Tom Fuentes and the accreditation crisis at the South Orange County Community College District

Today, at Red County/OC Blog, contributor tylerh will be posting about the accreditation of our two colleges. He has graciously offered to include a link to this post, which offers the "faculty perspective" on this matter.

No doubt tylerh has opined that the South Orange County Community College District’s colleges will likely be reaccredited (early in 2009).

He is probably right.

But why has the question arisen in the first place? It has arisen because, back in January, the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC) sent letters to the two colleges of the district—Saddleback and Irvine Valley)—advising them that if they did not finally resolve long-standing difficulties, they would lose their accreditation.

Back in 2004, the accreditors dinged the colleges essentially for trustee micromanagement and a “plague of despair”—the latter largely engendered by the authoritarian, repellent, and incompetent “leadership” of the conservative Board Majority’s man, Chancellor Raghu P. Mathur.

Back in 2004, instead of canning Mathur and ceasing their micromanagement, the board gave Mathur a new contract and a generous salary (he makes about $300,000), and it continued to throw its weight around inappropriately—for instance, imposing incompetent and irregular elements in follow-up reports to the ACCJC.

During all of these years of accreditation difficulty, the most consistently defiant trustee has been Tom Fuentes, the former chair of the OC GOP, who is now up for reelection in November. He has displayed open contempt for the accreditors, even declaring, during board meetings, that, contrary to the ACCJC, it is not trustee micromanagement but rather the “macromanagement” of “others” that burdens our colleges. The others, of course, are the faculty, whom he routinely demonizes.

Unfortunately for Mr. Fuentes and the district, circumstances have changed on the accreditation front, for, not long ago, the Department of Education, in the course of pursuing its peculiar reforms, took ACCJC/WASC to task for its failure to enforce standards.

Thus it was that, in January, the colleges were informed that “institutions out of compliance with standards…are expected to correct deficiencies within a two-year period or the Commission must take action to terminate accreditation. …[T]he college has lapsed significantly beyond the … two-year rule and needs to ensure that these recommendations are completed resolved at the time of the October 2008 report.”

This has placed the colleges in a difficult situation, for how, after these many years of “hostility, cynicism, despair, and fear,” are the colleges supposed to emerge with the requisite chirpiness, idealism, and hope? Mathur is still the Chancellor, depressing morale and causing an alarming administrative turnover. The board remains defiantly behind their man, despite his manifest incompetence and unpopularity. (In December, it was revealed that, for many years, Mathur had allowed the district to drift toward noncompliance with the 50% law, a situation that recently forced the district to engage in a hasty and disruptive faculty hiring initiative.)

The conservative readership of OC Blog will no doubt be receptive to Fuentes’ efforts to blame the situation on a recalcitrant and "overpaid" faculty that refuses to be led by Mathur and that pursues only power. But I do hope that they will listen to Board President (and Fuentes ally) Don Wagner, who, for five months now, has been working with faculty (and others) to address our accreditation difficulties and draft the accreditation report on behalf of Irvine Valley College. Since he’s begun to work closely with faculty, he has expressed only praise and admiration for their excellence and hard work. I do hope that you will ask him whether the problem with the district is its faculty.

In the end, owing to the hard work and dedication of such groups, the colleges will likely avoid accreditation disaster. But if they do so, it will be despite Mr. Tom Fuentes.

In the Area 6 trustee race, Fuentes is running against Bob Bliss, a retired Saddleback College professor. Like Fuentes, Bliss is a conservative. But, unlike Fuentes, he will not place our beloved colleges in jeopardy.

For a more detailed account of our accreditation predicament and how we came to it, please see Tom Fuentes and SOCCCD's accreditation crisis.

Summer news

Denizens of the South Orange County Community College District (SOCCCD), be sure to check out our list of "summer news" stories in the sidebar at right! =>

Catch up on what you've missed!

• FUENTES takes credit for high transfer rates!
• Saddleback College finally gets its ACCRED sh*t together!
• Vice Chancellors hired!
• TRACY DALY wants to take over the entire district!
• (OK, I just wanted to say that. Not true.)
• District to be guided by MOOD RINGS!
• (That one's virtually true)

Et cetera!

If you get the chance, read my post today on OC Blue Philosopher: Try to believe that a monkey is a pumpkin. It's about the rationality of believing in God, sort of.

An excerpt:

Isn’t God liable to get ticked off if you show up believing in Him, not because He reveals Himself in His fine and wondrous workmanship and love, but because, well, you believe in insurance? Imagine finally meeting Him and saying, "Oh, great! It was a real leap believing in you, dude—I mean, c'mon!—but like I always say, you gotta consider all contingencies! Ha ha ha!"

