From: "Altarriba, Jeanette"Subject: Notice on behalf of the Department of Communication
Date: December 2, 2011 4:56:18 PM EST
2 December 2011
4:55 pm
Christopher Philippo:
I have been advised that you have been posting materials via BlackBoard that constitute an inappropriate use of that technology. It is inappropriate for you to use this system to post information of the nature that you have posted. This message serves as notification that your actions have constituted inappropriate behavior.
Dr. Jeanette Altarriba
Chair, Department of Communication
Ms. Altarriba never specified who "advised" her, what "materials" she was referring to, what was "inappropriate" about the "materials," if she herself had seen the "materials," etc. despite my having asked her to clarify. Whether she'd intentionally waited until less than four minutes prior to the end of the workday to send her e-mail so that she wouldn't be around to reply that day, I don't know, but has never clarified. She seemingly violated university policy by simultaneously accusing me of and finding me guilty of something; it wasn't her place to do the latter, and whether it was her place to do the former, I do not know - but I would think not. There was no due process and no notice of a right to appeal or to whom one could appeal. I guessed that she was referring to two posts I'd made to Blackboard on December 2, 2011.
"Freedom, yeah! Freedom: yeah right..."
I'd sent a message through Blackboard to the entire class. While it remained in my outbox, I never received a reply from a single person - not that I ever saw, anyhow. My access to Blackboard had ceased prior to the time Ms. Altarriba had sent her e-mail to me; the course disappeared as if I were not registered, though the course still appeared in MyUAlbany. My access was soon restored, but would then go back and forth between being available and unavailable, without explanation. I wondered if during that time someone had gone into students' mailboxes and deleted my message to them, perhaps reading other messages in those students' mailboxes, and intentionally or accidentally deleting messages unrelated to the matter. I would have expected, out of 160 people or so, a reply of some kind, even if it were "WTF is this?" or "you narc!" or something. The Blackboard mail was later disabled completely, at least for me, denying access to the entire semester's worth of messages sent and received, even those sent by the instructor of record and teaching assistants.
Sent Friday, December 2, 2011 11:03 AM
Subject Information Literacy Project questions?
Regarding the announcement about how we must respond to at least one question by "Friday, November 2nd" and that students who don't receive a question will be given one by the TAs on Wednesday (November 30th? December 7th?) (as of December 2nd, 11:00 AM the day the assignment is apparently due - contra the announcement - I have not, and I don't think I'm the only one). That may not leave all that much time to answer one, which is perhaps a little anxiety-provoking. When might we expect those?
Mind, I'm not picking on the TAs [for not having provided questions as Barberich said they would]; I hope it doesn't sound like I am. They've been put in an awkward position, e.g. having to write PowerPoints for their professor (FWIW, the first class I've ever had where that was done) and having him fail to give them acknowledgement for their work without being externally prompted [i.e. when one left her name on the PowerPoint she prepared for him to present, and... like pulling teeth... after I asked him]. That acknowledgement about who wrote the PowerPoints (and iClicker questions, exam questions, etc.?) has only on rare occasions been given in class, and except for one PowerPoint was only done orally, and many students may have missed that acknowledgement [by not being present those days, or by not paying attention]. The TAs' work also is uncredited, again with one exception, on Blackboard where their slides appear in the lecture notes. Perhaps an announcement or message in writing on Blackboard about who wrote what might be an appropriate and a proper show of gratitude to the TAs for all their unpaid work authoring the class behind the scenes.
Also, I wanted to check again about what the uncredited source for the diagrams in yesterday's PowerPoint was? Some of the text in it was terribly small, rendering it terribly hard to read. That the diagram was included in the lecture implies that it was something we should learn, so it would be useful to know who created it and to be able to read it. On the other hand, that a man with a doctorate in Communication [Michael W. Barberich] didn't know where they came from might imply they weren't important, so I suppose that could be clarified as to whether we should learn that material or not.
When I'd turned in the third exam, I'd circled a number of spelling errors on it. I'd spoken to the undergraduate TAs and noted there was a more significant error conflating "infer" with "imply"that rendered a question without a correct answer as written. I asked later by e-mail how that was handled, and was told I'd have to ask the professor. Since the answer might be of interest to the whole class, it seems appropriate to let them all hear the question too. I don't mean to sound like a perfectionist: I'm really not. I'm as imperfect as they come and I naturally recognize people are necessarily fallible... though I note the evaluation rubric for the Information Literacy Project Part 1 will lower the grade for even a single misspelling or grammatical error.
Sincerely,
Chris Philippo
Was it "inappropriate use of technology" to ask a question of the professor the professor's own TAs indicated I would have to ask him? To ask for the sources of diagrams that had been in a lecture when they might be on the upcoming final exam and when the professor in class had stated that the diagrams should have been properly cited after I asked him about it in class? To suggest that the TAs should be given proper credit for their work by the professor, etc.?
Does Ms. Altarriba believe, as what she wrote on behalf of the entire Communication department appeared to indicate, that TAs should not receive proper credit for their work, professors should refuse to answer questions about material in their (TAs') lectures, etc.? Does the entire Communication department share Ms. Altarriba's beliefs?
"The University respects freedom of expression in all electronic forms on its computing and networking systems."http://wiki.albany.edu/display/public/askit/Responsible+Use+of+Information+Technology+Policy
"The University reaffirms its commitment to the principle that the widest possible scope for freedom of expression is the foundation of an institution dedicated to vigorous inquiry, robust debate, and the continuous search for a proper balance between freedom and order. The University seeks to foster an environment in which persons who are on its campus legitimately may express their views as widely and as passionately as possible; at the same time, the University pledges to provide the greatest protection available for controversial, unpopular, dissident, or minority opinions. The University believes that censorship is always suspect, that intimidation is always repugnant, and that attempts to discourage constitutionally protected expression may be antithetical to the University's essential missions: to discover new knowledge and to educate."
To learn how Barberich's failure to have his TAs provide students questions (which was itself something he came up with to cover for another one of his typical failures), I had to file a FOIL request for my own grades for his class. Barberich had never provided all my grades to me, my department advisor didn't help me obtain them, Assistant Dean Brian Gabriel didn't help me obtain them, the Registrar's Office didn't help me, etc. It turned out I'd been given 15/15 on the Information Literacy Project Part 2 when I hadn't been able to complete that part of the assignment at all. Not completing the project was supposed to result in failing the class, not that it would be at all fair for a student to fail the class due to Michael W. Barberich's numerous failures as an instructor.
UAlbany does a fine job of claiming to protect free speech, dissent, and so forth, but in actuality it is perfectly happy to violate the New York State Constitution and the United States Constitution left and right.
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