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OPINION: Nearly a year after leaders promised investigation, officials meet with bishop
University of Nebraska President Jeffrey Gold apologized for a drag show “Mass” and provided further updates on the school’s promised investigation into the controversy.
Gold made the comments during a recent meeting with Bishop James Conley, the leader of the Catholic Diocese of Lincoln.
The meeting followed a promise last year that school officials would look into the performance and convene a committee to address future controversies. The College Fix has extensively covered the situation, including the lack of transparency surrounding who exactly sits on the committee and how to get in touch.
“President Gold said the university system is taking an overall approach to addressing ethical concerns on campus,” Bp. Conley wrote in an update posted on Friday. “He told me incidents like the mock ‘Mass’ dissertation project don’t make the university better and don’t make society better.”
Conley also reported on the meeting:
“A failure of communication and judgment tripped us up,” President Gold told me. He said there was a problem with the academic advisor and the dissertation committee. He said the advising faculty and the student did not understand the impact or potential impact and the advisor should have notified campus leadership. “In this case, the student may have met the qualifications for a degree but neglected the implications.
A regent backed up the criticism of the drag show, questioning why someone had to mock Catholicism.
“Why mock another’s religion, race, political beliefs?” Regent Timothy Clare said. “Blowing out your candle doesn’t make mine burn brighter.”
The university system president also backed up a point made by this author – namely, that the thesis never should have taken place in the first place.
Bp. Conley reported:
President Gold said then-Chancellor Bennett met with the grad committee involved and made it clear there should have been a different process. “They should have told the student to find a different dissertation project.” He added that everyone needs to understand academics doesn’t live in a silo, but in the real world, and the implications of actions need to be considered. President Gold said “guardrails” have now been put in place and that the faculty advisor was made “painfully aware” of his or her failure in this instance.
The performer, M. Joseph Willette, earned his doctoral degree in musical composition based on the “Mass.”
That degree is the worst-performing degree at the entire University of Nebraska-Lincoln system, The Fix previously reported.
Despite this fact, it has survived planned cuts by school officials, who are trimming back other majors and graduate degrees.
