Should Katehi Resign?

Too lazy to figure out how to change profile name from this very old account. I'm Kerry Enright, Assistant Professor, School of Education, UC Davis. Many thanks to the comment asking for my name-- didn't realize it was absent!

I attended today's rally on the Quad, and was incredibly impressed by the students at our university. They are poised, committed, smart, thoughtful, and disciplined. Their responses to police violence at UC Berkeley were peaceful and powerful when they demonstrated on our campus last week. Their responses to the police actions here at UC Davis on Friday have been equally disciplined, thoughtful, and powerful.

I attended the rally to support these students. I wanted the victims of the police attacks to know that my colleagues and I, their professors, were with them in solidarity, horrified by the use of violence against them. Moreover, I wanted these young people to be HEARD... not as victims, but as demonstrators who were gathered on the Quad with their tents on Friday because they have something important to say, and no official venue to say it. Today, I wanted them to KNOW that they were heard.

Unfortunately, their reason for camping on the Quad is being lost amidst calls for Chancellor Katehi's resignation, and this saddens me. And the thoughtfulness that has pervaded so many of these student rallies is being lost amidst efforts to vilify Linda Katehi. These young people were upset before they were pepper-sprayed. They were upset about rising tuition and recent moves to privatize the University of California. They were upset that this university, whose purpose was to educate California’s youth, is being privatized in ways that will deny access to many of California’s talented hard-working young people. The shift in focus to Linda Katehi makes for more dramatic media soundbites, but it doesn’t move the students’ agenda forward, or get their larger complaints addressed.

When Linda Katehi first joined UC Davis as Chancellor, I was not happy about her presence here, because I sensed that she represented this move towards privatization. After she met with faculty in the School of Education, I was even less enthusiastic about her presence here. Her focus, like that of most UC leaders these days, was on “income generation.” The dominant narrative is that the state legislature, and the public, have cut education funding so severely that we cannot continue to provide a quality education unless we find alternative funds. When I asked the Chancellor how we, whose research and teaching focuses on the poor, the immigrant, the disenfranchised, could be expected to continue this mission FOR PROFIT, she had a pat answer that did not sit well with me or many of my colleagues. I would rather see us examine the premise behind these “privatization” efforts-- the premise that the university and its mission of access for Californians is no longer the responsibility of the state and the public. I would rather see us challenge this premise more publicly, and consider how we got here in the first place. This is what the students have been DOING while I have just been whining about it over cocktails with friends and colleagues.

If Chancellor Katehi resigns, then many students and faculty members will have a brief moment of feeling empowered. We acted, and made this happen. We removed a leader whose poor judgment resulted in harm to students. Someone will have been held responsible. My sense, though, is that there is potential for real change with Chancellor Katehi. I know that her hands and tongue must be tied right now, bound by university attorneys who don’t want her to choose words that might indicate culpability that costs the university millions of dollars in lawsuits. But she showed up today-- knowing that she would be heckled, knowing that she would likely be publicly shamed, she showed up, and took the stage even after public calls, moments before, for her resignation. She apologized, took responsibility to whatever extent the attorneys will let her, and acknowledged that she needed to earn students’ trust again. If Chancellor Katehi resigns, UC Davis will have a time of transition, with unknown leadership. Momentum will be lost. We will fade from the media’s attention, and I fear much of the ground that students gained this weekend will be lost. If Chancellor Katehi stays, she can demonstrate that she has learned-- from her mistakes, from our students, from the memories of the tragedies in Greece in 1973. She can get to know her students, respond to their concerns, and engage the full campus community in ways that just might generate new creative responses to the UC crisis. Sending the police to our students the same week as the UC Berkeley incident was irresponsible. I suspect she realizes that now. Hers was not the animal-like aggression demonstrated by the two officers who sprayed students. Hers was the ignorant behavior of extreme privilege. If she resigns, she will be replaced by someone of equal privilege, someone who has not been humbled by such a grave mistake. Privilege blinds us to our power, but it does not necessarily make us evil. Chancellor Katehi’s blinders are off now. I suspect she has an entirely new understanding of our students, our campus, and police intervention today. In fact, I’m sure of it, since there were no police officers in uniform at today’s rally.

I have had several humbling life-changing experiences in my lifetime. Each experience changed my world view, my purpose, my ways of interacting with others, my approaches to wielding power and dealing with my own privilege. I know I still have blinders sometimes, and I will continue to be humbled, to learn, and to grow. I would like to have someone smart, committed, and humble as our Chancellor. Linda Katehi might be our best chance at that. Why not give her that chance?