McMinnville
N-R/News-Register Nov. 19, 2020
At their fall meeting last week, Linfield
University trustees agreed to sign a code of conduct and join faculty and staff
in undergoing annual training about sexual misconduct, Title IX regulations and
discrimination.
“Each trustee must be a person of unquestioned
integrity, at all times recognizing you represent Linfield,” the code of
conduct says.
It orders trustees to “maintain the highest
standards of conduct, collegiality and care.” In addition to their fiduciary
duties to the school, it says they must maintain “policies and practices to
prevent inappropriate behaviors and address future allegations in a manner and
at a time that does not interfere with legal or policy requirements of
Linfield.”
It says officers of the university “are
responsible for reporting any perceived or alleged inappropriate conduct,
including such that falls short of an official policy violation.”
The code of conduct also stipulate the process
for reporting and investigating allegations of misconduct, whether it is of a
sexual or financial nature or another type of alleged violation.
The code of conduct was developed following
investigations into accusations of sexual misconduct by a former trustee, David
Jubb, and allegations that other trustees and school officials looked the other
way.
Jubb resigned from the board in May 2019, three
months after being accused by a student of touching her under her clothing. He
is scheduled to go to trial in Yamhill County Court Monday, March 22, before
Presiding Judge Cynthia Easterday.
Now 71, the Vancouver, Washington, man is
charged with one felony count of first-degree sexual assault and seven
misdemeanor counts of third-degree assault. He also was accused by three other
students, who said he touched them in May 2017.
In announcing results of the November trustees
meeting, Linfield President Miles Davis noted, “the weight of decisionmaking
leaders must carry is never heavier than during times of great anxiety and
uncertainty.”
He noted that 2020 carried “a significant amount
of anxiety and uncertainty,” including repercussions of the coronavirus
pandemic, elections, wildfires and “our own change from Linfield College to
Linfield University.”
As of July 1, the university officially consists
of a College of Arts and Sciences and schools of business and of nursing.
Linfield’s in-person classes were closed and
students and faculty switched to distance learning in spring because of the
pandemic.
The McMinnville and Portland campuses reopened
to students in August with strict safety protocols, including smaller classes
and social distancing. Students are returning home today and will finish the
semester and testing online.
In addition, trustees at their November meeting
agreed to change the name of a campus street currently named for A.M. Brumback,
a science professor who served as president of the school from 1903 to 1905.
About 1900, he “engaged in desecration and theft
of burial artifacts and human remains from Native American burial mounds,”
trustees said. The university is inventorying those and other artifacts so they
may be repatriated.
Trustees will consider a new name when they meet
in February.
The Board of Trustees also passed a resolution
saying the university will officially observe the Martin Luther King Jr.
holiday each January, and that members of the Linfield campus be encouraged to
perform community service that day.
Another resolution approved by the board says
leaders of the university’s schools of arts and sciences, business and nursing
be involved in decisionmaking for their schools.
#
Notes from Wildcatville:
1--Also see, “Board of Trustees November meeting updates”
which were “Posted on November 16, 2020 by Kathy Foss” and was a “Message sent
on behalf of Miles K. Davis, President of Linfield University” at this URL
link: https://www.linfield.edu/linfield-news/bot-nov-updates/
2—N-R story above includes, “In addition, trustees at their
November meeting agreed to change the name of a campus street currently named
for A.M. Brumback, a science professor who served as president of the school
from 1903 to 1905.” President Davis’ message about Brumback says he, “served
briefly as president.”
In 2014, Wildcatville blog (http://wildcatville.blogspot.com/2013/10/100-candles-on-linfield-football.html)
wrote “Coach of the Linfield teams for its first five seasons (1896-1900) was
A. M. Brumback. If his name seems familiar, it's because there's a Brumback
Street … on campus near Linfield Football's Maxwell Field. However, the street
honors not his football, gymnastics or track & field coaching at Linfield.
