‘Derecognition’ Revisited

Adding to Wednesday’s discussion about recognition of student organizations, a reader commented:

Also, there’s the famous method of “unrecognition”—intimidating enough of the faculty so that no one is willing to be the advisor.

Take a look at the case at Indian River Community College, where administrators had instituted an illogical policy requiring that faculty advisors be present at every student organization meeting or event. The Christian Student Fellowship (CSF), which normally would meet several times a week, lost its faculty advisor when he was unable to fulfill the unreasonable new requirement and therefore forced to resign. CSF’s ability to officially exist on campus was effectively defunct on two levels: (1) it could not officially meet without a faculty advisor present and (2) it could not fulfill the requirement even to have a faculty advisor because no faculty member was willing or able to fulfill the new duties. (Fortunately, after FIRE intervened, the college rescinded the policy.)