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University

Education: Substance & Spending

Following comments to yesterday’s post on proposed cuts to the UW System schools (Caution arrives late, doesn’t recognize its surroundings), here are nine quick comments about education. 1.  Act 10 as a budgetary tool.  This centrally-planned idea didn’t work.  Reductions in public-union bargaining powers in exchange for the ‘tools’ to balance school and other public…

Chancellor Telfer and the Narrow Limits of Public Relations

Chancellor Dick Telfer’s several years as leader of UW-Whitewater now draw to a close. In that time, Telfer’s administration – with a staff of ten in media relations – has pushed countless stories in the Daily Union, Gazette, Register, and Banner touting not simply students’ genuinely worthy accomplishments, but significantly his own importance. That’s Dick…

About UW-Whitewater Dean Mary Beth Mackin’s Drug War Defense

There’s someone with whom UW-Whitewater’s Dean of Students, Mary Beth Mackin, might wish to speak: Tammy Sadek, mother of the late Andrew Sadek. Readers may recall that in October, I wrote about Dean of Students Mary Beth Mackin’s defense of using students ensnared in low-level drug stings as confidential informants.  (See, The Dean’s Drug-War Equality…

Walworth County District Attorney Clears Coach Tim Fader of Wrongdoing

The Walworth County District Attorney, Dan Necci, has sent former UW-Whitewater wrestling coach Tim Fader a letter completely clearing Fader of criminal wrongdoing of any kind, in his wrestling program or any other matter. See, Former UW-Whitewater wrestling coach cleared of wrongdoing by DA @ Channel 3000 WISC-TV.  Here’s the text of that letter: November…

Support the Campus Accountability and Safety Act

Discussion is better than silence; knowledge trumps ignorance. Thousands of universities receive federal funds, including our own campus. Under the law, those universities are required, since the Clery Act, 20 U.S.C. § 1092(f), 34 C.F.R. 668.46 to record and report instances of crime on and near their campuses. (UW-System schools publish that information in compliance…

Scalding’s Not the Remedy to Freezing

A freezing person doesn’t improve his or her health by jumping into scalding water.  Weak leaders, often weak for years, can’t assure better conditions by shifting wildly from cold indifference to scorching concern.

‘No One Left to Lie To’

That’s the title of a book by the late Christopher Hitchens.  Although I share neither his atheism nor his support for the Iraq War, I’d suggest that for his book title alone Hitchens deserves to be remembered well.  It’s just perfect.  There’s a point at which, after years of dissembling, distracting, and excuse-making, shifty leaders…

The Campus-City Gap

All these years, so much talk about closer ties, and there’s still a chasm between city and university.   So much so, that for many residents in the city to learn about university-related crime, they’d have to look for an out-of-city station or publication. See, from Saturday @ 2:58 PM, Student reportedly called name, kicked, punched:…

The Dean’s Drug-War Equality Argument

I’m sorry I didn’t get to this sooner, but one of UW-Whitewater Dean of Students Mary Beth Mackin’s remarks about drug busts on campus deserves a reply.  She’s offered an argument for equality of treatment on and off campus.  Her argument implies that she either misunderstands the underlying justification for equality arguments, or that she…

Coach Fader’s Interview with WISC-TV (Channel 3000)

Update: Video interview embedded immediately below. On Monday night, WISC-TV Madison broadcast an interview with UW-Whitewater’s former wresting coach, Tim Fader. Coach Fader was dismissed from his position in June 2014, two months after he reported an alleged sexual assault to the Whitewater Police Department. A story based on the broadcast interview is now online.…