It's because he was the college's president, 1903-05. Some information about
Brumback calls him ‘Arthur Brumback’ or ‘Arthur M. Brumback.’ For the record,
his full name was Arthur Marion Brumback.”
IN 2008, Wildcatville blog (http://wildcatville.blogspot.com/2008/10/linfield-campus-streets-have-football.html)
wrote “BRUMBACK STREET …Brumback Street intersects with Renshaw Avenue … On one
end of the street is the Linfield Softball Field, which is across the street
from Renshaw Hall, now home of the college's Mass Communications Department.
Player/coach A.M. (Arthur M.) Brumback organized Linfield's first football team
in 1896. He coached for five seasons before being appointed college president
in 1903, a position he held for two years (1903-1905). Brumback taught natural
sciences at the college. According to one write-up, "Brumback had a
passion for sport, playing center on and coaching the college’s first football
team. While enormously popular with students" he was not successful in
dealing with Linfield's financial crisis. He left Linfield in 1905, to take a
position at his alma mater, Denison College, in Ohio. At Denison, he was that
college's first chemistry professor.”
:::
A. M.
Brumback listed here …
Current and former
McMinnville College/Linfield College/Linfield University presidents according
to Wikipedia posting as
seen 6:30am 11/21/2020
Presidents of
McMinnville College
·
1857-60: George C. Chandler
(Oregon became a
state on Feb. 14, 1859. Thus, at the start of Chandler's presidency, the
college was located in the Oregon Territory. At the end of his presidency, it
was located in the State of Oregon. Same location, different name.)
·
1864-67: John W. Johnson
·
1873: J. D. Robb
(Robb served Feb. 20, 1873-July 10, 1873, according to the
1938 book Bricks Without Straw: The Story of Linfield College, by Jonas A.
Jonasson.)
·
1873-76: Mark Bailey
·
1876-77: John E. Magers
·
1877-78: Ep Roberts
·
1878-81: J. G. Burchett
·
1881-87: E.C. Anderson
·
1887-96: Truman G. Brownson
·
1896-1903: Harry L. Boardman
·
1903-05: A. M. Brumback
·
1905-06: Emanuel Northup, interim
·
1906-31: Leonard W. Riley (McMinnville College name changed to
Linfield College in 1922)
Presidents of Linfield College
·
1931-32: William R. Frerichs, interim
·
1932-38: Elam J. Anderson
·
1938-43: William G. Everson
·
1943-68: Harry L. Dillin
·
1968, 1974: Winthrop W. Dolan, interim
·
1968-74: Gordon C. Bjork
·
1974-75: Cornelius Siemens, interim
·
1975-92: Charles U. Walker
·
1992-2005: Vivian A. Bull
·
2005-06: Marvin Henberg, interim
·
2006–2018: Thomas L. Hellie
·
2018-2020: Miles K. Davis (Linfield College name changed to Linfield
University in 2020)
Presidents of Linfield University
·
2020-present: Miles K. Davis
::
A. M.
Brumback mentioned here …
Mounds
of mystery
By
Elaine Rhose, ‘Rohse Colored Glasses’ column
McMinnville N-R/News-Register June 12, 2018
The puzzle of the mysterious mounds — found in the
Willamette Valley and virtually all over the world — has long gone unsolved.
You, many times, may have walked by these curious blips on
the landscape and paid no heed. It was not that their shape was highly unusual.
But seeing them here, there and everywhere, you perhaps never really took a
good look at the oblong little “mundane” mounds of soil that didn’t really look
as if they belonged there.
Archeologists viewed them differently — and, started digging.
A clipping, datelined McMinnville, October 15, but lacking
year and source, tells of the opening of a large mound (at the Morgan Baker
Ranch) by McMinnville College students under the direction of science professor
A. M. Brumback.
Great care was exercised and an unusual procedure was used.
A two-foot trench was dug around the base of the mound.
Three feet up the side of the mound, it was pierced all the way through, in
order to view the interior. Treasure was discovered: relics of war clubs. A
skeleton was also found in the mound. Evidence indicated that this may have
been a war scene. The search that day, however, could not be completed and had
to be continued.
