Harvard knew all of this when they appointed them to the post years ago. Was Harvard incompetent then in your opinion?
Or is it instead more likely that professors doing consulting work is just normal and accepted behavior?
Most professors put their teaching and students first. They dont get into conflicting situations and Harvard expected as much. Sullivan was obviously unable to do that as a house dean
Au contraire. Most Professors at R1 Unis put their research first (and second and third).
How do you know that H did not actively recruit Sullivan and his wife (along with other URMs) to be a House Dean? If so, they knew with certainty that he defended plenty of bad guys (and gals).
@Collegedad, your daughter (and the other students) didn’t have those principles when they decided to attend? They knew who Harvard employed. The principle they are espousing now is called entitlement.
Thr last time I checked if someone works three jobs, its perfectly legal and their call. To some a sign of being a hard worker or at least, versatile.
How do we know he’s not paying for his wife’s parents long term care facilities or college costs for extended family?
Or just finds the work interesting?
Or wants to open a pro bono legal service for low income families?
Questioning motives are what one might see as highly judgmental and extremely intolerant.
Just because a child attended a school doesn’t mean they are incapable of an error.
What principle are they exactly standing for? That it is ok to be personally disrespectful because someone, totally within his rights, represented someone you don’t like. I would be 100% in favor of any student demanding an audience, singly or as a group, with Sullivan to explain their disappointment/discomfort with the course he chose and ask why he took on this engagement in light of his role as Dean. That is being principled. If they chose to completely boycott the ceremony because they felt betrayed, I might even respect that as a gesture. Usually when we say someone acted on principle, it is associated with an action that required sacrifice of some kind to get across a point. Instead they cried to the Administration, stomped their little feet, and got to fully participate in the ceremony while thumbing their nose at Sullivan and Robinson. Yeah, way to go.
The principles they are standing up for is it is important to stand up for women who have been victimized by sexual assault and sexual harassment. They stood up for the metoo movement. I guess in the end they turned out to be better advocates than Sullivan . In the legal field one of the cardinal rules of advocacy is not to “overreach”. I think Sullivan learned something about overreaching. Hopefully he remembers. My D did have those principles when she decided to attend as did most of her friends. Remember its the students paying the professors salaries not the other way around . Also the largest use of the endowment funds is to support the students not to support a professor who is only interested in research.
I’d be fine if they boycotted the ceremony at Winthrop too but that’s not what they did. They wanted it changed, they wanted to participate but under their terms, they wanted someone else to give the diploma and shake their hands…
Many of the sport teams (or players) are choosing not to go to the White House to celebrate. That’s their choice, but they can’t ask to still go to the White House and have an alternate presenter, to have the meal but not take a picture with the host.
There was really no lesson learned except that you can’t control everythig.
The way it works at Harvard is they have a mass graduation with thousands of people and world renowned speakers.
Each house then has a graduation where they hand out the diplomas and say a little something about each graduate.
The host is not the dean of the house. It is a celebration for the graduates and the giving to them of their degrees. It is all about the graduates not about the dean
It is so true you cant control everything but you can try. “God grant me the courage to change the things I can”
I would have hoped that by the time they were graduating, students would have learned the world doesn’t revolve around them. The consumerist culture is in full display here- students are paying the prof salaries so they should bend to the kid’s will? Well, at least we can see where the students get the entitled attitude.
No, but s/he is the one that actually gives out the diplomas.
They didn’t boycott the ceremony. I would have had absolutely no issue if they chose to boycott. But that is not what happened. They went to the ceremony under their terms - that someone other than Sullivan/Robinson hand them their diploma.
Go to the ceremony. Don’t go to the ceremony in protest or because you’re hungover or whatever. Sing Kumbaya outside Winthrop for all I care. It’s no skin off my butt. But for a student (or group of students) to dictate the rules/procedures of the ceremony??? I’m comfortable calling them snowflakes, and I generally don’t use that term because it’s insulting to Frosty the Snowman. So I think that I am neither “insulting” nor “morally wrong.” Those students, however one feels about the grievances, were rude to the Faculty Deans, the other Winthrop Seniors and the guests. In my opinion, of course.
Even though it’s difficult, I have to wonder if any of these snowflakes even tried to secure an Interhouse Transfer or attempt to execute change from within or do anything other than jumping on the bandwagon in April.
“The principles they are standing up for is it is important to stand up for women who have been victimized by sexual assault and sexual harassment.”
This type of argument and extension of guilt by association is exactly one of the reasons why this country is so divided and dysfunctional currently. I don’t care if it is the left or the right, people immediately cloak their position or action with an unassailable virtue, making anyone who disagrees with them automatically “bad” even if the position/action in debate is just tangentially related to the virtue. Unless you are a misogynist neanderthal, who doesn’t agree that we need to stand up for and support women who have been victimized and harassed.
The origin or motivation of all of this was students feeling “unsafe” and uncomfortable with a dean that was on the defense team of a reprehensible person. I don’t believe that there has been any claim that Sullivan has sexually harassed anyone, covered up any instances of sexual harassment/assault or even cultivated an environment of misogyny at Winthrop. Let’s get it straight, the student protesters’ motivation to remove Sullivan had to do with a feeling of discomfort and distrust of someone who was willing to defend someone symbolic of sexual harassers and predators in general. Got no problem with that. Whether it was appropriate for Harvard to take action and not renew Sullivan’s deanship is a much more complicated question of balancing this interest of certain students with other principles that a university the caliber of Harvard (or any legit university) should uphold. I have my opinion but totally respect that others may balance the equities differently. But let us not fool ourselves into thinking that these kids are “martyrs” for a just cause. They pouted, Harvard bent and allowed them to dictate the rules and procedures as Ski mentioned. Wrong lesson learned imo.
Harvard is changing slowly over time. It still has a lot of the good old boy private school kids who wind up in finance and who populated the final clubs. But it also now has David Hogg and Jaclyn Corin who want to be voices for social change for the betterment of the future. David Hogg has been viciously attacked. I am sure he has been called a snowflake repeatedly. Change and social justice are really hard for some to accept
^^better hope that they get assigned to a House that does not have a Dean who is a member of the NRA, or is a strong supporter of the ‘right to bear arms’. 
David Hogg proactively meets with NRA groups and supporters in an effort to find common ground and to discuss their differences. So far, those meetings have been productive and positive. He goes out of his way to engage with all protesters at rallies to attempt a positive dialogue across the political spectrum. In short, he does what these Harvard students utterly failed to do. Maybe he can teach them something. Jacqui can too. A remarkable young woman who understands rational dialogue, much more mature than these Harvard kids.
It is rude and awful and their parents should be ashamed. Don’t go to the ceremony if you have an issue.
David Hogg was responsible for having 27 broadcasters leave a Fox News show.
One of his comments is “if you dont make your voices heard in the real world nothing will change”
He also offered his “thoughts and prayers” to the NRA after the Russian spy who worked with the NRA plead quilty. Yes roycroftmom i do think David Hogg can teach the Harvard students something.
Off topic, @collegedad13, but what do Fox news employment policies have to do with anything? Hogg never asked that they be fired. He requested a boycott of a show when a Fox employee made an inappropriate remark about him, which apparently worked. How that station handles their employees is not within his control. And a measure of limited sympathy to the NRA seems wholly appropriate. Neither act shows the entitlement or immaturity of the college students demanding control over a graduation ceremony they willingly participated in. In any event, thankfully those kids have left Harvard now, so maybe it will improve.
Let’s move on from David Hogg / Fox News / etc., please. AFAIK, he has expressed no PoV on the Ronald Sullivan situation, so there is no need for an off-topic discussion.