Does Smith College have a toxic atmosphere towards staff employees?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Smith College
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In my post #16, I almost exclusively reference the law firm’s report, which I hope you have also read.

The only part that I pulled from the NY Times in this post is stating that the photo, name, and email of Jackie Blair and Mr. Patenaude was released. In the law firm’s report, they have quoted her edited post, and here is an excerpt in which she apologizes for originally mis-identifying Mr. Patenaude (but not yet realizing that Jackie Blair didn’t make the call).

First and foremost, I’ve already removed any misidentifications from the post. My sincerest apologies to the man who I previously misidentified. I thought he was the man whom I took the sideview photo of during the incident, but I later found out that was incorrect. I removed any mention of his name once I found out about my error. My sincerest apologies to him and his family.

So again, I turn the question back to you. Based upon the finding of the law firm, do you or do you not see a difference in how Ms. Kanoute was treated vs. the staff?

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“So again, I turn the question back to you. Based upon the finding of the law firm, do you or do you not see a difference in how Ms. Kanoute was treated vs. the staff?”

It’s been my experience on this board that college students tend to be regarded as adults only when people disapprove of their behavior. Otherwise, the default position seems to be that twenty year-olds are “still children.” OTOH, corporate heads are loathe to issue apologies when both sides know a lawsuit is brewing. Those things are often part of settlement negotiations.

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I am not clear on Ms. Shaw’s connection to the student’s claims. I watched her video, and she states she is filing a lawsuit, from what I gather, for being treated differently based on the color of her skin because Smith required her to attend staff training sessions about racial bias, during which she felt like based on her skin color she was being accused of thinking things and doing things that she did not.

Is that her position?

Reading through the FAQs put out by Smith, the school alleges the NYT article didn’t get material things right: None of the staff in question were punished or reprimanded. One was offered leave with full pay, but the staff person declined. The school apologized to the staff. Faculty and staff both were required to do the training, which was a standard program used by many institutions.

I have read the investigation report, and watched the video. I have not looked at the Facebook posts by the student. I have read numerous articles. Here’s the crux of it, in my view:

The staff did nothing wrong - not in the initial call or in the police response. Yet, it is also entirely reasonable for an African American student to think that she was being targeted based on race, when put in context- both her personal experiences and of African Americans generally. It is a huge misunderstanding.

So the questions to me are:
In hindsight, what is the student supposed to do if she thinks she is being racially profiled?
What is the school supposed to do if they get a report of racial profiling by a student about staff?
What did the student and school do that veered from what they should have done?

The student posted on Facebook personal accusations that were not true. Not OK. But for her doing that, there would be no story.

If the school did not reprimand the staff in any way, the offending behaviors of the administration seems to be that it looked like they believed the student, and they forced training on staff. Am I leaving something out? They also retained counsel and investigated- both seem wise. What should the school have done/not done?

My impression (could be wrong) is that many first gen or BIPOC students experience interactions with authority- police, campus administrators, teachers, whoever, from a default position of assuming people don’t think they belong. Innocent interactions can easily be seen through that lens. So it isn’t shocking to me that a student would misinterpret the entire situation here - instead it being a generic set of steps taken under protocol (like frankly I would assume it was if I were in her shoes), she assumed it had to do with her specifically. It was personal to her.

So whose responsibility is it to make sure that misinterpretation doesn’t happen?

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Smith students are not ambivalent. There was a lengthy manifesto developed by the students that pushed back on the administration after the 2018 events. Student actions led to the dismissal of the incoming police chief and a restructuring of the police force, among other things. Trust me, the issues around race and class have not dropped from conversation among the students, nor is there any one opinion held by all of them.
What Smith students are not going to sign onto are poorly-researched, non-factual journalistic hit pieces like these articles, regardless of their amplification by random parents on College Confidential.

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You seem to have a huge vendetta against Smith. If you don’t like it, don’t go there!

