An open letter to Faculty
By: Ron Bishop
Issue date: 4/20/07 Section: Ed-Op
Originally published: 4/20/07 at 4:56 AM EST
Last update: 4/20/07 at 4:55 AM EST
Originally published: 4/20/07 at 4:56 AM EST
Last update: 4/20/07 at 4:55 AM EST
It was her.
I know what you're thinking: it's not our place to intervene. How could you have known? Getting involved in our students' personal lives is a tricky, potentially destructive endeavor. If we suspect a problem, we should make them aware of the Drexel Counseling Center, which does such wonderful work helping students to cope with the challenges and issues that occur in their lives. We could go so far as to make sure they actually go to the Center.
All true, but the unbelievably tragic events at Virginia Tech this week underscore the inadequacy of what amounts to a "hope for the best" strategy.
How do we, as educators, as a nation, react to the level of turmoil that causes a student to abandon her newborn baby or to shoot so many innocent people? Some of our reactions are predictable:
We will want to step up security - spend large sums of money to hire private security firms whose high-tech gadgets and voluminous security plans will only scare us and end up making the campus foreboding and inaccessible.
We will want to lock our buildings and fortify our classrooms. Some have talked about arming teachers. How can learning and discourse happen in such an environment?
We will want to encourage each other to keep our eyes open for suspicious activity and to report anyone who we believe is a threat to our safety. But as recent history teaches, being observant and cautious often turns into profiling.
We will want to administer psychological fitness tests to students as part of the enrollment process. But is that fair to individuals who have successfully battled mental illness?
If we have any hope at all of preventing tragedies like these, we should begin earlier. We should not put so much pressure on kids to succeed and let them determine their path in life. We should stop the incessant chatter about how going to the right school is the catalyst for future success. We should ensure that we don't treat the act of learning as a financial transaction.
I know what you're thinking: it's not our place to intervene. How could you have known? Getting involved in our students' personal lives is a tricky, potentially destructive endeavor. If we suspect a problem, we should make them aware of the Drexel Counseling Center, which does such wonderful work helping students to cope with the challenges and issues that occur in their lives. We could go so far as to make sure they actually go to the Center.
All true, but the unbelievably tragic events at Virginia Tech this week underscore the inadequacy of what amounts to a "hope for the best" strategy.
How do we, as educators, as a nation, react to the level of turmoil that causes a student to abandon her newborn baby or to shoot so many innocent people? Some of our reactions are predictable:
We will want to step up security - spend large sums of money to hire private security firms whose high-tech gadgets and voluminous security plans will only scare us and end up making the campus foreboding and inaccessible.
We will want to lock our buildings and fortify our classrooms. Some have talked about arming teachers. How can learning and discourse happen in such an environment?
We will want to encourage each other to keep our eyes open for suspicious activity and to report anyone who we believe is a threat to our safety. But as recent history teaches, being observant and cautious often turns into profiling.
We will want to administer psychological fitness tests to students as part of the enrollment process. But is that fair to individuals who have successfully battled mental illness?
If we have any hope at all of preventing tragedies like these, we should begin earlier. We should not put so much pressure on kids to succeed and let them determine their path in life. We should stop the incessant chatter about how going to the right school is the catalyst for future success. We should ensure that we don't treat the act of learning as a financial transaction.