Information collected at the second digging indicated that,
indeed, this likely had been a battle site. Several more skeletons were found.
Each with a hole in the skull — apparently a bullet hole. And two distinct
tribes apparently participated in the fight. Some skulls had the typical flat
head characteristic; others had normal contour.
Among other finds in the mound were four buttons, about one
and a quarter inches in diameter, with words around the upper edge, as on a
coin, but in an unknown language.
Although discovering that the mounds were Indian burial
grounds did, in part, solve the secret of the mysterious mounds, clouds still
muddle their past..For example, some American Indians dispute ever knowing
about them. There was disagreement as to whether the Indians had anything to do
with them.
Mounds exist all over the world, including Siberia and It is
interesting that an almost continuous line of prehistoric mounds has been found
from Finland to Japan that apparently have no connection with any of the races
now occupying that region.
Something else: Some settlers claimed that the Native Americans
were highly protective of their mounds, and had been known to guard them in
order to discourage intrusion, vandalism or desecration in any way. They wanted
strictest privacy with regard to them
Yet, A. S. Gatshet archeologist, tells of watching the
actual building of a mound and that Indians were well aware of his presence and
seemingly disinterested.
Gatshet describes what he saw: “Work progressed on the mound
during the night. On the mountain top they awaited the rise of the sun after
having exerted themselves through the night carrying up the hill heavy rocks.
Other hillocks are thrown up during the night by the female portion of the
Indian community who seem more eager than the males to continue this antique
custom of their forefathers. The flat topped eminence, about one mile east of
the Grand Ronde Agency, is likely Spirit Mountain.”
Calapooya Mounds along the Calapooya and Willamette rivers,
according to the Dictionary of Oregon History, now are about four feet high,
but were probably higher when built. They are 75 to 150 feet in diameter, and
each houses the remains of a stone-age chief. Some indicate sacrificial death
by fire. Excavations have revealed obsidian arrow heads and ornaments of native
copper. “In the area between Corvallis to Sweet Home more than 100 mounds once
existed, but most have now been plowed under.”
And at one time there were as many as six of the oblong
mounds near Wapato Lake. Indians depended on the lake, in part, for their food
supply of wild potatoes that grew at the root of the plant in the bottom of the
Lake.
They were harvested mostly by American Indians walking in the
water and pressing the potatoes between their feet, standing deep in the water
all day during the ripening season.
Mounds of a different type — shell mounds — were found along
the coast. These range in area from 10 to 20 acres and in depth from 20 to 30
feet. From Clatsop to Curry counties in areas along the Coast Highway cuts
through some mounds expose layers of shells and apparently the lowest layers
are devoid of relics. Upper layers, however have produced finds of arrow and
spear heads, pottery, mortars, pestles, smoking pipes and even ovens. Only one
skeleton had been found to date. It was taken from a midden in Lincoln County
but disintegrated upon exposure to the air before measurement and
classification.
Indian mounds apparently date back as far as the first
arrival of white settlers in Oregon but the Indians here as well as those in
other places have denied knowledge of these mounds.
Although the mystery of the mounds has been solved, at least
in part, perhaps the total solution will result in an exciting new chapter to
add to our Oregon history.
::::
(Info below is edited. Go to URL to read complete posting.)
A. M. Brumback mentioned in online QUARTUX JOURNAL …
…NDNHISTORYRESEARCH, Critical Indigenous Anthropology &
History | David G. Lewis, PhD : writer : researcher : educator
https://ndnhistoryresearch.com/2017/08/01/mounds-of-the-tualatin-yamhill-kalapuyan-area/
Of the Tualatin, Gatschet
states “six miles west of Forest
Grove on the eastern slope of a wooded hill which slants towards McCloud’s
farm...”
