The Communicator
The Voice of Pensacola State College Faculty Association
Lurking: Big Brother in the Cyber Classroom
In Philip K. Dick’s Minority Report, a special police unit has the power to arrest people before they
commit crimes. Their special ability comes from the ability to lurk into the minds of people who may
transgress against state laws. The state knows what the transgressor will do before the transgressor knows,
and, apparently, the state doesn’t approve.
It seems we have the same thing here at PSC. Administrators have recently been adding themselves to
your online classes to make sure you’re not doing anything wrong. The purpose? As one administrator
said, she needs continual, constant access “to verify or
disprove students’ claims regarding their work and
communication efforts in an online course when they are
complaining about grades.”
Of course this verification is done constantly, without
your knowledge and without your consent. But what do
you have to be worried about?
Should you be worried about your supervisor standing
in the back of your classroom watching each of your
lectures, judging each act of communication, approving
or disapproving of what you say and how you say it?
Yes.
Such snooping has a chilling effect on learning because teachers may feel that they need to monitor
their thoughts and communications to ensure the administrator can take no offense. Put another way, the
teacher is less likely to speak freely for fear the class observer, who is an outsider, will misunderstand the
context of remarks.
So, do you have a supervisor who is uncomfortable with evolution? Don’t talk about it.
Do you have a supervisor who holds a political ideology different from yours? Don’t interpret anything
to offend that ideology.
Do you have a supervisor who holds a religious belief different from yours? Don’t go there.
What a poisonous atmosphere for academic values. Here are the origins of the thought police and of all
the big brothers and sisters behind it. They are routinely lurking (an Internet term for reading someone’s
material surreptitiously) in your online classes without your consent.
(See Big Brother on page 4)
Page 1
Spicer defers comment on Web-course restriction
Academic Vice President Erin Spicer has
declined to comment on the college’s new policy
of assigning no more than one online class per
semester to full-time faculty.
The Communicator sent Spicer and General
Studies Dean Brenda Kelly several questions
about the policy earlier this month.
“While I appreciate the offer to respond to
questions and concerns, the administration has
already begun to address issues and questions in
a variety of ways and we plan to continue
disseminating information though our own
channels,” Spicer replied.
PSC President Ed Meadows told the Pensacola
News Journal in a story published Sept. 15 that
the “majority of our students are enrolled in faceto-face classes, and we need our full-time faculty
face-to-face and available to our students on our
campuses.” He added that “the union…wants
faculty to be able to teach most of their classes
online and do their office hours online and
doesn’t want faculty to be required to be on
campus.”
Unfortunately, Meadows mischaracterized the
Association’s position and, in so doing, appeared
to devalue distance learning at PSC. Aren’t Web
courses equal in value to traditional ones? We
think online classes should be assigned to those
with the most experience and success in their area
of instruction.
Here are the questions and concerns that Spicer
declined to address for now:
1. Is it not true that online classes often fill
first and have greater demand than most
traditional classes? Instead of opening
new sections, do not some administrators
try to place students in face-to-face
classes
that
don’t
fit
their
schedules? How do you respond to the
suspicion that the college is neglecting a
growing demand for online classes?
2.
By restricting full-timers to only one
online course, what is the college
implying about distance learning? That
teaching online is easy and, thus, a perk
that must be distributed evenly? That
somehow we can better trust online
classes to adjuncts (who are likely to be
teaching for other colleges too) than to
(See Spicer defers on page 4)
The Communicator is a monthly journal of opinion and news published by the Pensacola State
College Faculty Association. Unsigned articles do not necessarily reflect the opinions of individual members of the
Communicator editorial board. Members do agree, however, that all articles merit inclusion because of their value in
maintaining informed discussion about college affairs.
The Communicator regrets any errors of fact and will correct them as soon as possible. The publication also welcomes
the opinions of those who disagree with us. We will strive to present fairly the comments of our critics. Lengthy
comments may be edited or issued online.
Editorial Board members are Thom Botsford, Todd Neuman, Julie Ruengert, and Mitzie Sowell.
Consulting Editors are Paige Anderson, Charlotte Sweeney, Blaine Wall
Page 2
Student Paper Still Needs Full-time Advisor
Meadows asks faculty for help after year of turnarounds
It’s back to square one in the search to find a
permanent adviser to The Corsair and other student
publications at PSC. More than a year after the
resignation of the full-time adviser to the student
newspaper, the college is still trying to write the job
description for a replacement.
