Section A03
The readings for this week tie into the theme of the week, the
“Corporatization of the University,” because they explain how universities, are
beginning to operate more like major corporations, as evident in the recent
years. The readings explain how students in the UC system, struggle for their
campuses to prioritize their education over political acts that hide major
problems on their campus. In many cases, UC campuses would rather hide issues they
may have instead of losing money or even having a negative image of themselves.
People put in higher positions, like admin, often consider what is best for
them personally, instead of considering the students and their education, the
original purpose of their job. An example of this is how the UC Davis was
caught trying to hide their misappropriation of funds in A Tale of Two
Campuses: Berkeley and Davis Respond to Occupy Movements, by Alan Markow,
and Whistleblower: Police, by Amy Block Joy. In Whistleblower,
Amy Block Joy writes about how a person, that has worked in the UC system for a
long time, is conflicted with staying silent or reporting what is an obvious
act of injustice. She fears losing her job along with the respect of her fellow
employees. Protests broke out, but since they were held at Davis, the students
were demonized in the situation. A similar incident happened at UC at Berkeley,
but since protests are more prevalent there, students were glorified and were
looked at more positively. In Ethics and Breaking Bad, Amy Block Joy
writes about how the idea of teaching people ethics in the workplace might
prevent situations like this from happening. This also relates to the theme of
the week because if these type of classes were to work, universities would
begin acting less as corporations and more toward catering students’ needs.
Personally, there are things at UC Davis that I disagree with. The UC system
charges international students an outrageous amount of money, for no real
reason. Actually, they even have prices that are too high for in-state
students. I pay the same price for housing, as my friend, who has a
non-functioning air-conditioning system in his dorm. Though there have been
protests regarding the cost of tuition being too high for students, people with
selfish intentions are put in high positions and if there’s not a way to fix
that, it will never be fixed.
Question: (To Prof Valverde): How many protests were you
involved in within your college experience?
Media:
I chose to include this image because it shows how
students protest against corruption, even in India. It reminded me of how
students protested against their universities in the reading. This shows that this
is not an uncommon thing in the academic world and it is something we need to
fix worldwide.
References:
Alan Markow. “A Tale of Two Campuses: Berkeley and Davis respond
to Occupy movements.”
Amy Block Joy. “Whistleblower: Police.”
Amy Block Joy. “Ethics and “Breaking Bad”: Developing and
practicing ethical skills.”
(n.d.). Retrieved April 23, 2017, from https://cryptome.org/info/india-protest/india-protest.htm
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