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(04/15/20 5:35pm)
The following letter was co-signed by 23 Middlebury students and emailed to all Middlebury faculty on April 14. It has been lightly edited in accordance with The Campus’ style guidelines.
Deans, department chairs, faculty,
We write to express our concerns with Professor Priscilla Bremser’s motion to change Middlebury's grading policy to a credit/no credit system this semester. Our aim is to offer some perspective on the importance of maintaining grades. Our reasons are as follows:
I. Any binary grading system introduces new inequities in spite of its efforts to eliminate others.
Consider the student who worked diligently the first five weeks of the semester. Mandatory credit/no credit now puts her on par with the student who slacked off. This is an inequity introduced by the proposed change.
Consider the student who had a rough first year. Like many students, she learned to manage the difficulties of college academics during her first year and that yielded undesirable grades. Now she needs as many semesters as possible to improve her GPA. Mandatory credit/no credit disadvantages her relative to students who had stellar first years, already have high GPAs, and do not need every semester thereafter to improve. This is an inequity introduced by the proposed change.
II. We view grades as a fundamental underpinning of college scholarship. The quest for a high mark inspires quality. On campus or off, Middlebury’s mission is to develop students of rigor and wisdom. Evaluations are a central part of that mission, and the distribution of grades reflects different degrees of engagement.
Furthermore, grades currently serve as one of the few sources of motivation for maintaining routine during a period of crisis. Revoking grades will reduce academic engagement among students driven by the prospect of reward. Online learning already decreases the quality of our education in spite of our professors’ best efforts. In a time where many are desperately seeking engagement, preserving the one incentive that brings out the best in students seems essential.
III. Opt-in respects choice, including the choice of students to try to overcome obstacles. The administration already has a solution that works. It gives students ample time to decide whether their condition merits pass/fail. Overcoming hardships should be a Middlebury value, not an anti-value. Why should we assume students cannot persevere? Students may reflect on this semester as a time in their lives in which they overcame difficulty. Let them write their own stories. Any additional effort to mandate pass/fail as a “one size fits all” is overreach and diminishes the value of this semester.
Professors will tailor their courses to meet the spirit of the times. A biology professor’s judgement on how to best do that may not reflect a political science professor’s. Instead of mandating compliance with a binary system, grant each professor the opportunity to meet the challenge of the day in a manner they deem sensible.
We recognize that we write this letter in good health. If any one of us were to become sick, the college already has an instrument in place (the pass/fail option) to assist us through our ailment. If one of us were to exercise that option, we would never expect the college to force our classmates to do the same.
To that end, Middlebury ponders how it can help students handle stress. In our view, it has already done its job in delivering us the option to manage our own.
IV. Since the college announced its policy, students continue to operate under the assumption that they will receive grades. A late proposal to impose a single binary on everyone, contrary to our expectations, is itself disruptive. If the faculty wanted to act, it should have acted immediately when school closed, not weeks later. Students have already made sacrifices to preserve their grades. Their interests should be considered. Come May, students currently leaning toward the pass/fail option may determine a quality grade is within reach. Allow them to decide.
Recall that the previous Student Government poll included three grading systems, including the implausible dual A/A- policy. In truth, Middlebury is considering two live options. As such, we encourage faculty to ignore polls with little insight to offer.
Middlebury students are comparing their current academic experience with hometown peers’. It is in our interest that those comparisons reflect Middlebury’s continued effort to deliver an academically fulfilling semester.
The college has an obligation to deliver an education that empowers students to engage — for many of us that includes grades. For many of us, that is what we believe we are paying for. Stripping students of grades raises serious concerns about Middlebury’s commitment to academic freedom, a principle outlined in the college’s handbook. Even off campus, we know the product we signed up for. Honor that.
We recognize that questions of how grades will affect departmental honors, Cum laude and other distinctions will inevitably arise. Let that debate be handled another day.
No grading system will satisfy everyone’s needs. What we do know, however, is that our current system encompasses the widest array of interests. While some of our peer schools have adopted binary grading systems, many fine institutions have not. We urge you to lend serious notice to our arguments and vote to reaffirm the college’s current grading policy.