This description join that of McMinnville (Linfield) College
professor Brumbach who at the turn of the 20th century was excavating mounds in
the Tualatin area. Brumbach initiated excavations on at least one mounds
uncovering numerous artifacts and skeletons of Kalapuyans. It appears much of
the artifacts were sent to the Smithsonian Institution but they are as yet
undiscovered in the collections.
Linfield has been asked if they have such collections, but they
appear to not have kept the collections. The collections many have gone with
Brumbach when he left for a Chemistry appointments at Dennison University or
University of California, or they are at the Museum of Oregon Anthropology in
Eugene.
Apparently the tribes tried to protect their burials but in time gave in to continuous pressures. The tribes likely stopped practicing the traditions and the new generations stopped protecting the mounds. Found in the mounds are many items from the colonization period (copper, coins, buttons) indicating that mound building was practiced up to the 1850s. Some scholars have suggested it was a previous culture, but it appears to be the work of the present living culture of the 19th century.
REPORT THIS AD
REPORT THIS AD
Ideally it would be best
to find the artifacts and human remains mentioned by Brumbach to determine what
they are by the archaeologists at the Grand Ronde tribe. Thus far, there has
been no Brumbach archive or collection discovered
::::
Linfield
Sports Information website on 11/21/2020 included …
… “A.M. Brumback, football and gymnastics coach who later
became college president, helped develop Linfield's first running track. Put
into use in 1898, the track was primarily intended for use as a bicycle oval
and surrounded the original football field adjacent to Pioneer Hall.”
:::
Fall 2007 Linfield
Magazine includes about A. M. Brumback as Linfield (then McMinnville
College) president ..
… He “had taught natural sciences at the college since 1896.
Brumback had a passion for sport, playing center on and coaching the college’s
first football team. While enormously popular with students, he was no more
suited to stopping the fiscal wolf at the college’s door than was Boardman. In
1905 he left McMinnville to take a position at his alma mater, Denison College,
in Ohio.”
:::
Linfield
professor alleges antisemitism; Board of Rabbis calls for resignations
By Dora Totoian Of The News-Register• April 16, 2021
The Oregon Board of Rabbis called Thursday for
the resignation of Linfield University President Miles Davis and Board of
Trustees chair David Baca, matching calls from students and other university
community members.
Allegations of sexual misconduct against Davis
and other University Board of Trustees members have received renewed attention
in recent weeks after the faculty trustee on the board detailed antisemitism he
said he has experienced from Davis during his process of reporting sexual
misconduct allegations to the board.
The 31 members of the Oregon Board of Rabbis
were polled, and the 22 who responded all signed the letter supporting the call
for resignation.
The Pacific Northwest chapter of the
Anti-Defamation League also sent a letter last week requesting the university
to investigate the allegations of antisemitism.
In a response to the ADL, Davis denied making
the anti-Semitic comments and said Professor Daniel Pollack-Pelzner has been
engaged in a “smear campaign” against him and the University administration.
Linfield University spokesperson Scott Nelson said in a statement Wednesday
that “the facts are straightforward: Outside law firms agreed upon by Dr.
Pollack-Pelzner investigated his accusations of antisemitism in 2020 and found
no misconduct or violations of policy. There has been no other antisemitism
complaint filed with the university.”
“Linfield would be very happy – eager, even – to
have a discussion with the Oregon Board of Rabbis,” Nelson said. “Their call
is, by their own acknowledgment, based only on press accounts. The university
would welcome a full and deep conversation about all the issues and concerns
they raise, where the facts could be discussed as well as larger issues of
campus climate.
The News-Register sent Linfield a list of
20 questions and allegations to reply to on Tuesday and offered Davis a phone
interview on Wednesday. Linfield did not specifically answer most of the
questions, and replied with a statement and pointed to statements it issued
last summer amid calls for Baca to resign.
Pollack-Pelzner, an English professor and the
faculty trustee on the board, said he spoke up in a recent Twitter thread
because he wants a university environment where everyone feels safe and will
not face retaliation when reporting sexual misconduct or other abuses of power.
He has also called for Davis and Baca to resign.
