[HSU-CoordBoardInternal] Fwd: Student Concerns - Town Meeting Smoking Framing

Tue Jan 28 23:13:06 EST 2014

Dear Accountability Board, Coordinating Board & Josiah,

I would like to take a moment, as a Hampshire community member rather than
a CoordBoard member, to express my sincere apologies for the emails being
sent in response to the Town Meeting flyers. I was extremely displeased and
discomfited by the emails. I found the response to be incredibly glib and
openly disrespectful. These comments do not reflect my views, and I do not
wish to be included in such communications.

Sincerely,
Brittany Wilson

On Sun, Jan 26, 2014 at 8:36 PM, <smd11 at hampshire.edu> wrote:

>
> ----- Forwarded message from smd11 at hampshire.edu -----
>    Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2014 20:26:37 -0500
>    From: smd11 at hampshire.edu
> Subject: Re: [HSU-CoordBoardInternal] Student Concerns - Town Meeting
> Smoking Framing
>      To: Accountability Board <committee10 at hampshire.edu>
>      Cc: Coordinating Board <coordboard at hampshire.edu>, "Josiah S.
> Litant" <jlitant at hampshire.edu>
>
> I would like to personally apologies to the Accountability Board for the
> highly regrettable design used on one of the two upcoming Town Meeting
> fliers. While I now see the extreme folly in our ways, I can assure you
> that no CoordBoard members meant any sort of ill will when we decided to
> feature the Liberian flag so prominently in our advertising.
>
> I suppose we all believed that it was finally appropriate. After all, it
> has been  11 years since Charles Taylor's ouster from power. Should it not
> now be suitable to once more fly the proud star and stripes of Liberia
> again?
>
> Sadly, it is now clear that we were mistaken. While we were certainly
> thrilled with Ellen Johnson's election to the presidency (as was
> Accountability Board I'm sure), it is now clear that aspects of her Truth
> and Reconciliation Commission have fallen far short, and in some ways bring
> to mind the old days of Afro-American minority domination. We expect more
> from a Nobel laureate, and clearly judging by your email, you do as well.
>
> I for one am deeply sorry, and promise to never allow a catastrophe such
> as this to ever occur again.
>
> Accountability Board's humble servant,
> -Samuel M. Dean, At-Large Member of CoordBoard
>
>
> Quoting Accountability Board <committee10 at hampshire.edu>:
>
>  Dear Coordinating Board,
>>
>> We are writing to you about your advertising and framing of the
>> 1/28/2014 Town Meeting. We have received concerns (you can see our reply
>> to those concerns below) about the way that the issues of smoking are
>> being framed. Students are concerned that the way Town Meeting is being
>> framed allows only for raising punitive action and not leaving room for
>> other solutions. They also are concerned with how the HSU Townmeeting FB
>> page is being run. We wrote to you about the HSU Townmeting FB earlier
>> and you did not reply. We also are concerned by the fact that the
>> posters for Town Meeting were printed in color. The current SAF
>> guidelines state that the SAF cannot be used to fund color posters. In
>> addition, half of the posters had an image of the United States flag. We
>> do not think that this is inclusive behavior as expected by the values
>> in Purpose, Values, & Scope. The United States flag, as we observed over
>> the course of the last year, has different connotations for each
>> student, and we do not think it is appropriate to use it to represent
>> the Hampshire Student Union. The HSU is technically comprised of all
>> students, including international students. We also think that you could
>> have done better to advertise, since there was not a post on the
>> intranet or daily digest; and there was not a Facebook event as there
>> has been in the past. A post made by the Student Leadership Facebook
>> page lead some members of Accountability Board to believe that the next
>> Town Meeting was in February.
>>
>> We suggest that you issue a public apology at the beginning of Town
>> Meeting this Tuesday, or on the daily digest if you do not see this
>> email in time. (Or both, if you want to make us especially happy.) We
>> also suggest that you take more careful consideration with your posters,
>> and see to it that they do not violate SAF guidelines and meet our
>> expectations of inclusivity as outlined in Purpose, Values, & Scope. We
>> also advise that you be more aware with how you frame Town Meetings in
>> the future. Another suggestion, is that you always make a daily digest
>> post and facebook event for each and every Town Meeting in addition to
>> posters.
>>
>> We understand that this comes right after the recent HSU retreat, and we
>> assure you that we have only the best intentions. We want the HSU to
>> work just as much as you do. We understand that it is difficult to keep
>> up with so much work, but we still believe in the important of following
>> the values we all affirmed the other day at the retreat.
>>
>> Thank you for the work you do,
>>
>> Accountability Board
>>
>> P.S
>>
>> We would like to remind you that since Ethan Warshow resigned at your
>> last meeting, that you should make a daily digest post calling for
>> self-nominations to replace him. Also, when you finalize your meeting
>> times for this semester, you should post them to the daily digest, and
>> make posts about your meeting times on the
>> HSU-CoordinatingBoard at lists.hampshire.edu listserv, so that non-members
>> who do not wish to receive internal communications can still be notified
>> about meeting times.
>>
>> -------- Original Message --------
>>
>> Dear _Anonymized Student Name A, & Anonymized Student Name B_,
>>
>>
>> We really appreciate your letter and we see the issues you raise as
>> valid concerns. Unfortunately, at this time, we cannot take direct
>> action about this issue. We will write a letter to Coordinating Board
>> about your concerns and advise that they issue an apology at the start
>> of Town Meeting this Tuesday, and that they make efforts to not do this
>> again in the future. We encourage you nonetheless to attend Town Meeting
>> on Tuesday and raise your concerns there as well.
>>
>> Hopefully, in the future Accountability Board will have more actions we
>> are allowed to take, and we appreciate your understanding.
>>
>> Thank you very much,
>>
>> Accountability Board
>>
>> (You can see our 1/26/2014 minutes on Hampedia to see who specifically
>> was involved in writing this reply
>>
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----
>
>
> ------
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>

-- 
Brittany Wilson
609.351.9173
@brittwilson24
www.fallingwhistles.com

Go into the arts. I'm not kidding. The arts are not a way to make a living.
They are a very human way of making life more bearable - Kurt Vonnegut
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