Open Letter to the College That Fired My Father

(I Have Yet to Receive a Response)

Note: I am posting this letter at the suggestion of a friend and because it pertains to one of this blog’s primary concerns: the decline of American education. I still have not received a reply from the college and doubt that I ever will.

Dear Minnesota State College Southeast Administration,

It was with profound regret that I heard about the impending termination of __________ from the college. As both ___________'s son and a graduate of MSCS, I have, naturally, a strong interest in the situation. I spent two happy years at the college and successfully completed the Accounting and Networking Specialist degree before going on to Winona State University, where I completed a BA and MA in English. I wish to offer these words of defense and support for my father who has been, I believe, unjustly attacked.

As you know, my father has faithfully served the college for 18 years. During that time, I have personally witnessed his professionalism as well as the esteem in which he was held by students, coworkers, and, once upon a time, the administration. Everyone respected and liked him. I mention this because, in his humility, he probably has not sufficiently explained this in his own correspondence, but it is true, and I could gather many testimonials to prove this (which I will happily do if you request it). 

His goal has always been to bring excellent instruction to his students, and he has accomplished this extremely well, sacrificing day in and day out to give his best. I personally know of students who were greatly affected in a positive way by his instruction--one of my fellow Master's students at WSU, as just one example, was inspired to seek an advanced English degree primarily because of my father's encouragement. Another WSU English student and former student of my father's expressed in his written senior portfolio how great his experience in the English department at MSCS had been, how it had helped push him toward completing an English degree at WSU. Another former student described to me how my father's instruction was very thorough, intentional, thoughtful, and humorous. I could provide many more examples like these (and will, if you desire), but I will leave it at this for now.

Now, I understand that the college has its policies regarding COVID, and that its issue with my father has to do with his unwillingness to embrace them. I understand that the college has decided these policies are best for the college campus and that the college wishes to keep people safe. Yet my father has proposed reasonable compromises that would permit him to maintain bodily autonomy while still respecting the college's rules. This offer was not accepted, which, as far as I can tell, indicates that the heart of the issue is not the health or safety of students and faculty but rather the college's insistence on absolute conformity to its rules. Further, my father has presented well-reasoned arguments describing his religious objections and has requested a religious exemption to the college rules. This, too, the college has rejected, which seems to indicate that the college has a fundamental disrespect for the consciences and beliefs of individual employees. If I am wrong in my inference, I will willingly listen to the correct interpretation. But it seems hard to escape the fact that the college's behavior contradicts and gives the lie to the college's proclamation of tolerance and inclusion, as outlined on its About Us page: "As an institution within the Minnesota State system, MSC Southeast commits to equal opportunity and nondiscrimination in employment and education, and is a partner and employer of choice for people of all backgrounds and identities." The college's dismissal of my father's religious objections to its COVID rules amounts to religious discrimination, quite simply, and is a betrayal of its above statement, as far as I can tell.

But perhaps the college's reasoning is not that there are no work-arounds for the issue, but simply that my father has caused so much trouble over the years that he is not worth continuing to employ. This claim is absolutely false. The only trouble he has ever had with college administration is in the past year, and only because he has stood up for what he believes, a quality that used to be admired among academics. The past year has reflected negatively not on my father, since the past 18 years prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is and always has been an exemplary employee, but rather this controversial year has revealed the true nature of the college's new administration.

What exactly has this year revealed? It has shown--at least to outward appearances--that at MSCS, faithful employees of almost two decades should expect no reward or appreciation for their hard work. They should expect no respect for their rights. They should expect no understanding of their individual concerns. It shows that to the current college administration, the pushing forward of heavy-handed, one-size-fits-all, top-down rules and agendas, the enforcement of absolute conformity, and the removal of any form of dissent to the orthodoxy of the moment are more important to the college than the quality of instruction, the good of students, or the consciences of employees. Just like with certain political positions evident even during my time at MSCS, any form of dissent from the mainstream COVID policies is simply not allowed. Where is the tolerance, to which the college pays lip service in its Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion statement? Where is the openness to differences of opinion or background? Where is the respect for individual rights? Where is the pursuit of truth? Are these no longer values that matter to the college? There was a time when universities and colleges were champions of such concepts.

Cardinal John Henry Newman once wrote,

A university training is the great ordinary means to a great but ordinary end; it aims at raising the intellectual tone of society…It is the education which gives a man a clear, conscious view of their own opinions and judgements, a truth in developing them, an eloquence in expressing them, and a force in urging them. It teaches him to see things as they are, to go right to the point, to disentangle a skein of thought to detect what is sophistical and to discard what is irrelevant (my emphasis).

This is the ideal that those of us in education (I speak as a teacher myself) should be striving for. I hope it may be so for MSCS.

These criticisms are meant to be constructive, and I am not insensible to my own debts to MSCS. I sincerely thank the college for all the good it has done for my father and our family over the years. For employing him, I thank it. For providing me with educational opportunities, I am genuinely grateful. These words, therefore, come from a place of concern for my father and the college. I hope that things may be different in the future for other employees who may express genuine concerns over college policies. I hope that they may meet with a more responsive, humane, respectful, and intellectually honest reaction than my father has--for the good of the college and of our public discourse in general.

It is remarkable how easily one person or group of people--often with the best of intentions--may dismiss someone else's effort of 18 years. But as G.K. Chesterton wrote, "Don't ever take a fence down until you know the reason it was put up.” Let us hope that eliminating this particular support beam for the school has no more ill-effects than those we have already witnessed. Yet I fear it may not be so. We err if we underestimate the influence of one good man and the ill that may come of his removal.

But what's done is done.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

etc.