I write in response to Amelia Meyer’s article (“Academic self-governance,” Oct. 1). I take serious issue with Meyer’s characterization of self-governance as a marketing pitch of little value to the community and her sarcastic reference to the “shining examples” of Honor and Student Council (according to her, the source of ever so many woes). Meyer not only ignored the entire point of student self-governance but failed to acknowlege the vast effect that our unique way of administering Grounds has in molding the academic and professional lives of her peers, not only in school but far after. Beyond this, and much more seriously, in my opinion, is her arrogant and insulting viewpoint that not only ignores but derides the efforts of hundreds of her peers everyday to improve and maintain the amazing community students have built at the University.
No other institution that I am aware of places responsibility in student hands at the level of the University. This includes the experiences of newspaper and magazine staff, Student Council, Honor, UJC and the hundreds of organizations that have no faculty over-sight or administration control applied not only in day-to-day opperations but throughout their entire mission. My experience rests largely with the University Judiciary Committee, a much maligned but rarely understood body at the University that is entirely responsible for internal disciplinary proceedings. Perhaps Meyer cannot appreciate the contribution and impressive statement the University’s committment to an entirely peer-run disciplinary system makes to its community’s life, but maybe she should learn a little about it before deciding it is an illusory and ineffective phantom of the administration’s imagination, especially compared to some hackneyed and untested chance for a few people to make up their own three-credit study-hall.
Every single day, Meyer’s peers dedicate huge amounts of their time and energy to making the University work at its most basic levels. They provide a safe community and make sure students have activities to pad their resumes, whether they move on to law school or an advanced degree in museum curatorship or a career. University students do this at great cost and shockingly little benefit to them in the majority of cases, and with little to no help from the University’s administration. Meyer should show a little respect to her friends and neighbors, or at the very least get involved enough to appreciate it before she cuts them down for their efforts.
Seth Ragosta
CLAS ‘03
LAW ‘08
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