Something is seriously wrong at PCC

6:10 PM PDT, April 6, 2013

My husband read part of the editorial of the Pasadena Sun to me (“The ridiculous impasse at PCC,” March 24). It made me feel ashamed to be a faculty member of PCC. Is this how anyone associated with PCC wants the community to perceive the faculty of this school? What kind of college can this be if the faculty is immature and greedy? Whoever gave the paper reasons to come to such conclusions clearly does not have the best interest of the school and students in his/her heart.

I have stopped teaching summer school and winter session for years because I feel those positions should go to the part-time faculty. I have no personal gain whatsoever from the winter session. My opinion of this administration has nothing to do with money.

My experience with this administration has been such that I withdrew all my efforts in shared governance activities and have avoided any function where I may come into contact with administrative personnel. My involvement here on campus has changed from frequently attending the Board of Trustees’ meetings to having not attended one in three years. My service to the community has been shifted entirely to direct service to the students. The vote of no confidence without a question demonstrated that I am not alone. Can 90% of the faculty all be teaching winter/summer session and thus cast that vote based on financial greed?

The repeated shameless use of the media for self-interest and destroying the reputation of this institute in the process is the last straw that broke my silence in the community for the past three years. This act alone should blast off an alarm like a nuclear bomb in anyone’s mind that something is seriously amiss in the administration at PCC, which comes off in the media as the victim of unreasonably greedy faculty. Enough is enough.

Ling O’Connor
Pasadena

Editor’s note: The writer is an environmental science professor at Pasadena City College.

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http://www.pasadenasun.com/opinion/pas-0330-sun-editorial-had-it-wrong,0,2234321.story

The Sun editorial of March 24 (“The ridiculous impasse at PCC”) sounds like it’s been written by the president of PCC himself — or a journalist that goes exclusively to his private press conference on March 20 but fails to mention any of the grievances on the three-plus pages given at the faculty-student press conference the week before, or the speech made at the board meeting that he attended, at which faculty and students came together to share the 92% faculty vote of no confidence and the Associated Student government resolution of censure and no confidence in the administration.

What has been “tearing the campus apart” has hardly been a labor contract, but rather mismanagement of college resources, lack of shared governance, a preponderance of unilateral decision-making that is now detrimental for students to transfer their courses to universities, and an element of fear at PCC for those 800-plus part-time faculty and all staff, whose jobs can be cut at any time for any reason. The bottom line is the board of trustees are accomplices in everything that has happened at PCC since Mark Rocha, the college president, got here — they were the ones to cancel the winter [session] without looking at any data to inform their decision and now PCC is struggling to recoup the lost students and Prop 30 state funding.

The PCC Courier is much more attuned to what is going on at PCC, as is the Pasadena Weekly and even Pasadena Star-News. The fact that early this week, in all PCC faculty and staff emails, was waiting this very editorial from the Pasadena Sun, courtesy of the PCC administration, is an indicator to me that the PCC administration and the Pasadena Sun are very much aligned. I recommend its readers also look to other sources for more balanced reporting, which is precisely what I will be doing.

Editor’s note: The writer is an assistant professor of languages at Pasadena City College.