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The behavior of Smith College reminds me a great deal about the behavior of Oberlin College in response to an unfounded claim of racism. There, an underage black student was stealing wine from a local store named Gibson’s bakery. After being arrested, instead of the college staying independent, it took the side of the student and actively sought to paint the store as being racist (apparently for trying to stop shoplifting). College administrators organized student protests against the store, with one text message saying to “unleash the students”. Gibson sued and eventually won an initial judgment of $43M. You can read more about this here:

Any rational person would have immediately recognized what Oberlin did was completely wrong. First of all, this was off campus. Second, there was no doubt regarding the theft. Any administrator with a brain would have let it play out, and if appropriate, discipline the student afterwards. Instead, there was a massive dysfunctional groupthink at Oberlin that thought it was ok to create an unfounded charge of racism and destroy a local business over it.

I am seeing similar behavior here in terms of how Smith College is treating its staff, allowing an unfounded charge of racism to ruin the careers of multiple people. Smith did just about everything wrong, and in doing so, caused a minor incident to blow up to the point where it could be facing a great deal of legal liability. It wouldn’t surprise me if there is a multi-million dollar payout in Smith’s future as well.

And all of this could have been avoided if Kathleen McCartney was even minimally competent, or barring that, had a PR person who was. Here is what the right response would have looked like:

  1. An immediate statement that Smith College takes the accusation of racism seriously and will start an investigation. And that while this investigation takes place, that students should not rush to judgment, meaning that all parties refrain from making public statements until the investigation is complete.
  2. After Ms. Kanoute’s Facebook posts doxing Smith employees (and the wrong ones as it turns out), a statement that this type of action is never ok, and that she could face disciplinary action as a result.
  3. After the report came out saying that Smith employees did nothing wrong, a public statement both recognizing Ms. Kanoute’s heartfelt belief AND the Smith employees for following protocol. In essenence, it should have been “The employees did what Smith asked them to do, and we should review our policies going forward to minimize discomfort”. And then thank both Ms. Kanoute and the employees for the cooperation in this matter.

Note that none of this is particularly hard to do. It just required an administration just slightly more competent than Oberlin College.

The real question to me is how did this massive level of dysfunction occur? And why does it occur at places that are supposed to be concerned about the well-being of people less fortunate than the student body that attends?

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Really well said. D was just at Smith for a year of Post Bacc study and, sure, if you’d be comfortable at Hillsdale College then Smith is probably not for you. So the bent on race and social justice discussions are what they are, whether one agrees with it or not. And as it was at D’s undergraduate institution, the kids at Smith like to question and poke and have strong opinions on a variety of topics. This is not a population of indifferent people.

That said, we hardly perceived any tendency of hostility towards the staff or administration there. And they LOVE Kathleen, as do we. We perceived a fairly healthy relationship between the students and the administration, and picked up on no pronounced hostility towards staff. This to me was an instance and there’s no basis IMO to generalize it as a “thing” at Smith.

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Key difference being the underlying cause of the whole mess to begin with.

The Smith student didn’t commit a crime and have a whole campus defend it with charges of racism. The Smith student’s encounter and the Oberlin student’s theft create very different contexts. This would have been an issue at a great many campuses around the country … whether any of us think it should or not. I myself don’t believe for a minute that this is rightly described in a tone of “Oh Smith what have you done now?”. University Presidents have a tough job these days and issues relating to race are at or near the top of the list. The whole country is struggling with it; it should be no surprise that our colleges are flashpoints.

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Those who haven’t read the law firm report really ought to read it before they buy into what is being pitched in this thread.

This was a 5’2" female student relaxing on a couch (with a giant teddy bear) across a hall from a cafateria and dining room where she had just been served lunch. Her lunch dishes were on the table in front of her. An employee saw there was a black person - he couldn’t even tell if she was male or femaie - on the couch, and rather than walking over to her (as he could have done according to the proper protocol) he reported her to the police for suspicious behavior.

When the officer arrived the two of them approached the student and the employee repeatedly asked her what she was doing there in a way that, according to the officer, “might not have come off as polite.” Meanwhile the officer was confused about why he had even been called . . .

The Responding Officer said that when he got closer to the Reported Party, he “recognized her right away as a student” since he had seen her around campus. The Responding Officer said that the question in his mind was, “She’s a student. What are we doing here?” He said that she had a plate of food on the table next to the couch and she was “clearly in there eating her lunch.”

