Hold your nose

Thank God the elections will be over in a couple of days.  If the campaigns have demonstrated anything, they have demonstrated that the nation is full of people who are diametrically opposed to working with anyone other than their clones.  This does not bode well for our future.

Similar kinds of self destructive things happen in our departments.  For instance, my department is currently discussing the prospects of writing a grant to replace our research NMR.  This will require all our NMR users to work together in the effort.  Some are withholding any activity toward the grant until the university promises to hire an NMR technician.  Do we need an NMR technician?  Perhaps, but holding up any progress toward resolving our NMR needs problem, which is real, does not serve the faculty members withholding their effort or the department.

A department needs to be a community working together for a common good.  Even with budget problems and administrators who care more about six year graduation rates than education and the careers of our graduates.  The department faculty need to work together to use with the budget they have and educate administrators and students alike.  Stamping our feet and saying, "It's our way or no way!" is never appropriate in an academic department or a state house or congress.  Our students deserve better, colleagues deserve better, our state deserves better, and our nation deserves better.

T.S. Hall