Dear President Cotton,

As you know, the Board of Trustees has asked for a thorough accounting of the hiring practices at the College, and in particular of administrators. We note with great concern that at present there are somewhere between four and five provosts currently on the payroll. All of these provosts, whose tasks are as identical as their job descriptions and titles, appear to have been fired by your office at different times over the past year. And yet, as we already noted, they continue to draw salary, have offices (sometimes right next to each other), enjoy the perks of the position, etc. Perhaps more troubling, they have engaged in  violent confrontations with each other in what appears to be a zero-sum game turf war. We believe that these episodes may explain the many fires, explosions, and reports of gunfire that have marred our otherwise tranquil campus. Where outright physical violence is not employed, they have deployed incendiary propaganda in which they have defamed one another in the most vile and slanderous terms possible. At they same time, these propaganda efforts have resorted to lavishing praise upon your person and the office of the presidency. It is not outside of the realm of the possible that you have used these conflicts and divisions to enhance your own position at Willard College by effectively dividing your immediate subordinates into warring factions. But an unanticipated consequence of this divide et impera approach is that you may have lost control over the campus, which to all appearances is now divided into warring factions. Is it correct that the campus is criss-crossed by razor wire and that students, staff, and faculty can only move from one sector to another with passbooks that must be issued by one provost and counter-stamped by the provost in the adjoining sector? Is it also true that students without proper paperwork have been detained, held against their will, and that they have only been released after their parents have paid a ransom?

How do you plan to resolve this mess?

Sincerely, The Willard College Board of Trustees

Dear Colleagues, This summer, during a brief visit to Philadelphia we came across a wonderful artist named Ildiko Nagykisnagy whose triptych “Bohóc Gyilkosság” [Clown Murder] left us captivated and enthralled. Through her translator and lover, the enigmatic performance artist who goes by the name                     , we had a long conversation about abstract expressionism, theater, urban living, and college administration. Since effective today the Provost Triumvarite has been disbanded (please be patient as we prepare an official notification and explanation), Cheryl Tina Faye Cotton and I decided to invite Ms. Ildiko Nagykisnagy to serve as Interim Provost. Because Ms. Nagykisnagy’s primary and exclusive language is Magyar (you don’t say “Hungarian” anymore!), please contact her administrative assistant and translator who goes by the name                      , to schedule an appointment. Please bear in mind that the translator has only limited Magyar so you may wish to purchase a good Magyar-English dictionary. Please keep an eye out for some upcoming emails about Workforce Reallocations from the Provost!

Best, Henry Cotton

[The following is an audio transcript of the 2015 Willard College Commencement Address. Please do not reproduce, adulterate, or tamper with this text without the written permission of Willard College. Sections where the audio is unclear will be indicated by brackets, like the one at the end of this sentence.]

Welcome to the 2015 Willard College Commencement Experience: The Address! It will be hard to live up to last year’s Commencement, but let’s try, shall we?  First, some business. If the tear gas is causing your eyes to become irritated, remember that we have bottled water for sale at the concession stands located at the rear of each seating section. [Inaudible for 45 seconds] Apparently I missed the memo about the various efforts to subvert our beautiful Commencement. There are [inaudible], who thrive on fomenting all manner of grievance and griping about [inaudible]. They’ve been in the national news, but I am disappointed to see them spoiling our beautifully renovated cam [inaudible for 16 seconds].

The last year has been a [inaudible]. Certainly, we’ve had our [inaudible]. [Inaudible] and so Cheryl Tina Faye Cotton couldn’t join us today because she is [inaudible].

I [sound of Police and Fire emergency vehicles]. Let me just add that [inaudible] wishes the Class of 2015 a [inaudible].

[Transcriber note: President Cotton, the Provost Triumvirate, the Board of Trustees, etc. are being evacuated in a Willard College Security Armored Vehicle]

[This concludes the audio transcription].

 

“Willard College is an organism having ends, life, and means of action superior to those of individuals, singly or in groups, of which it is composed. It is a moral, political, and economic unity, realized wholly in Willard College.”

Article 1:

“Work, in all its intellectual, technical, and manual forms, is a social obligation. To this end, and only to this end, it is safeguarded by the College. The totality of production is unitary from the collegiate point of view; its objectives are unitary and comprise the well-being of the producers and the development of collegiate strength.”

Article 2:

“There is freedom of professional or union organization. But only the union legally recognized by, and subject to, the control of Willard College has the right to legally represent the entire category of employers or employees by which it is constituted […]; or to stipulate collective labor contracts binding on all those belonging to the category; or to impose on them dues, or to exercise on their behalf delegate functions of public interest.”

