very own Wendy Gabriella is running as a Democrat for the 73rd Assembly District seat. Recently, facts came to light that bode well for her success in that race. Among her chief opponents is Republican Jesse Petrilla, a City Councilman in Rancho Santa Margarita. On Monday, the Rancho Santa Margarita Patch published the following:

Petrilla's Past: Felony Assault With A Firearm (Rancho Santa Margarita Patch)

   Long before he became a politician in Orange County, Jesse Petrilla stood before a judge in Placer County Superior Court facing felony charges.
   Now a Rancho Santa Margarita city councilman and candidate for the State Assembly's 73rd District, Petrilla had been originally charged with 14 counts against the State of California, but on Aug. 10, 2001, everything had been whittled away to just two felony assaults with one enhancement for using a firearm.
   “Mr. Petrilla,” said Judge James L. Roeder, “you have signed this written plea form stating that you are entering this plea and giving up certain rights. … And you understand what rights you are giving up and the consequences of your plea?”
   “Yes, your Honor.”
   “Mr. Petrilla, in this felony complaint in Count One, you are accused on March 11 of this year assault with a firearm,” the judge explained. “That’s a violation of Penal Code Section 245, subparagraph (a) (2), as a felony. To that offense, what is your plea?”
   “No contest, your Honor.”
   Petrilla answered “no contest” to the second charge against him, as well as the enhancement of using a firearm.
   “Do you understand for purposes of your criminal record and sentencing that no contest pleas are treated as guilty pleas?”
   “Yes, your Honor.”
   Jesse Nathan Petrilla, now 30, and seeking to represent most of South Orange County in Sacramento in the State Assembly, was in 2010 the youngest city councilman ever elected in Rancho Santa Margarita. Yet before becoming a lawmaker, he fired a .22 caliber rifle at an occupied vehicle about five months before his 18th birthday. Tried as an adult, he was sentenced to 240 days in jail and five years probation.
. . .
   Petrilla was granted early release from probation in December 2004. At the completion of Petrilla’s probation, the court downgraded the felonies to misdemeanors and dismissed the charges.
. . .
   Last week, Petrilla announced he had finished 2013 with more than $100,000 cash on hand from more than 200 unique contributors to his Assembly campaign.
   Patch could not find any mention of the 2001 conviction by Petrilla during either his campaign in 2010 for City Council or his current campaign for State Assembly in the 73rd district.

     Then, yesterday, Petrilla released a statement:

Petrilla Releases Statement About 2001 Arrest (Rancho Santa Margarita Patch)

   This week, my wife and I are welcoming the birth of our son. While this is cause for great joy, I now need to address an incident that has been posted on the Internet.
   On the night of March 11, 2001 (at the age of seventeen), I was amongst a small group of my friends in a remote area just outside of the city limits in Auburn, California, (where I grew up), when we were confronted by many carloads of known older drug addicts and local criminals who clearly intended us physical harm. I fired a couple warning shots from a friend’s father’s .22 rifle in an attempt to stop their advances. It worked, and no harm was done as the attackers returned to their vehicles and fled.
   I was arrested the next morning and charged with multiple counts, each and every one of which was ultimately dismissed. Each and every one of them.
   As you may know, I then went on to join the Army National Guard as an officer and have received a Secret Security Clearance. Each requiring in-depth background checks.
   Reports from local bloggers last night have told a misleading version of events fed to them by my political opponents' political opposition researcher, clearly afraid of the momentum of my campaign. For fourteen opening paragraphs, one blogger offered cherry-picked pieces of salacious-sounding evidence before ultimately noting that in fact, all charges were dismissed.
   Former Senator John Lewis, who represented Orange County for twenty years in the legislature, also commented on this matter by saying "Jesse Petrilla is a honorable young man who has served his country with distinction with his service in Afghanistan. It is a shame that some political opponent is twisting the truth of an incident that happened years ago for political advantage."
   These desperate attacks will not deter me one bit from continuing my campaign, or the momentum it has been gaining. And I know that as voters explore my record, what they will find is: a military officer, a small business owner, a husband, and expecting parent.

     Naturally, we'll follow this story, see where it goes.

Petrilla in Culver City

SEE ALSO AD-73 Petrilla Gorilla Rips Open His Violent Past; Will Baric Come Out of Hibernation?

The men's bathroom of IVC's A200: a message to our students

Nothing says "we love you" to students more than a well-maintained rest room!
—And nothing says "FU" more than this.

Nothing I found in the restroom today is unusual.
This is how this restroom always looks.
Most of us (faculty) just go over to the restroom in A100,
which, natch, is nicer, though nothing to write home about.
Hell, over there, they seem to remodel stuff on a whim!
Remember when the floor was red, and then, suddenly, it wasn't?

I think they intended to put up a sign saying "midgets" above
that paper dispenser on the right, but they never did get around to it.

Somebody'll be around any second to bus this table.

This is what people do when they're in shitty restrooms.

The plumbing of these sinks looks Flintstonian.

The paper dispenser at right looks like it's been through several wars.

I don't know what this entity is, but, whatever it is,
it's been there, on the ceiling, growing, for years.

Cobwebs, natch.