“I understand that people in positions of power
often become defensive when they’re called out for abusing it. But I think it’s
really important to be clear that people who report misconduct are not harming
Linfield,” Pollack-Pelzner said Tuesday. “People who commit misconduct are
harming Linfield. And people who learn about misconduct and fail to act against
it are really harming Linfield.”
Pollack-Pelzner has served as the faculty
trustee on the board since 2019, for which his role includes delivering a
report at the board’s three yearly meetings. The board has 33 trustees and 14
emeritus trustees, according to a Linfield spokesperson.
In his time on the board, he has brought various
allegations of sexual misconduct against board members to its attention and
requested the board implement sexual harassment prevention training for
trustees and make board social events occasions centered on common academic
interests rather than off-campus events with alcohol, he said.
After the board didn’t implement those measures
before its Feb. 2020 meeting, Pollack-Pelzner met with Baca, who
Pollack-Pelzner said accused him of a secret agenda to grab power. Baca wrote
in a July 2020 statement that since Feb. 2020, trustees have to undergo Title
IX training.
Nelson told the Oregonian that Baca was unaware
Pollack-Pelzner was Jewish and was concerned the professor was asking him to
take “actions that an individual trustee does not have the authority to
make.”
The stereotype of Jewish people as power-hungry
is one of the most persistent anti-Semitic tropes, and Jews have often been
depicted as the villains in art and literature since the Middle Ages, according
to a post about anti-Semitic myths on the ADL’s site.
In May 2020, the faculty assembly passed a
no-confidence vote in Baca 88-18, which the board rejected. It eventually led
to a petition and student protest over the summer calling for Baca’s
resignation.
Read more about the history of the sexual
misconduct allegations in the accompanying story.
Contacted this week, several
Linfield students described feeling betrayed by the university and said they
don’t feel the board and president care about their safety. Charlotte Abramson,
a junior journalism major and the features editor of the Linfield Review, said
their leadership does not inspire confidence and called on Baca to
resign.
“The school has taken a side on sexual assault,
and there are no sides on sexual assault,” Abramson said. “We are paying so
much money, we should be able to trust the people in charge of our education
and that they’re going to put our safety as a top priority and not the paycheck
that’s filling their pocket.”
Dozens of people commented criticisms of the
university on a March 31 Linfield Instagram post featuring cherry blossoms
with the caption, “Spring has sprung.” “The flowers are so pretty!! You know
what else is pretty?? Not covering up acts of sexual harassment and
antisemitism,” one user wrote.
Beatrice DeGraw, a junior literature major and
president of Linfield University Pride, called on Davis and Baca to
resign.
“I’ve overwhelmingly had positive experiences
with different staff and faculty,” DeGraw said. “It’s really hard to be a
student at a university like Linfield especially when I am so close to
graduating, and to not be able to trust my institution and to not feel proud of
the institution that I’m at.”
Katie Martinez, a sophomore elementary education
major and McMinnville local, sent an email to trustees imploring them to listen
to students and professors and to not protect people in power.
“Linfield needs to do its homework and have some
extraordinary accountability and transparency,” Martinez told the
News-Register. “It affects all of McMinnville. It affects Yamhill County.
McMinnville is a community, and Linfield is a part of that. If this culture
permeates Linfield, it’ll permeate McMinnville.”
Pollack-Pelzner, in his recent Twitter thread
and in an interview with the News-Register, described Davis allegedly
commenting on the size of Jewish and Arab noses in 2018, implying Pollack-Pelzner
would be disloyal to Linfield by including allegations of sexual misconduct in
a trustee report, and telling board members in Feb. 2020 that following the
teachings of Jesus Christ would prevent Linfield from being destroyed by
internal disloyalty, he said. Pollack-Pelzner filed a complaint with human
resources at Linfield in Feb. 2020 and with the Oregon Bureau of Labor and
Industries this month, he said.
