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"Unvarnished." (Phi Beta Cons)
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(Rate Your Students)
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except that Maureen Dowd is kind of a wrecking ball of a writer,
and Soltan isn't. For the life of me, I can't figure out her
politics, but she's pretty fabulous, so who gives a damn?"
(Tenured Radical)

Sunday, June 25, 2006

More Santa Cruz Reaction
to the Chancellor's Death



'Today in San Francisco is the annual Gay Pride Parade and Celebration. My mind whirls at the craziness of it all - our openly lesbian chancellor may have been going through a break-up of her seven year relationship. Her mother said she had been depressed about work and personal issues. I know she had a rough landing at our little campus, with lots of bickering about her salary (too high, they said) and the whole town gossiping about the dog run she had built at her campus home (we don't allow dogs on campus) because it - supposedly - cost twenty thousand dollars. And a couple of weeks ago she was surrounded by a group of angry protestors as she left a meeting. They surrounded her car and made it difficult for her driver to manuever out of the small back parking lot. She was no doubt scared, but she decided not to bring judicial action against those students.

Who knows what demons, fears, illnesses she was wrestling with? Ours is a harsh community, and I've seen many staff and administrators beset by angry faculty, staff and students, who make the issues extremely personal. I don't know if the nasty reception she received played a role in her depression. Probably we will never know. I just hope that people come away from this with a renewed sense of compassion and kindess towards one another. I'm still reeling from this news and can't imagine how awful it is going to be to go to work on Monday morning. Many people in my office worked fairly closely with her. There are going to be a lot of heavy hearts, and dazed and confused minds.'