We're screwed, part II

Point of entry, faculty office with computer, books

     Today’s meeting concerning security issues in Irvine Valley College’s building A200 went well, I suppose. Owing to the good turnout—I didn’t count bodies, but maybe twenty or more A200 inhabitants showed up—the meeting was moved from the so-called A200 “lounge” to room A205, otherwise known as the “mold room.”
     Running the meeting were IVC Police Chief Will Glen and three or so of his officers, including a fellow named Todd Schmaltz, who gave an overview of what’s occurred and what the police are doing. He seemed to do a good job.
     Officer Schmaltz outlined the incidents, including two in which perpetrators entered a faculty office through the window and absconded, each time, with books and an iMac computer.
     Last Friday night—or early Saturday morning; it was 1:00 a.m.—as Schmaltz was heading home after work, he noticed a figure lurking near Building B200 on the other end of campus (relative to A200). Eventually, he confronted a young man parked in lot 10. The man explained, implausibly, that he was helping a friend to pick up a backpack. Eventually, the man acknowledged that his companion, who did not return, was up to no good. Later that night, the companion, too, was picked up—by Irvine Police.

Fresh air? Not so much. All windows now screwed shut.

     It turns out that these two young men—one an IVC student, the other a former IVC student—have significant histories as druggies and thieves. Officer Schmaltz and another officer who attended the meeting opined that these two are indeed the perpetrators of the A200 burglaries. At this point, however, there is no evidence justifying an arrest for those crimes, but the investigation continues.
     Chief Glen once again emphasized that these burglaries involve a threat to property but no threat of violence against persons. They are property crimes, he said.
     On the other hand, when I noted that, though “security” is a valid concern, so is comfort, and yesterday’s action of screwing closed all of the windows of A200 will entail discomfort for some denizens—we prefer fresh air—Chief Glen seemed to upgrade his understanding of the “security” issue to a matter of personal safety, for I was told—by Glen and also by President Glenn Roquemore, who also attended—essentially that security trumps comfort. Well, yes, if security means personal safety, then security trumps comfort. But if security means securing books and computers, then I’m not so sure.
     Well, whatever.
     Another denizen of A200 indicated that she prefers to open the windows to let in fresh air and hoped that there are alternatives to the new status quo. Glenn didn’t like that. Security, man; it’s important.
     Glenn also noted that, in a year or so, denizens of A200, at least those in the School of Humanities and Languages, will be moving anyway to the new A400 Building. That's supposed to be music to soothe the savage breast, I guess.
     The investigation of these burglaries continues.

UPDATE: I should mention that the two faculty who, during the meeting, noted the problem with screwing shut the windows were "holding back" a bit. One reason that we seek fresh air in (at least our section of) A200 is that it has a history—a recent history—of unhealthy mold. My office is next door to one of the mold-affected areas and has itself had mold & water-damage issues in the past; the other faculty is immediately across the hall from the affected area. And nothing says "mold" louder than a tiny office with lousy circulation and no fresh air.
     During the meeting, Prez Glenn Roquemore emphasized the importance of air conditioning efficiency and how that might be affected by the practice of opening office windows. Now, in fact, no one knows our section of A200 better than we do—after all, we practically live there—and, in fact, there has been no history of complaints about the inefficiency of the air conditioning, despite the fact that, down at our dead-air section of A200, the windows of at least two offices are (until now) routinely open, allowing a nice breeze to transect our damned, mold-friendly tarn.

Copier room: now locked shut. Not exactly Gemütlichkeit

     I should mention, too, that, during the meeting, nobody stood up to take responsibility for the decision to screw shut all of the windows—windows that are designed to be opened and that have in fact been opened routinely since the building's construction decades ago. Glenn even seemed to say that it (i.e., comments during the meeting) was the first he had heard about the mass screwage.
     Yeah, transparency and accountability my ass.
     Some will recall that, a few years ago, denizens of A200 grew vocal in their complaints that the building was uncomfortable and uninviting—it had no lounge nor sofas nor any other elements of the commodious workplace. Responding to such pressures, Glenn paid for a couple of couches and chairs and then showed up to take bows. The so-called A200 "lounge" was born, though, as it turns out, it is much more often used by students than by faculty (so uninviting does it remain).
     I didnt want to mention this during the meeting, but I'll mention it now: closing and placing a big, ugly lock (see above) on the photocopy/mailroom door is certainly a step backward for those who have long sought to create a friendly and inviting workplace environment. Every time I stop to punch in that infernal code to open that ridiculous door, I feel that I am working in a prison, not the home of Humanities and Languages (et al.) faculty.
     And do keep in mind that, as the Reb recently reminded me, the faculty environment is also the student environment.
     I seem to recall that, at the end of the meeting, Ac. Senate Prez Kathy Schmeidler suggested that administrators actually communicate a bit with the college community about the thefts and efforts to respond to them. Yeah, right. That's not gonna happen.

I wonder if this is what the new and improved A400 will look like. Security is important!

My and Reb's office: window no longer opens; hot, airless, stuffy--an invitation to mold

For-Profit Wage Gap (Inside Higher Ed)
     Community college students who transfer to for-profit institutions tend to earn less over the next decade than do their peers who transfer to public or private colleges.
     Those are the findings from a study released Monday by the Center for Analysis of Postsecondary Education and Employment, a research center that was created with a federal grant and is housed at the Community College Research Center (CCRC) at Columbia University’s Teachers College....