In a paragraph from part 1, Colleague Stein wrote:
On Fri, Mar 1, 2013 at 10:23 AM, Bernard Stein <bstein@hunter.cuny.edu> wrote [on the College Listserv known as Hunter-L]: In a post on Hunter-l, Prof. Gregg Morris asserted that Hunter’s journalism curriculum is not meeting the challenges posed by the migration of news to the Internet.
Actually, I wrote that the program was deader than a Dodo.
Tell Students the Truth – Part 1
Thursday, February 28, 2013 9:16 AM[Edited for Style]
There aren’t enough expletives in the myriad languages spoken on this campus to describe the debauching of the Department of Film and Media Studies.
The perversion is reflected in the demise of the best digital journalism-media network for undergraduates at the City University of New York, brought about by the sadistic treatment of the systems administrator who created it, and the image of HC-Five-O removing that (former) staff member from a department meeting at the behest of the Department Chair.
That gutting of the network, plus the abuse of and sadistic attacks on the administrator, and Colleagues’ near unanimous and enthusiastic support of those actions, provide an excellent view of a profound ethical morass. No more ICIT support for this department by directive of the Chancellor’s Office because of the sabotaging of the network and the abuse of the network administrator. This sordid state of affairs is also conspicuously reflected in the significant dumbing down of the journalism effort, AKA the Journalism Concentration.
Breaking Out the Snake Oil
D:F/M Great Minds will break out the snake oil and resort to more subterfuge, smokescreens, smoke n’ mirrors and outright lies to persuade students that this academic waste dump with its bottomless pit is a Princeton Review oasis deserving of their increasing tuition and fees.
Its digital journalism-media footprint at the City University of New York has been reduced to an embarrassing stub.Students should be told the truth so that they can make informed decisions about their studies and careers.
A real journalism effort plus that network could have been resources to attract outside funding opportunities and not just for journalism. Not that there were ever other Colleagues seeking outside funding for D:F/M students but the potential was there, the door was opened. I know that because of talks with organizations that fund undergraduate and graduate journalism programs, such as the Tribune Foundation. There were more.
D:F/M dementia has killed off those possibilities.How many departments at this campus have Colleagues trying to shoot down undergraduate funding opportunities, such as a Ford Foundation Grant for multimedia ethnic journalism. No one with brains would dare think that such moronic efforts don’t reverberate in grant funding circles. There are more examples.
Bye-bye digital journalism. Bye-bye digital media. The most recent journalism curriculum proposal? Pathetic. It reads like a plan to reduce already dumbed down teaching loads (which has always been a major agenda in this department). Will D:F/M become the poster child making Pathways look like a breath of fresh air?
The D:F/M TV Studio
The department a while back was given a substantial sum of funding to develop its antediluvian TV studio? Granted, there was no discussion of developing a strong digital journalism effort with that resource but the promise was there. And the result? Students should know that that project is as dead as the department’s undergraduate curriculum. There are still snickers about it at department meetings.
[Note to students: My full-time Colleagues and I still get paid, nevertheless, thank the gods.]
[Some might recall The Great Minds’ collaborating with the Student Liberation Action Movement years ago to – this is absurdly funning now but not funny then – try to take over the WORD. “We’re gonna’ tell you what you can publish,” said a PSC Hooligan before she was chased out of this writer’s office.]
The assassins – faculty and the staff ¬– continue to receive high-fives and ovations despite the debauching of academic principles and the existence of a D:F/M animus, profoundly bigoted if not racist, that exerts considerable influence in this department. MATL.
Kinky Torture Porn Sites
The conspicuous, sadistic abuse of the former system administrator became obvious after he shut down, on orders from ICIT 57th Street, the Kinky Torture Porn Sites nestling on the D:F/M network. There was almost unanimous D:F/M umbrage by Colleagues over the shutting down of the KTPS but hardly a syllable uttered as the network and the network administrator were being savaged.
Student staff members dispatched to invade his office to steal personal items? Despicable. Intervention by the Chancellors Office, fortunately for the systems administrator, resulted in a measure of surcease for him but nothing for students who are now shortchanged. That definitely was not a Princeton Review moment. MATL.
D:F/M has the self-anointed doyennes and doyens of Academic Freedom and union member comradery. What have these Colleagues been doing as this ethical morass has burgeoned? The PSC Hunter College Chapter Chair resides in this department. Enough said.
Staff coerced to feed parking meters? Profane. Colleagues filing bogus Violence in the Work Place complaints? Equally profane and litigiously provocative. Yet, there are Colleagues ready to argue that what goes on in D:F/M goes on in other departments. That moronic thought for many justifies D:F/M debauchery.
Did the Great Minds take into consideration that the demise of the ICIT supported Internet network could result in serious implications for D:F/M’s IMA/MFA program as well? Unless, of course, D:F/M Great Minds decided that a truly antediluvian graduate program was in the best interests of its grad students.
What Lies in Store for Students
[Imagine this s a D:F/M recruiting poster: “Enroll in our graduate program so that you can step back in time.”]
How should undergraduate students be advised in light of this enormity? Obviously, some will see the handwriting on the wall and flee without needing to be told. What will D:F/M do to staunch the flow ? Staunch the stampede? Lie, lie, lie that there isn’t a flow, nor a stampede.
What about students trapped by circumstances in a program devaluing undergraduate education, and Colleagues using the ferocious animosity against Pathways to cloak more debauchery. Should students be aware of academic decisions influencing their careers and lives? Hell, yes. MATL.
Reiteration: Will D:F/M become the poster child making Pathways look like a breath of fresh air if not divine intervention? MATL.
Nevertheless, students interested in journalism should know that the titular head of the Journalism Concentration can be contacted here, bstein@hunter.cuny.edu. As for the rest of so-called concentration majors: Good luck.
Edited for style
See Part 3: Wrap Up