Wishing you good health,
Quinn Boyle ’21.5
Jack Brown ’22
Rati Saini ’22
(02/20/20 10:57am)
As students who have been actively involved in and have benefited from Alexander Hamilton Forum lectures, debates and dialogues, we write to set the record straight and defend deliberating on the Green New Deal.
First, we believe the Hamilton Forum is the most politically and philosophically diverse program on campus, both in terms of the speakers it hosts and the students involved. Since its inception in 2018, the Hamilton Forum has hosted the world’s leading Marxist economist, Richard Wolff; the editor of the foremost magazine of the American Left, Michael Kazin; a lion of the civil libertarian left and the first female president of the ACLU, Nadine Strossen; and Harvard professor and clerk for Justice Thurgood Marshall, Randall Kennedy. The Hamilton Forum has also hosted several speakers on the political right, like New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, as well as speakers from the political center, such as former Clinton domestic policy advisor William A. Galston.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]Political diversity is not a bug, but rather the most impressive and beneficial feature of the Hamilton Forum.[/pullquote]
On Thursday, Feb. 20, the Hamilton Forum will host Manhattan Institute Senior Fellow Oren Cass and economist Robert Pollin, the latter of whom has actually designed Green New Deals for states like New York and Washington. This political diversity is not a bug, but rather the most impressive and beneficial feature of the Hamilton Forum.
In a recent op-ed entitled “We don’t need a Koch sponsored Green New Deal,” two students wrote that debates like the one happening this Thursday challenge “progressive ideals.” “The speakers don’t have to disprove every argument as long as they can plant doubts in our heads,” the authors wrote. “By hosting the debate, the organizers of the forum choose which questions to ask, therefore reinforcing and normalizing discourses that question climate activism.”
To us, this sounds like education. We think that challenging ideals, raising doubts and normalizing questioning is what good educators do. Shouldn’t we “normalize” the questioning of all political viewpoints, including both climate activism and opposition to climate activism? In fact, this would make a good, aspirational motto for our campus. “Middlebury College: Normalizing questioning since 1800.” Put it on the stationery, sweatshirts and key chains.
It is also puzzling that someone would suggest that the Hamilton Forum cherry-picks “questions to ask.” Does anyone really believe that it is the Hamilton Forum that determined the Green New Deal should be a topic of public and academic debate in America in 2020? It is important to discuss the hotly debated issues of our day, and we certainly believe that the Green New Deal is one of them. Also, as anyone who has attended Hamilton Forum events knows, the hosts leave a long amount of time for unfiltered student questions, and those questions come from students of every persuasion. Afterwards, speakers stay behind to continue discussion over dinner, which are some of the best out-of-the-classroom intellectual experiences we have had here at Middlebury.
Some maintain that the Hamilton Forum takes direction from outside sources. This is demonstrably false. As the list above indicates, no foundation or organization could possibly see the Hamilton Forum as its mouthpiece because the diversity of speech is so vast. You would need to be a Marxist, populist, libertarian, nationalist, neo-liberal, socialist, anti-traditionalist, Catholic, anti-populist, traditionalist and centrist to see the Hamilton Forum as your mouthpiece. We have never met any such individual.
The Hamilton Forum receives grants from external foundations just like many other programs on campus, and it operates with complete academic independence, as is evident in what we have said above. Additionally, anyone who wonders whether the Hamilton Forum’s director — Political Science Professor Keegan Callanan — is susceptible to political pressure should review his record of standing on principle and speaking his mind, even as a non-tenured professor back in 2017.
[pullquote speaker="" photo="" align="center" background="on" border="all" shadow="on"]Challenging ideals, raising doubts and normalizing questioning is what good educators do.[/pullquote]
Those who speak of “Koch funding” for the Hamilton Forum leave out a key factual detail. The Hamilton Forum’s grant from the Institute for Humane Studies is funded by the Clifford S. Asness Family Foundation’s Free Speech and Open Inquiry Program, with no grant funds from the Koch family. Why do the editorialists never mention this fact? Could it be that they realize it may “put doubts in our heads” about their narrative?
