University of North Carolina officials recently announced
that they were moving the controversial “Silent Sam” statue to a new, less
public campus facility. Apparently, just hiding the memorial to fallen
Confederate soldiers isn’t good enough for many of the school’s teaching
assistants and students, some of whom almost immediately took to the streets in
protest. Moreover, activists announced that no fewer than 79 teaching
assistants had signed a
petition threatening to withhold up to 2,200 grades as leverage to
force the UNC Board of Trustees and Chancellor Carol Folt to rethink their
decision to keep Silent Sam anywhere on campus grounds. Some instructors went
so far as to ask their students to take a stand on the “strike,” resulting in
student and parent complaints.
The
TA’s actions should result in no
fewer than 79 “pink slips.” It is unconscionable for teachers to use their
students as pawns to get what they want in their never-ending social justice
wars.
To his
credit, Bob Blouin, UNC Provost, said such a strike would “violate the
University’s instructional responsibilities.” He added: “Our students are entitled to receive
their grades in a timely manner. It is especially critical for the students
preparing to graduate next Sunday,” noting that their scholarships, grants, and
job opportunities could be imperiled by the withholding. He also stated that, “Such
actions have been interpreted as coercion and an exploitation of the
teacher-student relationship and in fact are a violation of students’ First
Amendment rights as well as federal law.” Exactly.
Blouin
appears oddly determined to do the obviously right thing and protect the
well-being of his students. He ended his statement by averring: “I trust that
our faculty and graduate students will not act in a way that harms the
interests of students and their families, and that these instructors meet the
legal, ethical and moral responsibilities for which they have been contracted.
Failure to meet their responsibilities to their students, including timely
submission of final grades, will result in serious consequences.”
Students pay
tens of thousands of dollars for tuition alone to attend colleges and
universities today. Some of that money goes into their instructor’s pockets. If
students wanted to protest a real
injustice, while also protecting themselves, they should not take after “Silent”
Sam. They should take to the campus roads and walkways and demand the teacher’s
assistants end their succession from sanity and morality…just like the
Confederacy did all those years ago.
That would be
one protest I’d support. And it would
be a monument to freedom.
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