Confusion is the term that best describes the current stand on student complaint procedures on the Cerritos College campus.
Student liaison Ryan Kang was not aware the student complaint procedures were even an issue the school was dealing with.
“I was not aware there was an issue or that this procedure existed. Obviously, I am Vice President of the Student Union and we’re there to help protect student rights, ” Kang said. “Students have the right to be informed of this process and the college policy but they have the right to seek their grievances and seek them in the appropriate places, wherever they deem appropriate.”
However, Kang was not alone in his confusion of the situation.
For a majority of the conversation amongst the senate members, Faculty Senate President Michelle Lewellen and others were introduced to many decisions they were not aware of previously.
One of the many bombshells dropped during the meeting was an e-mail read by mathematics instructor Dara Worrel via Dean Constance Boardman.
The e-mail contained revisions made to the Student Complaint Policy, made as of Sept. 14. Lewellen, among others, were surprised to hear of the revisions.
“There is a breakdown in communication and we need to get that fixed. Whatever bridge has collapsed we need to make sure we get that repaired,” Lewellen said.
Speech instructor Angela Hoppe-Nagao also discussed a meeting in which Dean of Liberal Arts David Fabish introduced the idea of eliminating the department chair from the student complaint procedure chain of command.
The original chain of command as it stands is, first address the faculty member involved, then take it to the department chair and lastly, address the dean if the situation has not been rectified.
“My entire time here the process has been if a student had a problem the student would go to the faculty member first. If it couldn’t be resolved it would then go to the department chair. If the chair couldn’t resolve it the student would then forward it to the dean or judicial affairs or other appropriate office on campus,” Hoppe-Nagao said.
She has been an employee at the Cerritos campus for 22 years. Ten of those years she served as department chair.
“At our September Liberal Arts division meeting, we were informed the interpretation of the student grievance procedure removed the department chair from the chain of command because chairs are not considered managers, we are only faculty,” she added.
After hearing of the unknown meeting Lewellen had one question: Why wasn’t faculty involved?
The original student complaint policy can be found in the 2016 class schedule book.
A book that Faculty Senate Vice President Scott O’Neil said is “older than dirt.” He added that the book hasn’t been revised in approximately 30 years.
From the student perspective, Kang said, “Even apart from the wording being confusing, students aren’t going to look at the handbook, it’s basically an essay.
“I had a grievance against a dean last year and I talked to several faculty members and administrators and not one person referred me [to the handbook]. So not even an employee of the college knows to refer to this guideline.”
While fixing the language is only part of the problem, Kang feels new ways to make it accessible to students should be implemented as well.
Agreeing with Kang, Lewellen said, “It does make it difficult for students to determine. There are titles of things like General Grievance. Well, how do students or faculty know what that means?”
Faculty senate is hard at work to gather up a supplementary group.
“The first objective is to clean that language up, so that everything is defined and the process is appropriate. The bigger issue that really needs to be resolved is how is this being communicated and how are we going to let everyone know what this process is,” Lewellen said.