Unlike what is implied in the posts above, the law firm report did not exonerate the employee. It merely found that there “was insufficient information to conclude that the Caller’s stated reason was a pretext for discrimination on the basis of the Reported Party’s race or color.” But that’s how these things work. So long as the party can come up with a viable, non-race pretense and is smart enough to stick to it, then it is extremely unlikely that the party will be found to have discriminated. The system itself provides the cover.

But come on. By the employee’s own account, all he could see was that the person on the couch was black. Would this employee have called the police on a 5’2" white female student lounging with a giant teddybear after lunch? Would he at least have walked over to see if was actually a student before calling the cops? Would he have concluded that such a student seemed “out of place?” Honestly, what are the odds he would have treated the situation the same way if he had seen white person on the couch?

Whether or not there was ultimately enough evidence to discipline the employee, the whole thing is absolutely outrageous. These colleges are supposed to be these students’ homes. They shouldn’t have the police called on them for relaxing after lunch.

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When my D and I toured Smith (admittedly, several years ago), one of the selling points was that you could eat at any of the dorms/houses, and even at other campuses. Your friends and boyfriends could be guests at your dorm or house any time. I really got the impression that there were lots of new people around all the time. If this was the summer, even more ‘strangers’ walking around, especially if this particular house was being used by high school students.

Lots of choices and privileges for Smith students, but then also some responsibility to prove who they are when asked. Is the staff supposed to question who is hanging around the dining rooms? Are the students allowed to eat outside the dining room? It sounds like the staff is supposed to call security, not confront anyone. If the security guy recognized the student, shouldn’t he have just said “Oh, no problem, I recognize this student. Thanks for keeping an eye out but she belongs here” and everyone walk away?

Honestly, I thought security was loose at Smith. The tour guide thought it was cool that anyone could come and go, guests at all times of the day and night, not escorted (I don’t remember if they had to swipe a card and if everyone’s cards worked at every building). Tour guide said everyone comes and goes all the time, for meals, for milk and cookies, for booty calls. I thought there were safety issues when touring the dorm. My D didn’t otherwise like Smith so I didn’t look into it more, but if we’d really considered it, I would have followed up about safety and security.

At the dorms my kids lived in, there were people asking who you were, show your ID, sign in guests, etc. Smith seems more casual about that, so rely on staff to make sure people who are there belong there.

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One important point you’ve omitted is that the student was in a closed section of the building and the protocol was to contact security if someone was found there. The school employee who contacted security was following the rules. The student was not.

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That’s advice I can agree with, but I recommend others read it carefully, as you missed some key points.

The janitor didn’t know that Ms. Kanoute was either 5’2" or a female. From the report:

From his call to campus police, we know that he thought the person was more likely male than female (and Ms. Kanoute confirmed this by claiming he “misgendered her”).

We also know from the investigative report that this janitor is hard of hearing. Now from his mind, there is a likely male in a closed off area in Smith College at a time when there are many summer camps for little kids, meaning security is even more important than normal. Given his communication difficulties, AND that Smith policy encourages calling security, it would be natural for him to call campus security.

Up until now, we have a misunderstanding that happened due to a combination of:

  1. A student being someplace unexpected (the part of the dining hall that was closed and not air conditioned) and largely obscured
  2. Summer camps with little kids that call for heightened security
  3. An employee with poor eyesight and difficulty of hearing
  4. A Smith policy that encourages employees to call campus security rather than confront the person themselves.

The Responding Officer was as kind and understanding as could be, and defused the situation. That, along with an apology from the administration, should have ended it. What caused this to blow up nationally were two things.

  1. Ms. Kanoute trying to ruin the lives of multiple employees.
  2. The incompetent Kathleen McCartney for allowing Ms. Kanoute to succeed in ruining their lives.
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Yeah, I think we’re all guilty of carving out specific exceptions to using common sense in the above situation. How does the employee only being able to identify the student as African American make her actions less triggering? There was one person in a deserted area next to an active dining area. Security would have had very little trouble finding them. But, in answer to the OP, do a series of missteps on both sides really add up to a toxic atmosphere? I don’t think so. But, let the lawyers have at it. Smith is still a great college; Northampton is still a great college town.