The seriously wacky world of California community colleges

     As you know, things can get mighty wacky at community colleges. There’s no limit, it seems, to the wackiness, especially when it comes to top administration and trustees. For instance, who’d o’ thunk we’d ever see a board (like the SOCCCD board until July 2000) that included a Holocaust denier, or one that appointed a guy Chancellor even though said guy had sued the district (once again: the SOCCCD board)? (See the OC Register, "Teacher's view of Holocaust stirs furor,” 4/4/95 and LA Times, 9/13/00: "Irvine Valley President Sues College District," 9/13/00.) Or one in which a trustee had secret meetings with administrators to make secret deals about hiring and firing quid pro quos (that would be the SOCCCD of ’97)? Click on article below for details.

       On Friday, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported (3 college trustees boycott over Sandoval agenda item) that three trustees of the Southwestern cc district “boycotted” a board meeting last Wednesday to prevent its being held—in order to prevent discussion of an item to extend a Southwestern College vice president’s job for a month or two. 

     It’s a tangled tale. Greg Sandoval, the VP, resigned not long ago after someone claimed he’d sexually harassed them. Then he tried to unresign, but the district’s Supe, Raj Chopra, wouldn’t have it. Then, when Chopra left town, Southwestern board president Dave Agosto hastily snuck a new item onto the board’s agenda for August’s meeting. The item was for an action that would have extended Sandoval’s administrative employment to January. 

     Why? ‘Cause, that way, Sandoval would be old enough, while still employed, to receive lifetime medical benefits! So three of the trustees put the kibosh on the meeting, thus deep-sixing Agosto’s agenda gambit. 

     Maybe that was the right thing to do. Dunno. 

     The Trib quotes Chopra as saying, “In my 35 years as an administrator, I have not seen one time an agenda item changed the way (this) did.” He oughta hang around the old SOCCCD. Raghu Mathur became an administrator when a similar maneuver was employed (back in '97). That one was illegal, as it turned out. 

     This Southwestern story doesn’t end here. In fact, it starts to get seriously convoluted at this point, ‘cause Sandoval is on the board of another district that does business with Southwestern, and it turns out that it was somebody on that other board, who benefited from the relationship, who urged Agosto to…. 

     Well, you know. 

     Have I mentioned that SOCCCD’s chancellor, Raghu P. Mathur, has been the subject of three votes of "no confidence" in the past ten years? —that, for the last one, 93.5% of full-time faculty indicated that they had “no confidence” in his leadership? Yeah, so the board gave him a raise.

     Now, we're on the accreditation chopping block, in part because of the "plague of despair" engendered by the ruthless and wily Mathur. 

     Will this board fire his ass? No, Mathur's ass is safe. The ass of SOCCCD's two colleges? Not so much.

Voting "no confidence" in Chancellor Mathur, 2004

    Red Emma (aka Andrew Tonkovich) reminds us that "Today at noon on KPFK 90.7 FM in Los Angeles/ 98.7 FM in Santa Barbara my very special guest is one of our most read, most translated, most celebrated authors, the novelist/essayist/poet/screenwriter Paul Auster, who community radio listeners will also know from his work hosting NPR’s National Story Project."

They got to watch it on TV

THE BIG FORUM. Last night, at OC Weekly’s “Navel Gazing,” reporter Eleanor Carmichael posted an amusing account of her big Saddleback Church adventure (RIDING LOW IN THE SADDLEBACK).

Carmichael explains that “OC Weekly usually gets identified as ‘alternative’ media.” For last night’s extravaganza, it was demoted to “auxiliary,” which meant getting stuck in some obscure room somewhere to watch the Big Event on TV.

Heck, she shoulda stayed home and watched CNN.

Evidently, included in the “auxiliary” category were the San Francisco Chronicle, KNX Radio AM 1070, and the Register.

"So there I was, in the same building (or at least the same 120 acres) with the candidates, the cleric, and 3,000 folks who could either afford the ticket prices or had it in good with Rick Warren (not a big Obama crowd, to say the least.)"

The crunch of traffic and warm bodies after the forum was so bad that she didn’t even get to see what little protest action there was.

She seemed to appreciate the pizza and Coke, however.

MEANWHILE, AT THE REG: Over at the OC Register’s ”Orange Punch,” the Reg’s summer editorial intern, one Mandie Russell, offered her impressions of the event. (Maybe she was sitting next to Carmichael in that little room. Dunno.)

She characterized Obama’s remarks as “smooth” and “down-to-earth,” though somewhat lacking in substance. He definitely “charmed the audience,” she says, despite its skewage rightward.

What about McCain?

”McCain made a point of addressing issues concisely, and with very clear stances, as opposed to Obama’s general attempts to go without offending either side. He definitely had, however, much more of a tendency for tangents, almost always involving war stories. Though usually applicable, these seemed more like prepared speeches, as opposed to on-the-spot answers to the specific questions…McCain did, however, certainly win the crowd-cheering contest, with most of his policy answers instantly obscured by applause.”

