Students protest dean selection

The selection of Peter Goldsmith as the new Dean of Student Life and Services at Oberlin College set off a wave of outrage in sections of the Oberlin Commuunity.

Beginning at 7 a.m. on April 15, a group ranging at times from 10 to 50 students occupied the Cox Administrative Building, blocking administrators and staff from entering the building. The crowd, which remained for 29 hours, chanted slogans such as "Nancy Dye, Shame, Shame. Dean search is not a game!" They distributed fliers and hung signs on the outside of the building. Protestors demanded that Dye admit to problems in the search process and that protesting students would not be punished for their actions. Although the administration agreed not to punish the students, Dye refused to admit to any problems.

The fliers distributed by the protesters claimed that Goldsmith was chosen prior to the final deadline for student input and that students were led to believe McNish chose to accept the Earlham position only after discovering she would not be chosen for the Oberlin position. Moreover, they claimed that the search committee was hand-picked by Dye, that she was a personal friend of Goldsmiths, that the job description was changed in the middle of the search, and finally that the on-campus interviews occurred during midterms.

Dean of the College Clayton Koppes, acting as President because Dye was on a fundraising trip to Hong Kong, was one of many administrators who tried to negotiate with students. He said that many of the claims of the protesting students were incorrect. English felt that the protesters' sources of information were inaccurate and that comments he made about the search were misunderstood and taken out of context.

Over 100 students were granted amnesty for participating in the protest, and hourly wage workers in Cox, who had been prevented from working, were paid as demanded by the protestors. However, the main demand, a letter of confession conceding bias in the search for the dean of students, was not met.

The protest, whose timing coincided with the "All Roads Lead to Oberlin" gathering of prospective students, elicited various responses from students who were not involved.

Some passersby were drawn into long discussions with the protesters while others simply found the event humorous and not worth the outrage.

The protest also came at the same time as a computer server crash at the Review, eliciting accusations of a media blackout as the paper wasn't published until the following Monday.

Immediately after the protest, a debate raged on campus regarding the validity of the protesters's actions. Many students felt that the protest was unjustified and that its only effect was to minimize the effectiveness of student action on campus and to create a mockery of political action. Other students argued that it was vital to have students' voices heard and that Bill Stackman was a much more qualified and deserving candidate for the position.

Although administrators' main concern with the protest was that the claims made by the protesters were not factual, they felt there was nothing to confess and were happy with the selection process. Koppes said, "There is nothing to confess. This was a good search process. It was about as open as a search process can be, consistent with the candidate's needs for confidentiality."

In the days following the takeover of Cox, the student protesters broadened their goals. They spoke with prospective student tour groups to express their opinion that the College is becoming increasingly conservative and that prospective students should be aware of this. They published a newsletter entitled "The Real Story" in order to express their concerns and their own story of what occurred during the protest.

Students involved with the protest organized to express concern with the operation of committees on campus and what they felt was a lack of student involvement in these committees. Senior Dan Spalding said he believes faculty and staff members of committees should be elected democratically. He said, "We found out through the Cox protest that almost everybody is concerned about democratic control on campus."

Goldsmith visited Oberlin for the first time after being selected as the new dean of students in the second weekend in May. "I really only ask one thing of the Oberlin community, and that is not to make assessments of me until they have an opportunity to see me, and talk with me," he said during his visit.

He had praise for the activism which surrounded his selection. "I think my main reaction to the protest is that it suggest to me that this is a student body that cares a great deal about the institution, that cares a great deal about the administrators and who they are, and the level of engagement by the students didn't surprise me remotely. In most every respect, it is a very good sign about student activism and engagement at Oberlin."