For the Sake of Truth and Clarity NuLeadership Responds to President Pollard’s Message

Medgar Evers College of the City University of New York (CUNY) was named after a slain civil rights hero and Black leader who spent his life fighting for the rights of all people  to be included in the economic, social, political and educational mainstream of American society without bias or prejudice.  The college that bears his name was founded to provide higher educational opportunities to the underserved urban populations of Central Brooklyn and beyond.  Since its inception, Medgar Evers College (MEC) has been true to that mission.  One of the ways it fulfills its mission is in the creation of centers within the college, which concentrate on specific population groups or academic disciplines: for example: the Center for Women’s Development or the Center for Black Literature. 
One of the centers at MEC, the six-year-old Center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions, has been singled out for attack, severe criticism and special treatment.  Ironically, and perhaps coincidentally, this center focuses on the population of students who have been formerly incarcerated but are now seeking to turn their lives around through the acquisition of a college education.  For the past several weeks, there has been a continuing controversy between the Center for NuLeadership and the college’s newly appointed senior management staff, led by President William L. Pollard, Vice President Lloyd Blanchard and Provost Howard L. Johnson, over the legitimacy of the Center for NuLeadership and its funding.  President Pollard referenced these issues in the July 8th issue of Our Time Press. It is imperative that we clarify and provide background information on these issues.
In “Summer News from Medgar Evers College,” Dr. Pollard writes about a funding grant proposal submitted by the Center for NuLeadership in January and the fact that “Provost Johnson received the [funding] proposal in May 2010 and raised in writing a series of questions reflecting the college’s legitimate concerns.”  To be clear, there was no grant proposal submitted in January.  The Center for NuLeadership was solicited by the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services to begin a series of negotiations on a Court 2 College grant that would provide formerly incarcerated people with an opportunity to attend college. The proposal to which President Pollard is referring, is a draft proposal and the Center for NuLeadership attempted to meet with the president for several months to discuss the proposal.  Furthermore, the Center for NuLeadership was provided with the provost’s questions related to the proposal on the same day that President Pollard sent a message re: nonresponse to questions on the proposal to the college community. 
The college’s senior management team has used the request for authorization of the proposal as a basis for questioning the legitimacy and status of the Center for NuLeadership. The funding proposal has nothing to do with our application to be approved as a center.  By mixing the two, the president has given the impression that the Center for NuLeadership is unwilling to cooperate with the provost.  Nothing is further from the truth. 
In April 2009, at the request of MEC’s former president, Dr. Edison O. Jackson, the Center for NuLeadership – with the assistance of the college’s legal counsel – submitted a formal written proposal to be recognized as a center within the college.  The proposal was presented to the Medgar Evers College Council, the highest governing body within the college, and approved by a unanimous vote.  The College Council instructed the former Provost to forward the proposal, with their recommendation for approval, to the CUNY Office of Academic Affairs, for final ratification by the CUNY Board of Trustees.  This was never done.  Provost Johnson, with the approval of senior management, has still refused to forward the approved proposal.  Instead, he has drafted a series of questions and demanded that the Center for NuLeadership answer them before he forwards the proposal. 
Simply put, the provost has decided to supersede the authority of the College Council and CUNY Central by disregarding the established CUNY guidelines for the establishment of centers and creating his own prerequisites for approval.  The Center for NuLeadership has no objection to answering the provost’s questions, and will.  However, it firmly maintains that the proposal should not be subjected to any additional prerequisites or requirements not asked of other centers, nor should its application be held hostage pending answers to these additional requirements.  The College Council, not the provost, is the governing body of the college.  It has already voted approval of the proposal.  The provost cannot now impose further requirements and ignore the College Council’s mandate.
For over six years, the Center for NuLeadership has operated at Medgar Evers College with absolutely no problems.  We were assigned an account with the Research Foundation of the City University of New York (RF), in the name of the Center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions, for purposes of funding, payroll and other expenses.  We have received extensive funding opportunities for the college and have always been self-sufficient in covering the costs of our staff, operations and programs. There has never been any question or issue with any of our grant proposals.   We have always followed CUNY rules and regulations to the letter and have always complied with any and all of the “legitimate concerns” of the college to secure approval for these funds.
While the controversy focuses on the Center for NuLeadership, its outcome has broad implications for all of the Centers in the college and for the relationship between the College and the Central Brooklyn community.  The centers were established to serve both the College and Central Brooklyn Community.  When the college interferes with the governance and programmatic issues of the centers, this negatively impacts the community.  Will the new managers of the college adhere to and respect the rules governing the college or will they continue to attempt to create their own rules, or change the college’s rules when those rules do not suit their purposes? 
Based upon our six-year history at Medgar Evers, there are no reasons why the Center for NuLeadership’s proposal should not be sent to the CUNY Office of Academic Affairs immediately.  There are no prerequisites involved. Sending our proposal to CUNY does not require approval of anyone at the college beyond the approvals already secured.  Finally, there are no reasons why the president and the provost should not welcome the work that the Center for NuLeadership is doing as opposed to trying to curtail it.
Dr. Divine Pryor, Executive Director
Center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions
 Mr. Eddie Ellis, Deputy Director
Center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions

