Maybe it's the lab reports waiting for my pen, or maybe it's just the cheery Halloweenie spirit that my backwards uni adminstrators have.Our whole department got this link in our emails this morning from a Dean with the subject line: "How to spice up Friday!"
The only reason I'm not firebombing the place today is because some of the review comments, like this one:
I really wanted to like this enough to order it. However, it's not exactly accurate. It should come with a pack of stale cigarettes and some ramen noodles. The robe needs armpit stains and some random splashes of laser cartridge toner down the front. Overall, the ensemble doesn't capture that unique combination of exhaustion, resignation, and despair achieved after the degree is conferred and the first loan bill has arrived four months after the wearer sent out 75 job applications to which she has not yet received any response aside from three affirmative action cards from the same HR department at Northeast Western Montana State College. I do commend the designer, however, for suggesting an alternative funding model for that grim day when the stipend runs out.
Those reviews are pretty funny. After reading them, I hope you do come to your senses and at least firebomb the dean's office. What a shitbag.
ReplyDeleteI think the dean needs to have a long, quiet chat with the HR people about sexual harassment policies.
ReplyDeleteWhere is the male equivalent of this costume? (not that I really want to see any of my colleagues in it, but it should exist)
ReplyDeleteJonathan Dresner beat me to it, but I was going to say, at my school that would (rightly, I think) be regarded as sexual harassment, especially if it was sent out as a broadcast. Hell, I'd be offended by it, and I'm a man.
ReplyDeleteHad I received such an email at my institution, I would inform the sender to quickly issue a retraction to the effect of "sorry, my email account was hacked and IT is looking into the incident." I just cannot fathom the lack of judgement, and while an institution might weather the thought that its leadership is incompetent, it is more damaging when they provide such direct evidence. On second thought, it's good when idiots reveal themselves, provided they can be rapidly replaced with their betters.
DeleteHard to believe the dean gets away with that, but of course anyone at the top of the hierarchy can get away with lots, since the underlings don't want to risk contradicting the person who determines their salary increases, promotions, tenure, etc.
ReplyDeleteHere in glorious socialist workers' state of California, even a dean or even a higher-up wouldn't get away with this shit, particularly not when it's so well documented. Someone with tenure should blow the whistle. I'd be glad to, but this isn't at my institution. (TWITCH! TWITCH!) I giggle with delight to see a dean taken down.
DeleteNah....he'll use the Katie defense...someone else did it...
DeleteBingo!
DeleteHas your dean perchance confused Halloween with April Fool's Day?
ReplyDeleteThat's firebomb worthy!
Wait, Professor Chiltepin is a man? I never once clued in to that all these years.
Thank you! :)
Delete(facepalm) Ouch!
ReplyDeleteThe dean reminds me of my last department head who, apparently, fancied himself a lady's man, despite an institutional policy banning sexual harassment. He probably thought himself sufficiently important there that rules and regulations didn't apply to him.
And the cap in the ad is wrong for a PhD. But maybe the PhD Tam just wasn't right. A Henry the XIII look!
ReplyDeleteAt my alma mater, the graduation gown was usually a black robe and a mortarboard, even for doctorates. (I think one department had red for their Ph. D.s.) The hood was the colour corresponding to one's discipline.
DeleteHowever, the gown changed the higher one's degree was. Bachelors had a light robe with half sleeves. Masters had the same robe, but the sleeves were 3/4 length.
Doctoral gowns were made from thicker material, had sleeves were all the way down to the wrist, and had 3 thick stripes of velvet. It was rather heavy, as I recall.
Here's an old item from the New York Times giving an explanation:
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2005/06/05/weekinreview/20050605_GOWNS_GRAPHIC.html
On the plus side, it looks cooler than standard academic garb (which, as QWV points out, can get heavy, and hence stifling in the late May/early June and/or late Aug./early Sept. heat in which academicals are often worn). On the minus, the range of things one could wear under it would be considerably more limited (and, as Charlotte Anne points out, a lot of us, male and female, are probably better off with a bit more covering).
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, that dean should be looking for a new job as of about 10 a.m. yesterday (either that, or he should get back in his time machine and return to the mid-20th-century). I'm sympathetic to the socially inept, since I fall pretty far on that end of the scale myself, but this doesn't even count as a judgment call.