Article 3:

“In the collective labor contract is found the concrete expression of the solidarity of the various makers of the educational product, by means of the conciliation of the opposing interests of the employers and the workers, and their subordination to the superior interests of educational production.”

Article 4:

“Legally recognized professional associations insure the legal equality between employers and workers, maintain the discipline of educational production and work, and promotes its perfection. Willard College constitutes the unitary organizations of production and integrally represent its interests […]. Willard College is recognized legally as the organ  of Willard College […].”

Article 5:

“The corporative college considers private initiative, in the field of educational production, as the most efficient and useful instrument of the College.” ^[1]

Article 6:

“The duty of employment is under control of the collegiate organs. Employers have the obligation to hire workers who are official members of the appropriate trades, and have the power to choose from the rolls of membership, giving precedence to the members of the College employee organization  according to their seniority of membership.”

Dear President Cotton, During renovations on the old Humanities building, which is being repurposed for the new Department of Administrative Science, workers uncovered a previously unknown sub-basement office area. In the space, they encountered a group of bearded men in suits and ties, and several older women with their hair in tight buns, working behind manual typewriters, surrounded by large and dusty books.  The crew was able to determine that these people are the Willard College Classics Department. Apparently, when the program was terminated ten years ago, an email was sent to the chair. She did not know that she had an email account. Not knowing better,  they continued coming to work, wrote conference papers, prepared lectures, gave classes to no one, engaged in often violent internecine departmental policy debates, factionaled, microwaved their soup, and waited.  What were they waiting for?

I seek your guidance on how to proceed.

Dr. Larry Gross, Dean of Facilities

Dear Willard College Board of Trustees and Loyal Administrators,

In these days of higher educational doom and gloom, with reports of budget cuts, declining college-age population, and rising costs, we are all searching for the good news. Well, I’m happy to report that Sweet Briar College in Virginia is closing shop at the end of the spring semester. This is good news in an era of hysterical predictions that residential colleges cannot survive. The closure also represents a rare opportunity for Willard College to identify, recruit, and enroll, a large population of full-tuition paying students. I’ve authorized the Provost Triumvirate to commence negotiations immediately with their counterparts at Sweet Briar. We will propose our innovative ‘bundling’ admissions system, in which we admit based on cohort scores, grades, credit-ratings, and extracurriculars, rather than on the time-consuming and cost-ineffective individual admissions. Based on the number of students who choose Willard College, we will provide a group discount on tuition. Credit transfers will be dealt with once the students have adjusted to Willard College. We are also looking into how to tie this proposal into their very healthy endowment.

Gleefully, President Henry Cotton

Dr. Cheryl Tina Faye Cotton has returned to Willard College following a brief interlude at Sylvester University. While away, Dr. Cotton completed her advanced degree in Marriage Counseling.Upon hearing of her return to Willard, Dr. Cotton was named Director of the Student Out-patient Mental Hygiene Clinic. She is replacing Dr. Clifford Beers, who retired last year. As students have left campus for the break, Dr. Cotton is offering reduced-fee counseling sessions for faculty and staff who are facing any mental health challenges related to the Holiday Season. Please feel free to drop in for a session OR drop her a line and she can dispense Holiday counseling advice free of charge.

With great happiness to have Cheryl Tina Faye back,

President Henry Cotton

A friendly reminder: do not pick up hitchhikers in or around the campus. Faculty are on lock down until final grades have been posted, students have offered their responses on Ratemyprofessors.com, appealed their grades, and faculty have changed the grades in accordance with those requests.

Sincerely, The Provost Triumvirate

Dear President Cotton, Herewith, we announce that the  offices of Vice Interim Provost Lionel Brouxet, Interim Vice Provost Candy Martin  and Associate Assistant Vice Interim Provost Fulgenze deBaptiste have formed a new unitary office, hereby declared to be named The Provost Triumvirate. Into this new office shall accrue all separate powers hitherto invested in the three above mentioned offices. The Provost Triumvirate accepts under its charge all matters academic, financial, athletic, sanitary, judicial, and promotional. Moreover, and therefore, the Provost Triumvirate is charged with the powers of police and security on Willard College campus, and in the perimeter as we determine fit to maintain the safety and security of all who either reside or employ within said grounds. In the interest of ensuring a peaceful future for our campus, The Provost Triumvirate will be holding summary trials of any and all individuals involved in recent disturbances, with exceptions for those granted a priori clemency during, or before, the outbreak, of previously mentioned disturbances.

Signed, The Provost Triumvirate