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Berquam aims to keep her job
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Interim Dean of Students Lori Berquam said Thursday the current recruitment and retention rates of minority students at the University of Wisconsin is a "crisis."
The statement came during the second of three student forums to help UW officials decide on a permanent dean, and was in response to a line of questioning from UW senior and MultiCultural Student Coalition member Jennifer Knox.
According to Berquam, UW's student-retention rate is a problem, and she spent time addressing the specific concern of the retention of minority students.
"A student can leave here and never be touched by anyone," Berquam said. "They can leave here and never have a conversation with anyone about why they're leaving."
That admission wasn't enough for Knox, however, who said she prefers Northwestern University's Timothy Gordon, who is black, over Berquam, who has held the position on an interim basis since the summer of 2005.
"If [Berquam] were chosen, I'd be disappointed," Knox said. "I was here at [Gordon's] session, and I thought that we [saw] a very strong candidate who had a lot of fresh ideas."
Despite the criticism, Berquam spoke with great familiarity of UW, where she has spent almost 12 years of her career in higher education.
"I have a strong passion for [being dean]," Berquam said. "I believe in students; I believe in this experience."
Other UW students who attended the forum voiced concerns about campus safety, student-retention rates and shared-governance opportunities.
Berquam said the opportunity for students to contribute in decision-making at the administrative level is one of the things that make UW special.
"When you look across the nation, shared governance is unique to here," Berquam said. "We are empowering our students to have some fantastic experiences — we're able to offer students a variety of different experiences and opportunities."
Berquam said she also recently asked for a security summit to address campus safety issues.
"I think we're evolving to being a big city, but we still like to think of ourselves as a small town," Berquam said.
According to Berquam, UW needs to re-evaluate how safety issues are dealt with, and begin a different type of dialogue. Although she has initiated discussions with Madison and campus police, she said there is more work to be done.
Recent UW graduate Mike Manuel, who helped screen dean of students candidates, said discussion is a great start but is not enough. Manuel said an elaborate plan could be written for anything, citing the long-range diversity initiative Plan 2008, but said if nobody is held accountable for the plan, "it won't amount to much more than words."
Gordon, who is currently associate dean of student services and registration at Northwestern University, spoke with students in a similar forum last Thursday. The third candidate, Rutgers' Brian Rose, is scheduled to speak in Madison Monday.
UW sophomore Stella Luong said Gordon set a high bar in his forum last week. She said Berquam did well in fielding student questions but said she was looking for more "tangible, proactive" goals.
Berquam acknowledged more action could always be taken, but said that action stems from dialogue.
"I think dialogue is one step, and then you have to move beyond that to formulate action," she said. "I think [dialogue] involves students. I think that involves staff, and it involves faculty."
Beyond the discussions she has initiated surrounding campus issues, Berquam said she has a great passion for her work.
"I really do try to lead with my heart, and I try to be attentive to being real with people," Berquam said. "I want you to be real when you leave here."
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Why does Knox get to use this as a megaphone?
"A student can leave here and never be touched by anyone," Berquam said. "They can leave here and never have a conversation with anyone about why they're leaving."
Leaving school probably has little to do with race (and probably a whole lot to do with ‘touching’). A student can blame it on ‘race’ or a number of other things, but ultimately individual start to believe the administration and what authorities tell them they need. “Ah, you’re a minority, you need to join a support group.” The thought of administration getting into the business of labeling and classifying people based on race and other arbitrary factors is scary.
Does anybody remember watching the short film “Cipher in the Snow”? made back in the late 70s?
Knox needs to learn to control herself. Was your point to make Lori cry last night? She really has worked hard … think about it everybody.
People need to learn to voice their opinion in a respectful manner. Attacking Berquam at this open forum was completely inappropriate. Perhaps immaturity from certain MCSC members is the reason ODOS doesn’t make an effort to meet with you. Get off your soap box and suck it up-this is UW-Madison in WISCONSIN.
Thanks for only interviewing MCSC students, BH. They have it out for Lori because she thinks there are important issues OTHER than solely diversity issues…shocking!
DEAL WITH CAMPUS SAFETY. JESUS CHRIST. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?
Look, kids, it has been thirty years since I graduated, and I can assure you of one thing: no one knows how to college educate black folks, least of all black folks themselves.
Harvard, the smartest dudes around, have abandoned “affirmative action” (i.e. help downtrodden American blacks) out of sheer frustration.
They were totally unable to beg, borrow, buy or steal enough smart blacks to equal their percentage in the US population.
Instead, they chucked “affirmative action” and any sense of obligation to American blacks and replaced it with “diversity”. Under “diversity”, they get to import blacks from all over the world to get their percentages up. After all it is color that counts. It doesn’t matter if those blacks are American ex-slaves or not. As long as your racial percentages are good, who cares?
Wisconsin might do the same thing. Forget the Core in Milwaukee, forget the projects in Chicago. Go straight for Africa and cherry pick the few real smart ones down there.
1:23AM— You touched on something important. While I was an undergraduate at the UW, all of my black friends were either foreign students (mainly Nigeria), or their 2nd generation. In class discussions, they constantly being asked to give their “expert” opinion on affirmative action, or how they made it out of the ghetto, or how they became so “well-spoken.” This was most irritating for them, to say the least…. Felt like saying, “just like any other international student gets to be well-spoken, dipwad.”
Truly, skin color is totally irrelevant, except for the administration and a handful of political/social science classes.
Berquam has done an AMAZING job here at the UW all while limited by an interim status. How soon we have forgotten the days not so long ago when Luo Luo Hong WAS the news. Under Berquam’s watch, the DOS office has rallied FOR the students not FOR self-promotion.
what i’ve read so far on the comment page seems to sound like none of the other commenters care what the higher education experience is like for students of color because they are white. is that right?
well, that’s unfortunate. because higher education is one of our most classist institutions in this country, therefore, one of our most racist. it also happens to be the main way for people to better their socio-economic position in society and achieve that “American Dream”.
never have so few taken so much for so long…thanks to people like you.
If Berquam has been in the job for a year and a half and there is “crisis” that she doesn’t already have a program in place to deal with—she really is not being proactive for students.
Her career has been largely at Madison and she lacks the necessary depth of experience and background knowledge to become the permanent dean of students.