The Macalester Board of Trustees granted tenure to Terry Boychuk, the embattled sociology professor who faced an investigation into allegations of sexual harrassment.

President Michael McPherson announced the trustees’ decision in a two-paragraph memo sent to the entire faculty on Tuesday, April 23. {more}

President Michael McPherson announced a new structure for multicultural affairs at Macalester two weeks ago in a report shaped by input from a large and diverse group of students, faculty and staff. {more}

Many Macalester students had a pleasant surprise when they made their ways across Grand Avenue last Thursday. Instead of the usual game of making eye contact with the drivers, waiting for the cars to slow and then dashing across the street, they were greeted by two, brand-new, mid-block crosswalks. {more}

Beginning this semester, divisional deans at Macalester have been phased out. In their place will be the Center for Scholarship and Teaching (CST), which officially began this spring. {more}

For the past two weeks, the Strategic Directions Implementation Task Forces have held community meetings to publicize the work they have accomplished over the last year. Community members are invited to provide input in decisions that will have a profound effect on the future of the college. {more}

MCSG passed three resolutions relating to the Judicial Forum process and the fact that The Mac Weekly did not print last week.

The first criticized “all members in the judicial forum process who breached the confidentiality of process, by producing documentation about the proceedings to The Mac Weekly, or any other source.” {more}

Israel is essentially in a state of war. But if all goes as planned, this will not deter a group of faculty, staff and students who will venture into northern Israel for the fourth annual trip to Macalester’s archaeological dig site. {more}

Two years ago, Macalester signed its name to the Talloires Declaration, an endorsement to create an environmentally sustainable campus. A group of environmental studies majors are reviving the issue, which has received little attention since the signing. However, they say that the administration is continuing to offer little support.

The Talloires Declaration has two major goals: to create public awareness of a need to move toward an environmentally sustainable future, and to implement steps at Macalester to bring that future closer. {more}

Haris Aqeel ’04 was elected President of the student government on Thursday, April 18. An international student from Pakistan, Aqeel emerged as the clear favorite in a four-way race, receiving 477 votes, or 57 percent of the vote. Jimica Dawkins ’03 received the next highest number of votes, at 181 or 22 percent. A sophomore, Aqeel is the youngest person to be elected president of MCSG iN recent memory. The current president, Nick Berning, and the preceding three presidents, were elected as juniors and served their terms as seniors. {more}

Press freedom is democracy

“All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently the first condition of progress is the removal of censorships.”
-George Bernard Shaw

“Our liberty depends on freedom of the press and that cannot be limited without being lost.”
-Thomas Jefferson

“Freedom of the press is not just important to democracy, it is democracy.”
-Walter Cronkite

On Wednesday, at a convocation honoring the four professors who have received tenure this year, Provost Dan Hornbach spoke eloquently about the importance of tenure for the preservation of academic freedom. Tenure ensures that professors can introduce new and controversial ideas into their classrooms without fear of repercussions. Without the freedom to try new things, Hornbach accurately stated, we could make little progress in the academy. The American Association of University Professors’ statement on tenure states, “Institutions of higher education are conducted for the common good and not to further the interest of either the individual teacher or the institution as a whole. The common good depends upon the free search for truth and its free exposition.” {more}

Abercrombie & Fitch sells racism with T-shirts

By ASIAN STUDENT ALLIANCE

Abercrombie & Fitch began promoting a new “multicultural” line of clothing last week. However, these T-shirts fell short of this goal and in effect displayed offensive stereotypes of Asians and Asian Americans to the mass market. The T-shirts, which retailed for $25, showed cartoonish slant-eyed Asians in conical hats with the slogans, “Wong Brothers Laundry Service: Two Wongs Can Make it White” and “Pizza Dojo. You love long time. Eat in or Wok Out.” One shirt also portrays a man pulling a rickshaw with the phrase, “Rick Shaw’s Hoagies and Grinders. Order by the foot. Good meat. Quick feet.” Due to these insulting depictions, young Asian Americans across the nation launched protest against Abercrombie in order to let the company know that consumers and Asian Americans will not tolerate this form of stereotyping and racism. {more}

How major is your major?

By HARLEY HENRY

In “Making decisions: Choosing a major and living up to a moment,” (From the Lilly Pad, March 15) Sarah Turner raises questions central to the college’s discussion of its “strategic objectives.” And at the heart of Sarah’s essay is the problem which every college like Macalester, and its students, faculty and staff, must necessarily confront: how does one get an education? {more}

Indulge me, if you will, while I ruminate a bit. This isn’t the traditional Mac Weekly opinion piece-I’m not pursuing an argument. Instead, I’ll offer some rambling reflections on the Macalester community.

Terry Boychuk

There never should have been a scandal. Beginning by at least last spring, allegations about Professor Boychuk made it to members of the faculty and the administration. These allegations, though, never made their way to the Dean of Students or the college’s grievance officer for students, Joi Lewis. There must be procedures in place to ensure that allegations that arise are reported to the appropriate officers. In the absence of these procedures, we’re likely to see a repeat of what happened on March 8: students raising allegations publicly because they perceive that the college has ignored the allegations-or worse, covered them up. {more}

This past Tuesday, MCSG passed several very important resolutions. However, we would like to draw attention to one in particular. Regardless of the veiled language used in this particular resolution, it remains clear to informed readers that the three-part resolution (passed by a margin of 11-9) is a condemnation of Professor Terry Boychuk’s actions this Thursday past. We apologize ahead of time to anyone who may feel we have misrepresented the facts of the situation, but it merely reflects just how uninformed we are as a community about this situation, as well as illustrates how inappropriate it was for us to pass judgment. {more}

Underclasspersons may not know about the “pillars” metaphor that Macalester used to promote. A few years ago, Macalester was saying it had four pillars: academics, internationalism, multiculturalism and community service. Now that’s changed to core values or something, we don’t really know. But for the purpose of this editorial (and the great visual aid to the right), we’ll be using the pillars metaphor. {more}