The Advice of the Unlearned

"Frank Wiley, chief of UAlbany's police department, addressed the students one morning last month and exhorted them to raise their own expectations of themselves. Some paid attention. One was writing on his hand.

"'You've got to want to,' said Wiley, who wore a four-button gray suit with a neatly folded pocket square. 'Wanting to is very important.'"

Aaron, Kenneth. "Don't count these students out yet; Teachers hold out hope for unruly Albany teens in alternative program." Albany Times Union. May 19, 2006: A1. http://albarchive.merlinone.net/mweb/wmsql.wm.request?oneimage&imageid=6399736

Wiley's advice would have been more meaningful if he followed it himself. Apart from that clichéd advice, given to students who weren't listening, there's a fatuous "Ideal Officer Profile" by Wiley http://police.albany.edu/IdealOfficer.shtml which is used, perhaps on a yearly basis, to lard the Annual Report http://police.albany.edu/UPDAnnualReport2011.pdf the way a bad UAlbany student might pad a paper with irrelevant junk.

"And most importantly . . . my ideal officer understands that 'gentlemen and gentlewomen consider the rights of others before their own feelings, and the feelings of others before their own rights.'"

Misquoted advice from a deceased basketball coach, which Mr. Wiley, as an ex-basketball coach from Maryland, evidently thinks applies "most importantly" to police officers in New York. Never having been a police officer in New York, Mr. Wiley's vapid thoughts about what makes an "ideal officer" are laughable. Mr. Wiley doesn't follow his own standards with respect to it either.

"Polite, Respectful, Courteous, Empathetic at all times"? Not he. "Poised - Not given to anger, confrontation, emotionalism. Intelligent and Well Spoken"? Most definitely not! "Will not appear unsympathetic or unconcerned." Being unsympathetic or unconcerned is evidently fine (and indeed, Mr. Wiley is demonstrably both unsympathetic and unconcerned); one just has to be careful not to appear that way (Mr. Wiley's failed even at that). Etc. Incidentally, what's with the Random Capital Letters?

"When one audience member asked Wiley what he likes about college students, Wiley answered that he likes college students because they are 'enthusiastic, idealistic and raise issues that require thought on the part of administration.'"

Cotton, André. "Security candidate visits and talks with students; Comm. passes decision to Dean, final choice soon." Oberlin Review 124(21). April 19, 1996. http://www.oberlin.edu/stupub/ocreview/archives/1996.04.19/news/candidate.html

Mr. Wiley doesn't really hold to those ideals either; Oberlin was wise to reject him and if UAlbany had genuinely cared to hire a good chief, they would have been wise to follow Oberlin's lead. Mr. Wiley isn't interested in listening to enthusiastic, idealistic students (or any people) who raise issues that require thought on the part of the administration; he's committed to preventing that from happening. Clarence L. McNeill forbade me to communicate with anyone other than himself at UAlbany for the rest of my life, and McNeill cc'd that to Mr. Wiley. Mr. Wiley is perfectly OK with prior restraint on freedom of speech that even extends to forbidding someone to report crimes to the police. Some "chief" he is! His parents must be so proud....

Do four-button suits with neatly folded pocket squares come in orange? My idealism leads me to hope there might be such, just for him.