Davis denied these allegations in a response
letter to the ADL and pointed to investigations into Pollack-Pelzner’s claims
(Read the letter in its entirety at bit.ly/3afcyyv). An outside investigator
found last summer that two of Pollack-Pelzner’s nine claims were partially or
fully substantiated and he “endured significant resistance” from Davis and
other University leaders, according to a summary of the investigation. Some of
the complaints couldn’t be substantiated because there were no witnesses or
because witnesses had a different recollection than Pollack-Pelzner, the
summary said.
The Oregonian reported Monday that Davis
allegedly referenced the Holocaust to make a point in 2018, saying something to
the effect of, “You don’t send Jews to the showers with soap,” according to two
Linfield psychology professors who were present.
Davis said in a statement he does not recall
making the comment but said that if he did, he would have attributed it to one
of his former business professors who used the imagery, in Davis’ words, “to
drive home the moral dimension of organizational work.” He apologized for
making the two professors uncomfortable and said, “I have never met or known
anyone at Linfield who would be intentionally anti-Semitic, and feel heartsick
about this accusation.”
The Oregon Board of Rabbis, comprised of 22
rabbis from all Jewish denominations, issued four requests: for Davis and Baca
to step down; implementation of a process for investigating sexual harassment
and guidelines against retaliation; training for the board on implicit bias,
microaggressions and antisemitism; and reporting and transparency on these
topics.
“Linfield University is one of Oregon’s most
cherished institutions of higher education, and as such, should guarantee
excellent safeguards for personal and academic freedom and dignity. We
will continue to insist that no one, regardless of gender or religion or race,
experience fear or intimidation, least of all in a hallowed learning
environment,” the letter said.
The Pacific Northwest chapter of the
Anti-Defamation League, a 108-year-old organization that combats antisemitism
and other forms of hate, wrote a letter to the Board of Trustees last week
asking the university to investigate the allegations of antisemitism and
encouraging the board and other campus leadership to attend trainings on bias
and antisemitism.
Miri Cypers, regional director of the Pacific
Northwest ADL, wrote the letter after two Oregon Jewish community leaders
raised concerns about antisemitism at Linfield. The ADL is not representing
Pollack-Pelzner or serving as his attorney, and it is not in a position to
verify his allegations, the letter said.
“Based on the alleged comments, it seems like
there were a lot of anti-Semitic tropes and stereotypes that had been used, so
we thought it was important to bring to light how these tropes become normalized
and more common if they’re used a lot and desensitized over time,” Cypers told
the News-Register Wednesday.
The ADL said last year that reported anti-Semitic
hate crimes reached their highest level since it began tracking them in 1979,
with over 2,100 incidents reported in 2019, according to its website.
Pollack-Pelzner said while
he is troubled by the alleged antisemitism he described, his aim in speaking up
is to make sure people at Linfield are not afraid to report sexual misconduct
and other abuses of power.
“I’ve had faculty say to me that they think the
president and board’s actions are unacceptable, but they’re afraid that it’s
only their own families who will suffer if they speak up about it,”
Pollack-Pelzner said.
The president proposes candidates for promotion
and tenure, and the board approves or denies those requests, Pollack-Pelzner
said.
Hannah Waterman, a senior biochemistry and math
major who helped organize the protest calling for Baca’s resignation last summer,
noted the power differential between trustees and students/professors. Waterman
also said she thinks Davis and Baca should resign.
Reshmi Dutt-Ballerstadt, an English professor
and the coordinator of the gender studies program, described a lack of transparency
between the president and board and the rest of the campus community in an
email to the News-Register. Nelson said he thinks Linfield is extremely
transparent with deliberations and decision-making but said it was fair to ask
if there were ways to improve campus communication.
Dutt-Ballerstadt called for Davis and Baca to
resign, adding she worried about harm to students and Linfield’s
reputation.
“Our community cannot even begin to heal until
those that have injured our community are removed. Any rhetoric of ‘moving
forward’ without serious accountability is irresponsible, ableist and damaging
for those who have been harmed and the overall health of our institution,”
Dutt-Ballerstadt said. “If he doesn’t step down then we will signal that those
in power at Linfield can simply get away with anything.”
