Coming out of darkness over here to post an editorial that ran in the Cincinnati Enquirer today. Ms. Reutter expresses my own suspicions: that the move to squash Western was one of political payback. Check it out.

Miami loses by eliminating school

By Claire Reutter

I am a Miami University graduate from the 1980s grieving the loss of a dear friend who made an indelible impression on my life. My alma mater, the School of Interdisciplinary Studies (or the Western College Program), is slated to close (“Last pitch fails; trustees dissolve Western College,” June 24).

The news came suddenly to the Western community of alumni and students, who were shocked when they got the first word in the spring that this might happen. The outgoing Miami president and his administration overturned a 40-6 University Senate vote that called for a study next year to explore issues such as low enrollment. Instead, the school will be eliminated no later than June 30, 2008.

What’s in it for an outgoing university president to squelch dialogue and rush through closure of this dynamic liberal arts college that Barron’s Buys considers to be one of Miami University’s two stongest programs (the other one being its School of Business)?

Well, Miami’s dining hall and maintenance employees had a strike. Not surprisingly, several faculty members and students in the School of Interdisciplinary Studies – which has always concerned itself with social justice – supported it.

So now it’s payback time, and the outgoing president can make sure that the incoming president has one less thorn in his side, one less dissenting voice that suggests that even the menial laborers deserve a fair share.

I shudder to think where I would be now if it weren’t for my alma mater. Many of my colleagues attended Miami solely because of the Western Program.

One thing is certain: Without an entity that speaks up for what is right, Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, will become more of a monoculture than ever before.

Claire Reutter has moved back to the Cincinnati area after four years in Maui, Hawaii, where she worked as a teacher, a writer, and a public librarian. She now lives in Clifton with two sisters, her husband and their 4-year-old son.

A sober and thoughtful response to the news of Western’s demise was printed in the Columbus Dispatch today. Here is the nicely-summarizing meat:

The Western program comprises about 1 percent of Miami’s student body but contributes about 10 percent of the honors students…

Two reviews found the program not without flaws but still worth preserving; Barron’s Best Buys in College Education, Eighth Edition, calls it one of Miami’s two strongest programs (the other being the School of Business), and yet an ad hoc committee recommended its closure.

Western is charged with being too expensive, but it is by no means the most expensive program at Miami. It is charged with not drawing enough admissions, but last year the Miami admissions office prohibited Western from recruiting directly from high schools, while still claiming that Western is primarily responsible for its own recruitment. When the transparency of the evaluation process was called into question, a lawyer gained access, via the Ohio Public Records Act, to 1,500 pages of relevant documentation and concluded that indeed, the process had not been open at all.

The University Senate passed, 40-6 with no abstentions, a resolution calling for a further year of study without any other action being taken; it was overruled by the administration — an unusual move, as the Senate exists to deal with academic matters. At every turn, the facts seem to support at least a more detailed evaluation not only of the Western program but also of the decisionmaking process.

Michael Conaway from Union, N.J.: kudos to you.

Hays Cummins and Chris Wolfe have been working on a “Plan B” to try to salvage whatever can be salvaged from the old program for the new, and kudos to them, too. They’re good guys with a lot invested in Western.

But oh, more I think about it all, the angrier I get.

Meg was particularly angry when she heard the news. She was an architecture student, but it was the community life at Western that kept her at Miami. Otherwise, she would’ve split. So you’ve got a couple whose lives would’ve been totally different without Western.

It’s no wonder I’ve been harping about this so much.

The great point that’s been made over and over: it’s not only past, present, and future Western students who suffer from this decision, it’s really everyone at Miami.

But maybe Miami doesn’t deserve what it had. Who knows.

“The process of writing will always be trying to repair something that doesn’t exist with tools you have to invent on the spot.” I read that quote by George Saunders (from an interview with Fugue) right after I read the Dispatch piece.

I’m not sure what exactly it has to do with Western, but it sure as hell seems to fit.

Kumler Chapel, Western Campus, Miami University

Last Friday, Miami University’s Board of Trustees voted 10-0 in favor of accepting President Garland’s bs recommendation that the Western College Program (School of Interdisciplinary Studies and my alma mater) be eliminated as an academic division. (Here are reports from the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Dayton Daily News, and Hamilton Journal News.) This comes as a disgusting, but not shocking, blow, and will probably forever taint my feelings towards the university which had previously been very, very generous to me.

While I had remarkable professors, friends, classes, and experiences on Main Campus, it was Western that drew me to Miami, and it was Western that made my time there what it was. I met my wife on Western, I met some of my best friends on Western, and I discovered my personal, artistic, and academic voice on Western.

