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In that tweet re: university reopening, I spoke about the "lie of normalcy" as being sold to students.
This is true: every reopening plan I've seen has been predicated on the lie that the semester and the college experience will resemble the "normal experience." (1/n)
This is true: every reopening plan I've seen has been predicated on the lie that the semester and the college experience will resemble the "normal experience." (1/n)
Where the "normal experience" includes regular campus activities, face to face classes, traditional lectures, and all the community activities that accrue around the mythoi of "the college experience."
None of these are possible under current pandemic conditions. (2/n)
None of these are possible under current pandemic conditions. (2/n)
In fact, social distancing guidelines ensure the absence of the normal. Pep rallies, convocations, welcome back activities, student affairs programming, are all impossible or must be severely adapted due to the pandemic.
This is what admin failed to tell students. (3/n)
This is what admin failed to tell students. (3/n)
Now, I say "failed to tell students," when I should really say "actively lied to students."
The assumption that campus would open "as normal" except for social distancing, regular testing, and mask policies, is a lie. There is absolutely nothing normal about this. (4/n)
The assumption that campus would open "as normal" except for social distancing, regular testing, and mask policies, is a lie. There is absolutely nothing normal about this. (4/n)
And yet, administrators (and some faculty, tbh) pressed on as if the additional guidelines were additions to, and not significant reorientations of, the "normal." They built an entire reopening structure on the LIE that we'd have "fall semester + COVID-19 adaptations." (5/n)
Admin built an entire reopening structure on the LIE that hastily cobbled together and ill-thought plans would be enough to allow for a "normal opening" in abnormal times, and they persisted in believing this lie even in the face of all evidence contrary. (6/n)
Then the admin took that lie and presented it to the students. They offered up the like of "business as usual," or a "return to campus as a return to normalcy" to coerce student into a situation they knew was unsafe. And then they LIED about the nature of student needs. (7/n)
And they did so to justify their own lies about the necessity of reopening campus. Let me be clear about this: student desires to return to campus are based on an assumption of a normal campus experience, an assumption administrators sold to them. (8/n)
Then, in some cases, the assessment industrial complex quantified student needs based on the lie sold to students by administrators via student surveys.
Of course student survey results will say students want to come back IF you lie to them about the "normal." (9/n)
Of course student survey results will say students want to come back IF you lie to them about the "normal." (9/n)
Of course students (and parents) will push for reopening if you offer mealy-mouthed support for online education without actively making clear the difficulties faced last spring were due to the sudden nature of online transitions. (10/n)
Now, I'm not saying all this to speculate on the reasons for pushing this lie and the toxic positivity that accrues around it: I'm saying this to make clear the kind of "world" that makes possible all the "bad decisions" that students are being blamed for. (11/n)
Put simply: if admin sell students the lie of normalcy, you get students who act as though the lie is the truth. When they act as though the lie is the truth, they're not making "bad decisions," they're making normal decisions in line with that lie. (12/n)
Moreover, if admin sell students the lie of normalcy, knowing full well that students are craving that normalcy, craving the stability that a "normal college experience" can offer, admin are preying upon the fears and trauma of their students. (13/n)
Now, we might ask that students to be conscious of the consequences of their actions, and that's fine. However, we're asking them to do so in the context of a world structured by a collection of lies, lies which make developing that consciousness much more difficult. (14/n)
Especially since that consciousness would likely lead to demands for remote education and comprehensive training to provide the best remote experience possible. It would force admin to rethink the operation and organization of their institutions. (15/n)
But that's a broader point. The main thing is this: heaping the blame on students for acting inline with a lie that they've been sold for months is missing the point.
We need to blame the people who sold them that lie in the first place. (fin)
We need to blame the people who sold them that lie in the first place. (fin)
