Following the dismal attendance at Monday’s presidential search forum, Boston University students have a chance to partially redeem themselves tonight. Those students who can spare an hour and a half will hear from our top administrator and can ask questions. This relatively rare and important event merits a full capacity crowd, but students also must bring intelligent questions.
This question-and-answer session with Chancellor John Silber does come in the middle of midterm chaos, but many students are already done and others could enjoy a 90-minute study break. However, the Student Union should have recognized this week’s bad timing and waited until after Spring Break. Rather than rushing the event and potentially reducing the response it will elicit, the Union should have spent more than two weeks in planning to find a time convenient for students, and perhaps a larger venue. While the Metcalf Science Center holds about 60 fewer people than the School of Management auditorium used last year, airing the event on WTBU is a wise way to ensure students who are turned away can still listen.
Despite logistical issues, the Union has succeeded in vastly improving the event’s structure. Rather than limiting students to questions written in advance, students can directly address the chancellor on the spot tonight. This much more open structure erases any skepticism that questions will be screened, allowing students to bring up any topic and hear Silber’s spontaneous responses.
However, this open session will also require students to show their maturity and intelligence. During forums in the 1980s, crude insults and tasteless remarks caused Silber to walk off stage and killed the opportunity for incisive debate between administrators and students.
Silber has consistently shown that he only responds to maturity and expects students to meet his level of high intelligence. After last semester’s event, he described the student questions as tame. This time around, students have every chance to make challenging, thought-provoking inquiries. Students planning to ask questions should spend time brainstorming to maximize their efforts.
Making disrespectful comments or bringing up topics Silber has already addressed will only waste time; Silber sticks to his opinions and probably will not have anything new to say about the Gay-Straight Alliance, for example. Instead, students should encourage further dialogue and could pose questions asking for advice to help Silber open up. What does he think of the hiring freeze, tuition hikes, the Master Plan or relations between students and administrators? What does Silber see BU moving toward in the future, especially with the search for a new president? Even finding out what Silber is doing for Spring Break could help students better understand their chancellor.
Silber is taking time to communicate openly with students, and other top-level administrators should follow the leads of Silber and College of Arts and Sciences dean Jeffrey Henderson, who eats dinner with students once a month. However, this openness only works when students show interest. If students have any interest in the way their university is and will be run, they should attend the session with Silber tonight and bring smart questions with them.
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