Toward the Student-Centered College

2010 marks 40 years since the founding  of Medgar Evers College in 1970.  Under the leadership of Edison O. Jackson, the school has created nationally known centers such as the Center for Law and Social Justice, the Caribbean Research Center, the Center for NuLeadership on Urban Solutions, the Ella Baker/Charles Romain Child Care Center, the Center for Women’s Development and the Jackie Robinson Center for Physical Culture.  The construction of the Academic Science Center and earlier this year achieving the status of a full-funded CUNY four-year institution are other testaments to his tenure.
Now under the stewardship of  President William L. Pollard, we asked what are the greatest challenges he faces after only five months on the job.  The president was hesitant to speak of particular difficulties, saying the job is “Everything I expected, plus some.” 
Asked about the challenges of the incoming class, Pollard says the students in the new class as well as those already attending, “affirm my thinking” regarding his defining goal of Medgar Evers College being “the leading student-centered school in the CUNY system.”   He says that the decisions he’s making in terms of personnel or the physical plant, are in line with that student-centered vision.  “I want us to be first and foremost a college that is pro-student.” and that changes are being made “not necessarily to benefit faculty or staff, but to benefit the students.”
The first example he offers is that “in order for the campus to be more student-centered, it has to be more technologically efficient than it has been.”  In order to achieve that, “We have to have a chief information officer who can help us make better decisions about technology to bring our software and hardware more closely aligned with the needs of the students.   The technology we have now is not well-thought-out and it’s not of benefit to students or faculty and administration.  The technology hire is designed to help students, first and foremost.” 
Another hire will be a chief financial officer with the title Assistant Vice-President for Finance, to deal with a legacy financial system that he finds cumbersome.  “We currently have a structure that has the president making virtually every financial decision in the college.  And while the president is responsible for the decisions made, if I have to buy robes for the choir, or popcorn poppers for the gymnasium basketball games, when do I have the time to reflect on what the needs are for the institution more broadly?  I have to get away from the nickel-and-dime decision-making.  The only way I can do that is to put the financial house in a kind of order and direct it in a way that allows for greater decision-making at the unit level.  It’s at that level that student needs are taken into greater consideration.” 
Pollard will also be hiring an assistant vice president for the physical plant, so that decisions can be made and projects can move forward without the direct involvement of the president’s office. 
As part of his student-centered vision, President Pollard opens his office to students on Friday afternoons and Tuesday evenings.  With this procedure, “I get to hear firsthand what the students are concerned about.  As a result, there are things that I’m able to pass on to faculty and staff that allows them to be much more responsive and supportive of students.”   Pollard explains that “if we’re going to ask students to take classes on Saturday and Sunday and in the evenings, we have to have office hours to answer the needs of the students.  That’s student-centered.”
The president makes clear who is in charge of the school. “Student-centered does not mean student-run.  It means we have to be responsive to students, and give them direction so that they make decisions with care and forethought.”  Some of those decisions involve how students dress and behave and he mentions that, “At Morehouse, the president has told the young men they can’t wear baggy pants or do-rags.  At Lincoln, the president has decided that the university has to take more responsibility to help the students make better decisions on what they eat.” 
Rather than issue an edict, President Pollard has chosen to engage the students in dialogue about their future and the steps they need to take to get there.  “I’ve had a couple of town hall meetings with students and engaged in conversations on what students ought to look like and how they ought to behave if they’re going to be Medgar students,” and while the president has not established a formal dress code at Medgar Evers College, he is  challenging the students to begin reflecting more about their appearance and their roles as young men and women as they move into the future.
President Pollard is very protective of his students and bristles at the fact that “We’ve heard people talk about ‘nontraditional’ students.  I don’t believe we have nontraditional students at Medgar, we have students, who for reasons of the economy, for reasons of age and circumstance, have to take non-traditional means to get a college education.
“They may not enter right after high school.  They may enter college with family and personal obligations that make their road to a degree longer.  taking 5,6,7 8 or 9 years.”   This contributes to lowering the school’s graduation rate, but not for any failure on the part of the school or student.
One example he speaks of is a student in the biology department who is studying the nervous system of shellfish.  In the course of that research, he’s seen that magnesium has a negative effect on the nervous system of human beings, causing Parkinson Syndrome-like hand tremors.  “In some people, it is not Parkinson’s but an overabundance of magnesium in the body.”  This student’s research is looking at how to manipulate the amount of magnesium in the body to control tremors. 
“This young man is 28 years old.  His mother and father had a difficult divorce.  He dropped out of school 8-9 years ago so that he could help his mother take care of his siblings and himself.  Is this a nontraditional student, or a student taking a nontraditional path?  He never lost sight of what he needed to do and he’s now a biology major who will graduate next year.”
Asked if the building boom at the college was over for a moment while he concentrates on other issues, President Pollard says, “We are not finished with the building boom.”  Pollard expresses a deep appreciation for the amount of work, patience and willpower that Dr. Jackson exerted in bringing the new buildings into being on the MEC campus saying, “I understand what it took politically and personally to reach this point and that it represents a 10-12-year effort”  and yet he said, and he was sure that Dr. Jackson would agree, “The college needs that space again.” 
“We are not finished with the building boom and we’re still light years away from where we want to be technologically.” 
High on his list is the need for a student center.  A place with meeting rooms, food franchises, student government offices and a comfortable location for students to sit and talk between classes.   “When you drive by the school and see students out on the street, it’s because we need a student center where the young people can congregate.”  And again, this is part of  his student-centered vision.  “Any building boom has to include a plan for total student development: spiritual, mental and physical.”  Along with the student center, Pollard insists there is a need for a field house and playing field as well.   He feels that those who think that intramural sports are not integral to higher education miss the learning experiences inherent in sports and that the social skills learned on the soccer field are useful in the boardroom.  “Young people learn how to lead, how to work in teams and are prepared to work in structured environments such as the society presents.” 
“I want my legacy to be that Medgar becomes the leading student-centered college in the CUNY system.  One marked by students who know and believe they are the most important thing at the college.  It will be reflected in the way we treat them, reflected in improved graduation rates, reflected in the office hours for faculty and staff,  and in the way students are accorded courtesies and conveniences in the evening and on weekends.”