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Our leaders of higher education have an amazing fetish for growth of institutions. They’ve sacrificed every standard, every form of reason to pull in more, more, more, students. I have, of course, criticized all these decisions, particularly the decision to attract violent ideologues instead of scholars, but one group I’ve only mentioned a little is illegal aliens.
I honestly feel that a state supported institution shouldn’t be so eager to support illegal students…the taxpayers are paying to support the school for the benefit of their own kids, their own neighborhood, their own state.
It shouldn’t be an easy thing for illegal to gain admittance to college—to enter, you must produce a high school diploma, problematic when you are, as the politically correct term for it is, “undocumented.” It’s not an issue, as admin is so eager for growth that they don’t even do basic document checks (it’s the same reason we have nomad students going from campus to campus collecting checks, and why I could get admitted into accredited advanced degree programs even when I provided no background beyond a credit card number).
There are now enough illegal alien students in higher education that they can form a union of sorts, and make formal demands for treatment. This strikes me as particularly nuts. Is there a Murderer’s Union requesting a discount on purchases of firearms? A Rapist’s Union asking for free treatment for sexual performance issues? Those would be completely insane requests, right?
But our campuses are just that crazy right now:
Much as it would be completely ridiculous for the Pedophile’s Union to ask for free candy and ice cream, we now have illegal alien students who’ve left their homes and are requesting free housing from higher education administrators.
Mark Twain is noted for saying truth is stranger than fiction, because it doesn’t have to make sense…I rather see his point, here, because I couldn’t make something up this insane if I tried.
The illegal alien student organization is called UndoCU (clever, eh?), and even has their own Facebook page. Why don’t other groups of criminals have their own Facebook page? Oh yeah, that would make it too easy for law enforcement to track them down.
Anyway, let’s take a look at the preamble on their page, because it’s great for laughs:
This past year, the year of UndoCU’s conception, we have consistently faced issues and problems that the university has, at best, responded to sparingly. Our daily lived experiences are shaped by national and federal forces that we must face with bravery, but the collective university administration’s inaction has worsened these issues. Some of us were on the verge of homelessness. Some, including their families, are at high risk of deportation. That the university is not active in aiding and ameliorating these problems demonstrates Columbia’s lack of intrinsic interest in its undocumented students.
I don’t want to sound unsympathetic but, like most everyone with an advanced STEM degree, I had many friends in school who were born in another country. They came here legally (documentedly? It’s so hard to figure why we need to change the language here), and paid their dues. Maybe higher ed should cut the legal students some slack, but I just don’t understand how illegal (“undocumented”) students should get better treatment than the ones who are doing things properly.
Ok, so let’s consider some of the demands (and, yes, they use that word):
How will the university help with our inability to pay tuition or housing?
In all possible senses, how will the university provide the proper support that will allow us to thrive as students and contributing members of our university community?
The assumption here is jaw-dropping. Why should the university be responsible for tuition and housing of illegal alien students? I understand the desire for growth over all, but if the students aren’t even paying tuition, why is the school responsible for them? Oh, that’s right: state schools get paid for butts in seats, it doesn’t matter how those butts get there.
How can administration contact and keep in touch with undocumented students without a record of students that the administration may be in the future be forced to relinquish to federal authorities?
The confusion of ideas here is immense. Our institutions of higher ed are either directly state government agencies (eg, your typical State U), or indirectly Federal government agencies (by virtue of taking huge amounts of Federal student loan money). Either way, to even think there’s a way to self-identify as a Federal lawbreaker and not risk being identified as a Federal lawbreaker is, well, stupid.
Trouble is, of course, it won’t surprise me when we later learn that some schools are doing just that…wouldn’t want to cut into growth, after all.
We are international students only by technical designation, so we are all subject to pay the semesterly $70.00 international services fee. Further, classifying us as international students puts us at risk of having our information exposed to Homeland Security. We want the university to respect and recognize us as domestic students…
Talk about wanting to have your cake and eat it too…they want special privileges for being foreign students, and special benefits for being domestic students. One more:
-Creation of an ombudsperson position who understands the psychological, financial, administrative, and all other dimensions of the undocumented student issue and experience.
–they’re not stupid with this demand, you better believe admin will be happy to have more admin.
Wow, establish another fiefdom just to deal with the students on campus illegally. As idiotic as it sounds, the gentle reader should know that other student groups have made comparable demands, and admin gave in. This isn’t so much spinelessness on admin’s part as self-interest: every new fiefdom is more money for admin, after all.
These endless concessions, of course, are the whole reason we now are getting utterly nonsensical demands. The UndoCU students saw other groups getting ridiculous benefits granted to them by admin unwilling to do anything that might cut into growth, and so they figure they can ask as well.
Now, a Facebook page is open to comments, and so one might guess that, well, there are a few negative comments here. Nope, it’s all positive, because UndoCU can simply delete posts they don’t like (hey, it is their page, after all). At least they acknowledge that their ridiculous behavior isn’t completely approved, even if all the comments allowed to be published are approving:
Recently, UndoCU has been receiving an increased presence on our page from racists, trolls, and people whose sole purpose is to spread hate on our cause.
Yeah, no kidding.
Will Columbia U give in to the demands? So far, nothing official has been decided. What’s their track record on this? Not good:
This is a school which spent millions of taxpayer dollars on fake voicemails from people “dying of climate change,” so we’re sure they’re willing to pony up for this. Since there’s not sign of the gravy train stopping, there’s always more federal cash on the way.
I imagine eventually they’ll give in, and then “best practices” will allow other institutions to likewise set up fiefdoms to cater to this particular type of criminal. Then, of course, tuition will be forced to rise to pay for it all.
And, sure enough, the taxpayers will be paying not for a school to help their kids and community, or even country, but to help people that taxpayers would have never guessed would be getting their money. Once again I conclude we need to get the Federal government out of the higher education business, starting, as always, with the student loan scam.