The Faculty Association has objected to the fulltime job for Student Publications Manager now being
advertised because it requires the successful applicant
to teach two classes per semester without officially
joining the faculty.
On Oct. 6 President Ed Meadows asked a group of
faculty members to propose a solution that will please
both the administration and faculty who work with
publications.
English Professor Thom Botsford, a Corsair
adviser from 1986 through 2002, agreed to consult
with faculty and Association officers and make a
recommendation. Dr. Meadows said he would review
relevant budget data and schedule a meeting for
further discussion.
The move comes none too soon for The Corsair,
which has seen four different temporary advisers in
the past year. Indeed, one could make the case that the
college has mismanaged The Corsair during this
period.
First, when publications manager Mike Ensley
resigned in the fall of 2014 to accept another job, the
college refused his offer to remain temporarily as
adviser. PSC then left the Corsair staff with no
professional help for several weeks before assigning
the job to an English adjunct with no journalism
experience. The students that fall published one
poorly edited newspaper.
Ironically, they also published a story online that
made an impact. It was a brief report about a small
group of faculty members who had expressed “no
confidence” in the Meadows administration—a sign
of things to come, since the PSC faculty a few weeks
later would express “no confidence” in Meadows by
a vote of 125-7.
Upon publication of the Corsair story, a lawyer for
the college wrote a letter to the Faculty Association,
notably copied to The Corsair, maintaining that
faculty had no right to voice opinions on matters still
being negotiated at the bargaining table. It demanded
that all such communication end.
Attorneys for the Faculty Association and the
Student Press Law Center, however, were quick to
point out that the college’s lawyer was in error, he
should have known better, and that the opposite is
true: Faculty and students do have a First Amendment
right to comment on matters of public interest.
A journalistic Web site, InsideHigherEd.com,
publicized this incident in an embarrassing story that
Dr. Meadows, we suspect, regrets. From the vantage
point of some students and faculty, the
administrator’s efforts to suppress critical speech did
not bode well for real journalism or The Corsair.
The paper was revived several weeks into the
spring term after the college hired English teacher
James Hagan, a former Corsair editor, to serve as
part-time adviser. Hagan and his staff published
(See Corsair on Page 4)
Corsair deserves an end to turnovers
The Communicator October, 2015, Volume 31, Issue 6
Page 3
(continued)
several issues that were big improvements over the
fall paper. He left abruptly in June, however, when his
temporary contract ended.
Hagan offered to remain even without pay to assist
the staff on its fall issue, but PSC refused him. It then
turned to Botsford and asked him to advise the paper
until the fall term began. Finally, in early September,
the college named yet another adviser, English
Professor Paula Ingram.
Big Brother (Continued)
Administrators may argue that there is nothing
menacing about this. They may argue, “If you’re not
doing anything wrong, then what do you have to
worry about?”
Well, they inevitably take it upon themselves to tell
you what you should consider menacing or improper.
They judge your actions, your thoughts, and they
determine what’s right or wrong.
Our contract, like most contracts in academics,
prohibits surveillance for just those reasons. Here is
what article 6.05 of the CBA says: The College agrees
that security cameras and other surveillance
equipment will not be used to record or monitor a
faculty member’s performance of his or her
professional duties without the permission of the
faculty member.
Without such protections, we lose the capacity to
teach new, sometimes challenging thoughts because
we simply won’t speak them—knowing, as we do,
that the thought police are lurking.
The Communicator October, 2015, Volume 31, Issue 6
Dr. Ingram, who has a degree in journalism, has
indicated that she would be willing to continue as
Corsair adviser, but she needs better compensation
than the three overload hours she is currently
receiving for editorial assistance to the paper.
All of this turnover has severely challenged the
students on staff, as often they find themselves with
too little leadership, support, or training.
We hope a full-time replacement will be at work
as early as January. The students deserve no less.
This lurking is not the same thing as an in-class
evaluation. That is done with your consent and it
is not constant.
The Association hopes the administration will
stop this lurking without our having to file
another grievance or another lawsuit.
Spicer defers (Continued)
our own professionals who have
developed effective online materials and
accumulated years of experience?
3. We note increased competition from
UWF, Troy, the University of Phoenix,
Capella University, and even St. Leo’s. Is
PSC conceding online classes to other
colleges? Have we forgotten that online
enrollment has increased at PSC in times
when other areas were flat or losing
enrollment? Instead of working to
increase online enrollment, is the college
actively downplaying or restrictingit?
Page 4