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Point of clarification: The janitor is male. The dining worker, Jackie Blair, is female.

Ms. Kanoute had a right to be upset. She had a right to make a complaint and demand an investigation. What she did not have the right to do was dox the employees to the point that they can’t get jobs despite having done nothing wrong. Jackie Blair, the dining hall worker, suffered from a recurrence of lupus due to the stress and therefore faced increased medical costs and could not find a job after being laid off due to Ms. Kanoute. Remember that the report basically said that Ms. Kanoute changed her story about Jackie’s behavior. Jackie now has legal counsel, and as you say, the lawyers will have at it. But that doesn’t undo the damage caused.

Another one of doxxed employees was Mr. Patenaude, who wasn’t even there at the time. He left Smith College due to anxiety at being called a racist.

Smith students are smart. Smart enough that they should go beyond the Pavlovian response of assuming that someone black is always the victim and someone white is always the aggressor. Prior to Smith, Ms. Kanoute attended the private Westminster high school, which has a full cost of $67k. She has extraordinary privilege, especially compared to the employees who probably make less in a full year than it costs to send someone to Smith or Westminster for a semester.

But with power and privilege comes responsibility, and that includes treating those less fortunate with kindness and understanding, even if there is a misunderstanding. Ms. Kanoute’s parents apparently failed to teach her that.

Here’s a question to all the Smith students and Smith parents out there: Why is there no mass condemnation of Ms. Kanoute’s actions, and why was there no apology from the students to the staff after the investigative report cleared them? Are they not capable of thinking for themselves despite the apparent lack of leadership from their President?

To answer this, I will close with a quote from the NY Times article:

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Oh, c’mon. You can’t argue on the one hand that this is all the fault of a “privileged” African-American student and then somehow pivot back to the president of the college as the possible savior - if only she had apologized. Apologized for who? On behalf of the student? As much as people try to draw the analogy, this isn’t Oberlin.

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You and @hebegebe and @twoinanddone try to paint a picture of the student being somewhere that she wasn’t supposed to be, as if the student had entered a restricted, higher security area or something. This was just not the case. The student was credentialed to be there, had entered through the front doors with a valid keycard, and when asked had accurately informed an employee that she was working as a teaching assistant with the summer program. The french doors to the room were shut for energy conservation purposes, but this doesn’t mean the area was closed or restricted. She had a right to be there.

First, the protocol you describe was for when employees found people in places on campus they shouldn’t have been, but this student had every right to be where they were. There was nothing suspicious about it, so no reason to call the police. As the officer indicated, this was quite obviously a student having lunch. Second, the protocol allowed for the worker to approach the person to figure out whether the person was supposed to be there or not, but the employee saw a black person and called the police instead.

Not true. The student had not broken any “rule.” The student was credentialed to be there.

The employee didn’t know these things because the employee didn’t bother to walk into the room to see whether or not this was indeed something suspicious, even though the policy allowed the employee to do so. Nor did the employee even bother to put on his glasses to get a better look. Instead, the employee saw a black person and called the police.

In your zeal to create a suspicious circumstance where none existed, you seem to be making things up.

  • There is absolutely nothing in the law firm report about “little kids.” There was a “Precollege Program” for high school kids looking to “strengthen their college applications.” The student was a teaching assistant at that camp!
  • There was absolutely nothing in the law school report about “heightened security” or even the need for “heightened security.”
  • Likewise, there is nothing in the report indicating that “a Smith policy that encourages employees to call campus security rather than confront the person themselves.” The policy allowed the employees to approach and speak to the person, but the employee saw a black person and chose to call the police rather than approach.
  • Likewise, the report did not establish that this employee did “nothing wrong” nor did it “clear” the employee. The law firm investigation had a very narrow purpose; to determine whether there was “intentional different treatment” based on race, and found there was “insufficient information to conclude that the [employee’s] stated reason was a pretext for discrimination.” That is a far cry from saying that the employee did “nothing wrong.” The report did not address potential negligence, implicit bias, best practices, or even whether the employee could have handled the situation better.

