Word: sac
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Less than one week after the head of the Institute of Politics (IOP) dissolved its Student Advisory Committee (SAC), IOP members committed to preserving student leadership in the organization presented sweeping proposals for change yesterday morning...
...decision to disband SAC, announced in a Nov. 9 breakfast meeting, was not preceeded by any meaningful process of discussion with those students who would be most directly affected. It is especially worrisome that Pryor saw fit to discuss the changes with concerned non-SAC students but did not feel that SAC members deserved to be consulted. Although SAC had been making several efforts to increase student access to leadership roles at the IOP--most notably by reducing its own size and by creating the senior associate program to devolve responsibility to students outside SAC--it was never given...
Furthermore, the decision was not just about SAC: other student-run IOP committees that provided valuable student services have also been axed or have been left in administrative limbo, with their existence after Dec. 1 unclear. Students might thus lose the benefits of IOP programs that they might have retained had the reforms emerged through discussion rather than dictate...
What organization will rise anew from SAC's ashes is still unclear. Some have worried that in pursuit of equal access to students, the IOP may not provide for any leadership roles through which students can channel their concerns. Perhaps these fears will be alleviated at this morning's breakfast meeting. Perhaps also Pryor's actions will not set a dangerous precedent, and the leaders of this new structure will not live in a state of permanent unease that they, too, may find themselves suddenly undesirable...
...happened, the damage done by Pryor's disregard for student input has undercut the benefits that may arise from any reforms. Whatever SAC's faults, the students who have devoted much of their college careers to laboring to make the IOP a better place deserve more respect than they received...