[...]UC Davis Physicists to Chancellor Katehi | Cosmic Variance | Discover Magazine[...]…

The chancellor does serve at the behest of the regents ultimately. However, if she lacks support from a large fraction of faculty and/or students, this must be taken seriously as a message to the Regents.

- From my position of ignorance, I too would await the report of the investigation.

- It is also not clear that it is the role of the faculty and student body to determine who shall be the chancellor of UC Davis. I rather think that it is the role of the UC Board of Regents. Now, if her position is so damaged that she cannot work effectively with the faculty and student body, that would be a problem; but, as Daniel indicated above, that is not clear; and even if it were true, that would have to be a determination by the Board of Regents.

http://www.davisenterprise.com/opinion/letters/katehi-has-faculty-support/

I do know there is a large number to offset this list, but honestly, I do not know how many.

Whatever you may feel about Occupy in general, the UC Davis students have been very clear on their intentions about mitigating tuition hikes and possibly rolling them back, increasing the share of the wealthy in state tax revenues as a means to increase educational support, reducing loan burdens for students, and improving the economic climate for postdegree careers.

Whatever you may feel about Occupy in general, the UC Davis students have been very clear on their intentions about mitigating tuition hikes and possibly rolling them back, increasing the share of the wealthy in state tax revenues as a means to increase educational support, reducing loan burdens for students, and improving the economic climate for postdegree careers.

I don’t know enough to comment on Katehi’s responsibility specifically. I feel that any administrator or faculty anywhere should feel some urge to protect student’s well-being (starting with their physical safety) and must see this as a monstrous event. Perhaps some feel that there was a tough choice here, weighing the dangers of police force versus the danger of “lawless” students (the latter danger not quite but darn near zero, from all the evidence that I have seen). It was a stupid choice though, because now you will have more of both.

Is that a go-ahead to yank a professor by the hair to the ground?

“In a town hall meeting with students and faculty last week, Chancellor Katehi refused to answer numerous questions about whether she authorized the use of force, and whether she knew riot police were going to be involved.”

Source:
http://www.sacbee.com/2011/11/27/4080633/uc-davis-chancellor-must-do-the.html

When you say “they get what they get” Kathy, my blood runs cold. What kind of human being would say a thing like that?

And why has our chancellor not come out unequivocally against the use of torture by the UC Davis police, even now?

“In each “brutality” case the protesters were given ample time to prove their point before being asked to disband and they did not, therefore they get what they get (fair or otherwise – I’m not passing judgement on the justification for the pepper spraying incident, I don’t have enough facts to pass judgement).”

The point is not that the students weren’t warned, it is that the measures taken were unnecessarily brutal. They were not resisting arrest: They could have been removed without pepper spray.

If your argument were valid, it would also be permissible for the police to say, “We’re going to machine gun the square in 5 minutes. If you’re still here at that time, you’ll get what you get.”

Somehow, I think that even today’s Supreme Court would conclude that this would constitute cruel & unusual punishment.

In each “brutality” case the protesters were given ample time to prove their point before being asked to disband and they did not, therefore they get what they get (fair or otherwise – I’m not passing judgement on the justification for the pepper spraying incident, I don’t have enough facts to pass judgement). The demonstrations have gotten plenty of publicity, but have done little to affect change. And it’s little wonder quite frankly. Today on the radio I was listening to (yet more) sound bites from occupy protesters. The question was “why are you here?” The answers, all the same, were “because we believe in the cause and we want to show our support.” Meaning: “we have no idea what we’re mad about, but we’re hear because we’re mad.” Protests are for the impassioned, not necessarily the intellectual.

PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The faculty of the UC Davis physics department held an emergency faculty meeting in
the late afternoon of Monday Nov. 21 to discuss the response to the recent pepper-spraying
incident on campus. This followed extensive informal discussions among faculty, students, and staff, including an “open house” in the chair’s office earlier that day.

The following actions were taken:

• The physics faculty voted *unanimously* to issue an apology to students and post it on the department web page. (Link to apology)

• A majority of the Faculty of the UC Davis physics department also signed a Letter calling for the resignation of UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi. (Link to letter to Katehi)

These actions were not taken lightly, and followed serious and substantive deliberation and debate on the issues.

[End Press Release]

http://tinyurl.com/ucdavis-physics-apology

http://tinyurl.com/ucdavis-physics-dept-to-katehi

Geoff