If you missed Wednesday’s Second Line procession, you missed something special.
Greg Simon, the UNL AAUP Chapter Secretary, resident keeper of the calm energy, and Associate Professor of Composition, led the procession with his jazz students. It reminded me why I love being part of a university community. You are surrounded by people who are really, really, amazingly good at things you’re not, or that you haven’t even ever thought about. And they are all too happy to share their talents with you. It’s magical.
Beyond that, a university is full of young people discovering what they are good at and passionate about. Sometimes, those young people come back when they are a little less young to further their education and careers in graduate programs. It looks different, but it is no less wonderful to witness their learning and growth.
The diversity of talents, interests, passions, and skills is what makes a university what it is. To haphazardly cut departments and faculty frays the fabric of the university. It frays the fabric in all kinds of ways, expertise, revenue, teaching, research, but also the social fabric of the university.
Although we certainly don’t teach this in EDAD, the UNL admin has been excellent at weakening that social fabric. They pit us against each other for merit pay. They pit us against each other for resources at the college and university levels. The turn the APC into an adversarial situation, instead of one in which faculty represent faculty interests. They also pit us against one another across campuses for raises and now programs. The time is now to say no more. We stand together as One Faculty, One Nebraska. No department cuts at UNL, no department cuts at UNK (slated for the first BOR meeting after the holidays, I’ll be there to say no, you should be too), and no department cuts at UNO (if anyone has heard about that, please let us know!). No, making decisions without faculty who represent our interests and who actually are experts who have skills that would contribute to navigating this perilous moment in higher education and public education more generally.
See you all on Friday! Bring your remarks, your best sign, your favorite UNL T-shirt, props, cow bells, pots, and pans.