Were I looking at colleges now, there’s no way I would ever end up at Miami.

It was never any secret that the Western program had its problems: a stale curriculum, a weak recruiting and marketing campaign, and a faculty that lacked fresh blood. But despite its shortcomings, the living-learning community and the academic freedom afforded to its students made it not only a unique program, but an essential one: a kind of free-thinking, risk-taking, radical antidote to an otherwise bland, uninspired, and conservative student body. (I’ve made this argument before.)

It seems clear to me that the real reason Western is being dismantled is a political one. Western students are extremely politically active, and made up the overwhelming majority of the dissenting political voice on campus. In 2003, the janitors and dining hall workers of AFSCME Local 209 went on a wage strike, and several of the leading students aiding the effort were Westerners. Same thing with the war. Western has always been a thorn in the side of the administration, and with a conservative President and Provost so fundamentally opposed to the major pillars of liberal education, some prophetically inclined could have seen this coming.

AIDS, Bird Flu, West Nile…forget ‘em. Worry about Greed and Stupidity. Because they are the diseases that will destroy us. And they are trickling down from the very top to the very bottom.

They will infect everything.

I suppose there is still a glimmer of hope: the proposed Honors College could actually include an souped-up version of Western, but what was known as Western is probably about to disappear in the next couple years. I’m moved to quote Toni Morrison in her first book, SULA: “Maybe it hadn’t been a community, but it had been a place.” But Western was both a community AND a place, so that quote doesn’t apply.

To those current Westerners still reaping the benefits of a fantastic place, Good Night and Good Luck. Hang in there.

To the Board, President Garland, Provost Herbst, and those Woody Guthrie called, “all you fascists bound to lose,” Good Riddance.

So long Western.

President Garland has announced his recommendation that the Western College Program be eliminated as an academic division at Miami University. Read the full text. Obviously, this wasn’t unexpected, but it strikes me as a spineless move, announced during final exams, when students have little time and energy left to be heard, and right before Jimmy goes on a permanent vacation. The whole thing makes me sick.

Dear Drs. Garland and Herbst,

I think it’s reasonable to assume that your inboxes have recently been flooded with e-mail from concerned students, professors, alumni, and friends of the Western College Program. Let me add my e-mail to the batch, not only as a recent Western graduate, but as a former Harrison Scholar and recipient of the Provost’s Academic Achievement Award.

It would be a waste of time for me to further sing to you the praises of Western’s academic program: the university as a whole has already adopted Western’s long-practiced liberal education policy, interest in interdisciplinary inquiry, and emphasis on living-learning communities. The big question seems to be: why should Miami pay 3 times more per student so that Western majors can experience this wonderful education?

You wouldn’t have caught me dead in a business or marketing class at Miami, but I believe the answer lies in branding. This became clear to me after watching a DVD endorsed by U.S. News and Reports and put out by the WB network, called THE U: EVERYTHING YOU WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT COLLEGE BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK. (I’m not making this up, if you haven’t already, you can get your copy at www.theu.com.) Miami is featured on the Midwest Colleges DVD, and here’s the summary:

Miami University likes to think of itself as the Harvard of Ohio, but, it’s better to think of this school as what Harvard would be if you moved it west, dropped it in a cornfield, kicked out all the nerds*, and added a lot of hotties rocking the popped collar. Yeah.

*I’m guessing by nerds, they mean academics.

This too was my nightmare vision of Miami as a high school senior (although I don’t think people were popping their collars at that time). Sure, it’s a stereotype, but stereotype is everything in this culture. I had three full-ride offers to outstanding universities, and I chose Miami only because I found my way to the Western College Program. As my mother likes to say, “I wouldn’t have let you go there, otherwise.”

The year I received the Provost’s Academic Achievement Award, three out of the dozen recipients were Western majors: a higher percentage than any other academic division. Western provides an “alternative” brand to the stereotypical beer-guzzling-red-brick-and-pink-polo-shirts Miami brand. This alternative brand attracts top students like myself, who contribute to greater improvement of the intellectual environment, which boosts Miami’s reputation, which then attracts even more top students.

There is your payoff.

Eliminating Western will eliminate students like me. Please, for the greater good of Miami University, do not take any drastic actions. Give Western a chance to improve within the recommendations of the Winkler committee. The greatest minds of my generation are not going to attend a college universally dubbed J. CREW U. without it.

Sincerely,

Austin Kleon

Class of 2005