The broader principle regarding gifts and grants to Middlebury is that there should be no political purity test. A purity test barring donations on the basis of a donor’s political views would be out-of-step with Middlebury’s stated commitment to political diversity. It would be discriminatory. It would be a great way to alienate a substantial portion of the alumni donor base. Middlebury should no more discriminate on the basis of political viewpoint in its acceptance of grants and gifts than it discriminates in its admissions or (let’s hope) in hiring new professors.
Middlebury is not a political campaign. We are a learning community, and we are here to ask important questions together, to be challenged, and to challenge ourselves.
Akhila Roy ’20, Joey Lyons ’21, Quinn Boyle ’21.5, Max Taxman ’22, Maddy Stutt ’21.5 and Rati Saini ’22, are 2019–20 Alexander Hamilton Forum fellows.
If you would like to attend Hamilton Forum events and dinners, you can sign up at go/joinAHF.
(10/03/19 10:05am)
Vendors from all over Addison County congregate in Middlebury every Saturday for the Middlebury Farmers Market (MFM), with vendors selling an assortment of products including poultry, dairy, seasonal produce and crafts, accompanied by live music. The MFM is open outdoors every Wednesday and Saturday morning from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. from May through October at the Veterans of Foreign Wars post on Exchange Street. It moves indoors during the offseason.
The MFM works in collaboration with the Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA), an association committed to certifying local farms and processors to the USDA National Organic Program Standards. According to their website, NOFA “promotes organic practices to build an economically viable, ecologically sound and socially just Vermont agricultural system that benefits all living things.”
NOFA’s goals are carried out through various means. Paige Wener, a farmer from Green and Gold CSA (community supported agriculture), described the work she does and her interaction with NOFA. “Green and Gold is a farm and coop that primarily grows fresh produce and raises chickens,” she said. Some of the fresh produce on hand at the farmers market this weekend included various leafy greens, broccoli rabe and seasonal root crops.
Green and Gold CSA also has honeybees on its property and holds spiritual retreats and special events, including harvest dinners during the fall and taco and tubing nights during the summer. Green and Gold is also a certified organic CSA that abides by “no till” and “low till” farming practices, where the disturbance of soil is kept to a minimum. Green and Gold pursues many of NOFA’s goals by participating in subsidized programs for low-income families. The Vermont Farm to Family Program is one such program, which offers coupons to needy families valued at $6 for produce; in return, Green and Gold receives reimbursement from the state. Crop Cash, a similar program used by other vendors, provides families with an EBT card with extra money to be spent on fresh produce.
Two other vendors at the Middlebury Farmers Market, Foggy Meadow Produce and Windfall Orchard, have both employed students from the college in years past. Foggy Meadow Produce, located in Benson, Vermont, is a small farm with just two full-time employees, and a few part-time, seasonal employees. They are open to the public and offer tours showcasing their equipment, heat tunnels and natural farming practices. Foggy Meadow only grows fresh produce, but they are able to stay open all year by using indoor heat tunnels. “Now that our fall crops are coming in, it’s time to harvest our roots and put them in our coolers and cellars in which we have space for 30,000 pounds of produce,” Foggy Meadow employee Janice Burton said.
Windfall Orchard, a three-acre orchard located in Cornwall, Vermont, boasted several of its 80 varieties of apples this weekend at the MFM, including MacIntosh, Spartan and Twenty Ounce Pippin. “This week we have Bartlett pears and some new apples, like Hitchcock, a heritage variety with a pinkish interior. The Blue Pearmains and Honeycrisp are also new,” said James Kipp ’19.5, an employee at the orchard.
Windfall Orchard also features an on-site tasting room with farmhouse and iced cider, as well as hard cider, open every Sunday afternoon from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m.. They are open every weekday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. for picking and hold markets in Middlebury and Burlington every Saturday.