Pollack-Pelzner pointed to trauma researcher
Jennifer Freyd’s work on institutional betrayal and institutional courage in
describing what he thinks accountability should look like, saying Linfield
should begin by apologizing and outlining steps it is taking to prevent sexual
abuse.
Waterman, the senior, described a tension
between her appreciation for Linfield students and professors and the
frustrations she has with university leadership.
“It really isn’t the university, it’s the board
and the administration. I love being a student at Linfield. My professors are
amazing. I’ve never once had a terrible encounter with professors or other
students,” Waterman said. “But having people who are leading the university who
have this reputation for discrimination and retaliation is shameful.”
A timeline of complaints
and concerns
By DORA
TOTOIAN Of the News-Register April 16,
2021
In Nov. 2019, Pollack-Pelzner learned of a
student and a professor who described being inappropriately touched by
trustees, including Linfield University President Miles Davis, but did not want
to file Title IX complaints, he said.
Instead, they asked Pollack-Pelzner if he could
request the board to implement sexual harassment prevention training for
trustees and make board social events occasions centered on students’,
professors’ and trustees’ common academic interests rather than off-campus
events with alcohol.
Pollack-Pelzner learned through a Dec. 2019
Oregonian article that the student trustee on the board had filed a complaint
against now-former trustee David Jubb, who had previously been accused of
sexual assault but allowed to stay on the board, according to the Oregonian.
Pollack-Pelzner asked Davis, Board of Trustees chair David Baca and the
college’s general counsel to implement the preventative measures before the
board’s next meeting in Feb. 2020.
Jubb resigned from the board in June 2019 and is
awaiting trial. He pleaded not guilty to one count of first-degree sexual abuse
and seven counts of third-degree sexual abuse, according to the
Oregonian.
When Davis asked faculty to host dinners for
trustees in town for the February board meeting, on Valentine’s Day,
Pollack-Pelzner again asked about the preventative measures he suggested.
“There’s a well intentioned desire to have
communication between trustees and faculty and students. But after three
consecutive meetings with complaints about sexual misconduct all involving
alcohol and off-campus events, to have the president propose another off-campus
event involving trustees and alcohol seemed to me to miss the point,”
Pollack-Pelzner said.
Pollack-Pelzner said Baca soon accused him of an
agenda to grab power. Linfield spokesman Scott Nelson said Baca didn’t know
Pollack-Pelzner was Jewish and thought he was being asked to make decisions
beyond his role as an individual trustee.
Davis then asked Pollack-Pelzner to withdraw his
February trustee report describing allegations of sexual misconduct against
board members, Pollack-Pelzner said. A summary of the investigation last summer
looking at Pollack-Pelzner’s claims against Davis substantiated that Davis
indicated the report would damage Linfield and “forcefully conveyed – while
perhaps not using the actual word ‘disloyal’ – that Dr. Pollack-Pelzner was
being disloyal to Linfield by disclosing the allegations in his report,” the
report summary said.
In his May 2020 trustee report, Pollack-Pelzner
said 4 people on the Board of Trustees, or about 10% of the board, had been
accused of sexual misconduct. Baca censored the allegations in the May report,
according to a July 2020 article in the Linfield Review.
Baca said in a July 2020 statement that it was
“malicious” to say four board members had been accused, and said that at the
time, there were no pending allegations by any Linfield students against
current trustees.
The board also issued Pollack-Pelzner an
official censure and prevented him from attending executive sessions, he said.
Nelson said his removal from executive sessions happened because he “broke
confidentiality” of those sessions.
In his May 2020 faculty trustee report,
Pollack-Pelzner expressed his concern over the elimination of the voting
faculty and student trustee roles on the Board of Trustees. Nelson said the
board is looking at “how we might actually increase student and faculty
representation at board meetings and give them a chance to provide feedback on
important issues, while getting away from voting members.”
