At today’s Legislative crackerbarrel in Aberdeen, Northern State e-learning prof Greg Francom asked who would benefit from and what problem would be solved by House Bill 1199, Speaker G. Mark Mickelson’s proposal to strip professors and all other Regental employees of their right to collectively bargain. Francom prefaced his question with his own opposition to the bill, saying it could “reduce higher education’s effectiveness.” He said the bill looks like the product of “somebody who has a personal dislike for professors or faculty members because of an experience from a small group of professors who may not have maybe acted the way they should from one program or… one university in the state.”
Attentive readers might think Francom was talking about Speaker Mickelson, who seemed to come away cranky from a USD task force’s decision to stay in Vermillion instead of moving to Mickelson’s home base in Sioux Falls.
It turns out he could have been talking about Lana Greenfield.
But first, Rep. Dan Kaiser (R-3/Aberdeen) rose to say (1:55) he doesn’t know who would benefit from banning collective bargaining on campus. Out of the blue, Kaiser said he thinks South Dakota’s ban on strikes by public employees is “a little bit overburdensome on the individual.” He said he doesn’t plan to support this further dig at public employees’ rights.
Rep. Drew Dennert (R-3/Aberdeen) said (3:00) he “would lean toward opposing” HB 1199, due to the input he’s gotten from constituents, particularly those at NSU.
If I didn’t have the video, I might question whether I actually heard two hard-right South Dakota Republicans take a pro-union position.
Rep. Lana Greenfield (R-2/Doland) restored my faith in the South Dakota Republican Party. She said (3:25) she signed onto the bill because it’s a “statement”:
It was a statement made that maybe we should take a look at some of the classes that we’re teaching in our colleges and the direction that we’re moving our students. I think that what’s been happening in some of our schools is that the students are being told what to think instead of taught how to think, and so the what to think has become the questions on the tests, and the answers that are expected for the students to regurgitate what is told to them, and I don’t happen to think that’s right. I can give you a point… a scenario, I won’t tell you what school or what state, but my daughter was attending a school, and there was a government class, and they were to learn something in terms of government. She quoted the Bible as a source when the answer was asked on the test, and she was given an F because that person who was grading it said that it had nothing to do with the Bible, to stick with the facts, that the facts are the facts, and she really took issue with that, because she told him that indeed the Bible was a very factual book. The professor finally gave her a D, so I think we just need to make a statement sometimes and make everybody accountable for what is being taught in some schools in the country [Rep. Lana Greenfield, response to question about who would benefit from banning collective bargaining at South Dakota’s public universities, Aberdeen, SD, 2018.02.03, timestamp 3:25].
Boy, and we thought Mickelson could hold a grudge.
Yes, Lana, sometimes we do need to make statements. At a public forum, when a member of the public asks you who benefits from banning collective bargaining, you need to make a statement about what good it does and for whom to ban collective bargaining.
You didn’t make that statement. You didn’t explain, to an audience at a public university, how a bill you’re sponsoring would make learning or life better for anyone at that university. You didn’t show any grasp of how eliminating collective bargaining could affect the recruitment and retention of quality professors. You didn’t show any evidence that South Dakota professors are colluding to suppress critical thinking or the Bible, let alone that banning collective bargaining would stop any such heinous conspiracy. You didn’t even show that your daughter’s professor was a union member.
The only statement that you made today is that you still have a burr under your saddle about your daughter getting a bad grade possibly fifteen years ago from an unnamed professor at an unnamed university that you won’t even confirm is in this state and thus would be affected by the law you want to write.
The statement you really make is that you are a bitter and unrecovered helicopter parent writing a law to scratch a long-held personal grudge based on a single, unverifiable allegation that has nothing to do with the public policy you would rewrite. The condensed version of that statement is, “Lana Greenfield is not qualified to legislate.”
I can hardly wait for a former student to tell everyone how wrong I was to give him an “F” when they answered the question (in Western Civ. Class) “What is the connection between Marxism and the Mexican Revolution” with “Communism is a failed ideology.” And that is a true story. No regrets at all.
And, of course, collective bargaining in no way determines how the content of individual courses are delivered and performance is evaluated. That is covered by Regents policy: 1. Board Policy 1.11 (Academic Freedom and Responsibility) requires faculty evaluate a student solely on academic basis and not on opinions or conduct in matters unrelated to academic standards.
I’d love to get Laci Greenfield’s professor on the record about what really happened on that test. But just as the FBI can’t rebut the Trumpist hogwash memo without revealing confidential information, professors can’t violate FERPA and hand out students’ tests, even to respond to a legislator’s grudgeful slander.
Once I was teaching COLLEGE STUDENTS Bush v. Gore, who thought Bill O’Reilly “books” were valid source material.
Ms. leslie, did you corrupt those students’ minds with your opinions?
I think FERPA might not be a hindrance, I recently wrote about a case for which I was a grievance officer that originated as a dispute over a grade and morphed into an allegation of sexual discrimination. Lawyers were involved, and the complainant’s lawyers said that the proceedings had to be confidential. However, the complaining student had widely made her allegations to students at the union and in the dorms. The contending lawyers cited case law that granted universities and individual academic officers the right to respond to public charges of misfeasance with exculpatory matters of record. In making her accusations public, the student forfeited any claim to confidentiality. This happened about 25 years ago, so there may be newer interpretations of the law. But under that rubric, Ms. Greenfield may well have breached any claim to confidentiality by making her accusations in a public forum.
However, the situation Ms. Greenfield relates raises other issues. Her contention that the Bible was quoted as a source for a provision in American government flies in the face of the history of the Founders avoiding any such citations in establishing the separation of church and state. And citing the moral allegories of scripture as a factual basis for American government sets bushy old literary heads ablaze. This from a former teacher?
Interesting, David! I’d love to check with profs at SDSU and see if any recall this incident and can share any details. However, in the case you’re citing, did the student’s forfeiture of privacy apply only to discovery and trial testimony, or could the university in question respond to questions in the press as well?
If that precedent still applies, would it apply here, where a parent has only obliquely referenced an incident without naming the student, professor, or school but has provided sufficient detail for us to identify the student (her only daughter) and the university?
As I recall, the university could respond publicly, including through the media, as a matter of maintaining its reputation and the public trust. While the right to control the information is the daughter’s after she is 18, the mother’s public allegation, particularly in conjunction with proposed legislation that denies professors to have a voice in the conditions of their profession, raises an issue that the university might wish to address. In the incident I was involved in, it was made clear that the records would be fully revealed if the matter went to court. So, the charges were withdrawn by the complainant and dismissed as having no merit by the university. As the records can be revealed under subpoena or court order, that circumstance might apply here. However, the university has the right to establish that it conducted itself according to academic standards and could produce the supporting evidence in direct response to Greenfield’s allegations. She has put the university and her daughter into a bad situation.
Indeed, Lana violates FERPA here by revealing her daughter’s educational records.
The SD Board of Regents has required the following statement be on faculty syllabi. Does Ms. Greenfield’s daughter not read the syllabus? Freedom in Learning
“Under Board of Regents and University policy student academic performance will be evaluated solely on an academic basis, not on opinions or conduct in matters unrelated to academic standards. Students are free to take reasoned exception to the data or views offered in any course of study and to reserve judgment concerning what are matters of opinion, and they are responsible for learning the content of any course of study in which they are enrolled. Students who believe that an academic evaluation reflects prejudiced or capricious consideration of student opinion or conduct which is unrelated to academic standards set forth for the class may contact the dean of the college which offers the class to initiate a review of the evaluation.”