Students For Academic Freedom To Office of Student Development: Give Us an Up or Down Verdict

We’ve blogged about attempts of the Marquette chapter of Students for Academic Freedom to get recognized as an official student organization at Marquette.

As of last semester, officials in the Office of Student Development had made it clear to the student group that their Constitution, as written, was not acceptable. But no official verdict had been forthcoming.

Now, the organization is putting the student affairs bureaucrats on the spot by demanding an up or down ruling.

The following is an e-mail sent just this morning by the President of the organization:

From: Rickert, Charles
Sent: Mon 1/22/2007 12:13 PM
To: McCarthy, Mark; Kusiak, Katherine
Cc: Neumann, Kelly; Dooley, Jon
Subject: Students for Academic Freedom: Letter of Determination

Office of Student Development:

At your earliest convenience, the members of Students for Academic Freedom request an official determination of either acceptance or rejection by the Office of Student Development. In a previous meeting, it was stated that formal decisions are communicated through written letter. In the event of rejection, the reasons for refusal would be clearly articulated.

Students for Academic Freedom has demonstrated considerable student interest in the organization while affirming that our mission and constitution are well within the realm of rightful student organizations at Marquette University. As such, the members of Students for Academic Freedom chose to retain its original constitution for the Office of Student Development to review.

On behalf of Students for Academic Freedom, thank you for your time, effort and careful consideration. I look forward to receiving the official judgment.

Best regards,

Charles

Charles Rickert
Students for Academic Freedom

Students for Academic Freedom is a conservative student organization, that has as it’s objective to criticize leftist bias in university programs, speakers series and courses.

One cannot imagine the OSD bureaucrats minding the Gay/Straight Alliance criticizing Marquette for being insufficiently “gay friendly.” One cannot imagine they mind if the Black Student Council complains about the lack of “diversity” and demands more affirmative action hiring, more “diversity” requirements in the curriculum and more scholarships limited to black students.

So quite clearly student groups that intend to criticize Marquette and its policies can get recognized and supported by the student affairs bureaucrats.

But they are in the business of recognizing and supporting politically correct demands coming from politically correct victim groups. Letting conservative students speak is an entirely different matter.