UPDATE: Despite Assurances, McCain Wasn’t in a ‘Cone of Silence’
OC Reg: McCain and Obama civil, not too revealing at church forum
VIDEO: The question of "evil"

REACTION: I actually missed most of the forum, having entirely forgotten about it until the last minute. Still, I did watch the instant analyses provided by the usual suspects on CNN and MSNBC. The conservatives among them seemed dazzled by McCain's "black and white" perspective on issues and his speed and decisiveness.

I kept thinking, "Um, you can be very black 'n' white, very fast, very decisive, and dead wrong." Evidently, the "right or wrong" question didn't come up for 'em.

Are we a nation of morons or what?

Meanwhile, some of the more liberal Opiners seemed impressed by Obama's "charm" and "humility," though somewhat uncomfortable with his stopping and thinking and actually responding to Warren, not the audience.

Evidently, McCain pretty much used Warren as an electronic prompt, repeatedly turning away from the fellow and toward the audience—to tell his stories.

"Americans like stories," said one of the Opiners, clearly impressed by the Republican candidate's "performance."

Near as I can tell, the forum was indeed civil, but also about worthless.

THE BIG CARNIVAL

Very apt: scene from the great "Ace in the Hole" (1951):


Ace in the Hole is Billy Wilder's exploration of some of the acreage on humanity's dark side. About a small-time newspaper that hits a big story, it's amazingly hard-boiled, cynical, and funny. The hotshot newspaperman is monstrous, the public is moronic.

The other title to the movie: "The Big Carnival." You know, like the big forum.

My favorite line from the movie: the character Lorraine (played beautifully by Jan Sterling) is asked to put on a show by praying for her man, who is stuck in a collapsed mine. Her answer:

"I don't pray. Kneeling bags my nylons."

In another scene, she says this about the reporter:

"I've met a lot of hard-boiled eggs in my time, but you—you're twenty minutes."

Rebel Girl's Poetry Corner: "sweet impossible blossom"

Rebel Girl has returned from her sojourn up north and she is trying to get back into, as they say, the swing of things. Her summer was full of so many things: people, their words, water, fire, fish, stars, the death of a little boy, her friend's son, whose family and friends are remembering him by placing flowers in the seats of swings. Thanks to Chunk for holding the fort.

Here's a start.

A poem by Li-Young Lee, about peaches, about summer, about hope, which she and so many need. Eat a peach. It helps.

From Blossoms

From blossoms comes
this brown paper bag of peaches
we bought from the boy
at the bend in the road where we turned toward
signs painted Peaches.


From laden boughs, from hands,
from sweet fellowship in the bins,
comes nectar at the roadside, succulent
peaches we devour, dusty skin and all,
comes the familiar dust of summer, dust we eat.


O, to take what we love inside,
to carry within us an orchard, to eat
not only the skin, but the shade,
not only the sugar, but the days, to hold
the fruit in our hands, adore it, then bite into
the round jubilance of peach.


There are days we live
as if death were nowhere
in the background; from joy
to joy to joy, from wing to wing,
from blossom to blossom to
impossible blossom, to sweet impossible blossom.

Mr. Moon tonight

Those mountains to the east are empty—of people. They seem so far away, so desolate. Someone told me once that there's an old building in some canyon over there, abandoned and falling apart. I truly hope it is true. I dream about it, Mr. Moon.

Soon, Mathur's mysterious "consultant" will pay the colleges a visit

• Irvine Valley College faculty, if you consult the Flex Week handbook (which, this year, sports several of my photographs!), you’ll find that, on Tuesday (August 19), from 4:00 to 5:30, IVC Prez Glenn Roquemore and Ac. Senate Prez Wendy Gabriella will be holding another “accreditation update” (in B209).

I’m told that board President Don Wagner will be there too.

I sure hope everyone will make an effort to attend!

• A couple of days ago, senators of the Irvine Valley College Academic Senate received the agenda for the first senate meeting for Fall ’08, which will be held on Wednesday (August 20), from 10:00 to noon in B102.

I finally got around to reading it. Some elements are predictable enough. We’ll be informed of the progress of our accreditation task force, etc. We’ll hear about new faculty orientations.

But one item caught my eye:

Consultant Site Visit: September 02 and 04, 2008

Evidently the “consultant” will attend a special meeting with the senate’s Representative Council (i.e., the senate) on Sept. 4.

Our ever-wiley Chancellor, Raghu P. Mathur, has long promoted the fiction that this person has been hired by the district to help us out somehow. That’s why he’s called a “consultant.”

Yeah, but, as we’ve reported previously, that’s bullshit.

I’m told that Saddleback College will be “site visited” on two other days by this “consultant.”

The consultant will be writing a report. My guess is that the report will be written quickly and will be sent somewhere up north. 

Maybe Novato, CA.

Some newsberries:

• O.C. sheriff vows to arrest reservists if they're lying about lost badges: Sheriff Sandra Hutchens calls a mandatory meeting of reserve deputies designated by ex-Sheriff Michael Carona. 42 have reported missing badges or ID cards, which are now recalled.

• Chancellor Mathur looks like asshole, is asshole, says blog