In May 2020, the faculty assembly passed by
88-18 a no-confidence vote in Baca after an alumna said the university and Baca
failed to intervene as promised after she reported that Jubb allegedly touched
her and two other students in 2017, according to the Oregonian. The board
later rejected the faculty’s no-confidence vote, the News-Register
reported in July 2020.
In Nov. 2020, the Board of Trustees dissolved
the faculty assembly and replaced it with a faculty senate model of
governance, according to the Linfield Review. The model gives each of the
university’s three schools an equal number of senators, but is overall a
smaller governing body than the faculty assembly, the article said.
The faculty senate of the College of Arts and
Sciences planned to meet on Thursday afternoon, after the News-Register’s
deadline.
Over the summer, Linfield community members
circulated a petition calling for Baca’s resignation and organized a protest on
campus.
It also led to two investigations of a
professor’s claims against Davis and trustee Norm Nixon, which were found to be
“substantiated by a preponderance of the evidence” but did not violate Linfield’s
anti-harassment and sexual harassment policy or its Title IX policy, according
to summaries of the reports.
An investigation of Pollack-Pelzner’s claims of
harassment and retaliation partially or completely substantiated two of the
nine claims, but found the complaints did not meet the threshold for unlawful
harassment or retaliation, according to a summary of the report.
:::
Whatchamacolumn
By Jeb
Bladine President / Publisher
•April 16, 2021
Bladine:
Story resurfaces with a vengeance
Linfield Professor Daniel Pollack-Pelzner wanted
another bite of the apple in his campaign to discredit Linfield University
President Miles Davis. He didn’t get just one, but a whole bushelful.
Our news story today rekindles distasteful
controversies at Linfield dating back to 2017, before Davis arrived in mid-2018
from Shenandoah University in Virginia. Since then, Davis and Linfield have
endured three tumultuous years, and Pollack-Pelzner has been a continuing thorn
in some of those wounds.
Setting aside the 2018 storm surrounding
Linfield’s volleyball team — a high-drama situation resolved deftly by Davis —
those controversies include:
Pre-2018 financial problems leading to 2019
faculty reductions; sexual offense and inappropriate behavior charges against
members of the Board of Trustees and, to a lesser degree, Davis himself;
overlaying all that with challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic; and lesser known,
internal faculty power struggles related to Linfield’s 2020 conversion from
college to university.
That’s a lot of apples, as previously reported.
For a complete review, just type “Jubb” into our website search field; read
today’s story, which links to a letter Davis issued in response to the 2020
controversies; and consider how this latest reprise of old news surfaced.
Two weeks ago, Pollack-Pelzner wrote a series of
tweets retracing his grievances against Davis and Linfield, with special
emphasis on accusing Davis of long ago anti-Semitic comments. Back in 2020, we
reported Davis’s terse denial “in the strongest terms possible. These claims of
bias on my part are fictitious, and were thoroughly investigated. I will not
dignify the allegations by discussing them further.”
Pollack-Pelzner’s 2021 Tweets drew a letter of
concern from Portland chapter of the Anti-Defamation League; Oregon Public
Broadcasting, whose website indicates no 2020 coverage of the Linfield saga,
dove into the whole story as if it were all new stuff; The Oregonian, which
covered the 2020 sexual scandal but apparently missed the anti-Semitism charge,
made up for lost ground with a lengthy investigative article published this
week.
And now, we’re all revisiting these past
offenses and allegations. Developments continue to unfold, like the call from
the Oregon Board of Rabbis for Davis to resign, which occurred just as this
column was going to press.
Linfield has rebounded financially, and its
conversion to University status may be its best path to future stability. That
good economic news evolved despite the series of controversies that Linfield
hoped – now without success – were being left behind.
Meanwhile, Miles Davis remains a lightning rod
at the local campus, as Pollack-Pelzner plays a mixture of Zeus and Thor in
raining down bolts and encouraging others to do the same. It seems like a story
with more to come.
