The comment is in line with reserved Scandinavians: it indicates that we are following the news, paying attention, but we're not going to offer an opinion. It's risky to offer an opinion. Not that Minnesotans are averse to forming opinions - quite to the contrary - we just want to maintain a reserved face.
How might Scandinavians or anyone else form an opinion about the admissions scandal? I feel moved to react as someone who has made a financial gesture to UMM on behalf of my family. My deceased parents were synonymous with the U of M. Dad got his undergraduate degree from the U, taught at the U's St. Paul School of Agriculture in the 1950s, and then of course came to Morris to work hard launching our UMM. Mom worked on campus for many years and got the Martelle Award.
Me? I was a passive onlooker. I had lots of contact through my involvement with the Morris newspaper, owned by the family that has emerged as prime UMM benefactors: the Morrisons. I felt a sense of obligation to make a like gesture, given my parents' background. Let me put it this way: if it weren't for the Morrisons' gesture, most likely I would not have made one in the name of the Williams. A photo of my father directing music is across the hallway from the art gallery named for the Morrisons.
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| Clyde Johnson |
Through the years we got solicitations for the Clyde Johnson Scholarship Fund. I had feelings tugging at me that the Williams ought to be active in the same way. Dad and Clyde were the early prime movers in UMM music. My father was the music founder and the only music faculty in UMM's first year. All those glorious concerts were at Edson Auditorium. The auditorium is now part of an entity (?) that has the Morrison name.
For a while I thought maybe things were getting overdone with the Morrison name out there.
I was clueless about the trend of money from private sources - hell, from any sources - really taking over. Well, you might argue that of course money is essential. So yes, I'm not naive, it's just that for most of my life I subscribed to the idea that public colleges were simply funded by government in a consistent way. What do I know? So when in Rome, do as the Romans do.
I have contributed $ in my family's name and I'll likely contribute more. This will certainly happen when I croak but it could happen sooner. And, will I suggest a little more family recognition? Well maybe. Maybe it would be another framed photo display somewhere. All these things are negotiable, what we are learning in spades with the college admissions scandal. Such a "heckuva deal," eh?
"Money's honey, my dear sonny, and a rich man's joke is always funny." I learned that from Mad Magazine when I was a kid. It was a caption under a photo that showed Nelson Rockefeller with some well-heeled friends in suits and ties, yucking it up. I remember when Rockefeller, old Scrooge McDuck, had a press conference to announce his proposal for a "lottery" for military conscription. What he and so many other politicians deserved at that time was a robust retort of "f--k you." As much as Donald Trump comes across as a dangerous clown, he hasn't done anything even remotely as bad as promoting military conscription for a tragic war like Vietnam.
I recently had the opportunity to have our family fund be subject for an article in the U of M's "Legacy" magazine. I initially felt enthusiasm and said I'd be happy to do anything that helps the U of M.
On the other side of the coin, there are various stuffed-shirt community leaders in Morris, if not present then former, who would not like seeing my name in connection with a prestige U publication.
There was a time in our community's history when I clashed with a very powerful local labor union: the public school teachers. This reached a head in the late 1980s. To this day I stick with the opinions that I had.
Clashing with a powerful union can be dangerous. A union will fight you by any means they can think of, like promoting a meme that you are hopelessly stupid. I faced this in spades. There were orchestrated efforts to ruin me. The contrary elements toward me got a new person hired at the Sun Tribune, although I ended up outlasting that person at the place. That person had a spouse who was a division head at UMM. But then, that marriage became dissolved.
Your "creds" can be so important in this town. Me, all I had was my commitment to honest journalism, a passion for the whole craft and for life in general.
My parents owed everything they had to the U of M. My personal feelings don't reflect that kind of bond because I'm skeptical of higher education in general. I'm skeptical about public spending for education at all levels. Despite recent puffy pronouncements for the State University system ("Minnesota State"), in which we hear the cliche testament about education being so doggone important, we should cut back some. We should look at closing one or more of these institutions. We need to ignore the cliches.
We hear that high schools might be given a pass for canceling school days due to the weather. As if the kids are actually going to be hurt if they miss a few days of school. Preposterous. The issue here is really funding: if "x" amount of tax dollars are allocated for each day of school, isn't it problematic to outright cancel some days? I have suggested that taxpayers get a rebate check like in the days of Jesse Ventura.
Why don't we just cancel half the whole school year? Or, if we really want to apply common sense, let's re-structure the school calendar to reflect reality: have six weeks vacation in winter, beginning a week before Christmas, and have the other six weeks of vacation in summer. I've been told that teachers would recoil at this, that they would want consecutive vacation time. Teachers are always an irritating distraction.
"Almost" a magazine article
I cooperated with the U of M's "Legacy" publication to a great degree, we just didn't reach the finish line. What I did, was I typed an email to the Legacy writer that included everything I could think of in connection to the Ralph and Martha Williams Fund. So at that point all systems were go.
But when I was then requested to take part in an interview, I had to withdraw. There are people out there who, when noting any quote coming from yours truly in a U of M publication, will be so sensitive, so eager to portray me as a "dumb s--t" and to use other expletives when doing so - this is part of their nature - I could not continue.
I'm sorry Mom and Dad, but I have to live with reality back here on Earth.
A special-interest network
The public school teachers had affinity with UMM people because, they were in the same profession and were unionized also.
If you ever want to kill off giving to UMM, just allow another employee strike on campus with people and their placards on the outskirts. Motorists would drive by and honk their horns in a seemingly approving way - hogwash, most of these motorists probably wanted to cuss out the strikers. If all those strikers could be away from their jobs for so long, are their jobs even necessary?
Maybe the U of M doesn't need our money. Just find some obscenely rich celebrities and get them to dump money on you, in exchange for just letting their kids get through and get their prestigious degree. Maybe the kids wouldn't even have to attend class. Unethical? Well I suppose, but I wonder if this even matters anymore, today when we have a "grifter in chief" in the White House.
I don't think the road to heaven is paved with money. But then again, I have always been an outlier. I stick with my views.
Addendum: I was viscerally attacked by a teacher when I was in high school. Steve Poppe was there. Even at that young age I was probably starting to give the impression that I was a contrarian toward the teachers. So the teacher had his power in that moment. Years later I would enter the media and find I had my own power. Fair enough? John Stossel went through the same thing. He recalled being bullied when a kid, so when he got to work with a camera in the media years later, he found he could "turn the camera back on the bullies." Fair enough.
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