Wherever you are getting this stuff, it is not from the report.

Also, I can’t quite wrap my head around your insistence that somehow the student (or the university) owes an apology to the employee who called the cops on her for eating lunch in an area where she was authorized to be. It is too much to demand that the wrongly targeted person apologize to the person who targeted her.

Likewise, I do not understand your insistence on blaming the college for the student’s social media posts and interaction with the press. I agree the student shouldn’t have outed innocent parties on social media, but that is on her, not the college. Not the first or the last time a wronged college student reacted rashly. But what should the college have done about it? Should it have explained to the student how “privileged” she was to even be there, and told her to keep her mouth shut? How’s that fit in with your notions regarding free speech on college campuses?

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This is the NYC summary of events…

“A Summer Day

Ms. Kanoute, New York-raised, a 5-foot-2 runner and science student, was the first in her family, which had emigrated from Mali, to attend college. She worked that summer as a teaching assistant and on July 31 awoke late and stopped at the Tyler House dormitory cafeteria for lunch on her way to the gym. This account of what unfolded next is drawn from the investigative report and dozens of interviews, including with a lawyer for Ms. Kanoute, who declined several interview requests.

Student workers were not supposed to use the Tyler cafeteria, which was reserved for a summer camp program for teenagers. Jackie Blair, a veteran cafeteria employee, mentioned that to Ms. Kanoute when she saw her getting lunch there and then decided to drop it. Staff members dance carefully around rule enforcement for fear students will lodge complaints.

“We used to joke, don’t let a rich student report you, because if you do, you’re gone,” said Mark Patenaude, a janitor.

Ms. Kanoute took her food and then walked through a set of French doors, crossed a foyer and reclined in the shadowed lounge of a dormitory closed for the summer, where she scrolled the web as she ate. A large stuffed bear obscured the view of her from the cafeteria.

A janitor, who was in his 60s and poor of sight, was emptying garbage cans when he noticed someone in that closed lounge. All involved with the summer camp were required to have state background checks and campus police had advised staff it was wisest to call security rather than confront strangers on their own.

The janitor, who had worked at Smith for 35 years, dialed security.

“We have a person sitting there laying down in the living room,” the janitor told a dispatcher according to a transcript. “I didn’t approach her or anything but he seems out of place.”

The janitor had noticed Ms. Kanoute’s Black skin but made no mention of that to the dispatcher. Ms. Kanoute was in the shadows; he was not sure if he was looking at a man or woman. She would later accuse the janitor of “misgendering”.

A well-known older campus security officer drove over to the dorm. He recognized Ms. Kanoute as a student and they had a brief and polite conversation, which she recorded. He apologized for bothering her and she spoke to him of her discomfort: “Stuff like this happens way too often, where people just feel, like, threatened.”

That night Ms. Kanoute wrote a Facebook post: “It’s outrageous that some people question my being at Smith, and my existence overall as a woman of color.”

Her two-paragraph post hit Smith College like an electric charge. President McCartney weighed in a day later. “I begin by offering the student involved my deepest apology that this incident occurred,” she wrote. “And to assure her that she belongs in all Smith places.”

Ms. McCartney did not speak to the accused employees and put the janitor on paid leave that day.”

People will attribute culpability subject to their own biases but it seems like there were numerous lost opportunities to deescalate, give others the benefit of the doubt and treat one another with respect and dignity.

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There is quite a lot in the NYT summary that conflicts with the law firm’s report. For just one example, the student did have access to the facility and was “involved in the summer camp” as a teaching assistant. Rather than go through the article line-by-line, I suggest you read the law firm report rather than relying on the news report.

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This is really the key, and why comparisons to Oberlin seem to be efforts to reach a conclusion. What she was doing, while perhaps technically wrong (edit:
other posts are indicating even that is incorrect), was ridiculously harmless. I’ve walked into areas I’ve been told were “closed” or non accessible for this or that reason many times on college campuses (because I tend to wander). If someone had called campus security I’d have been really annoyed and if I were black even more so. The guy should have walked closer to accurately assess what he was doing, especially so if he knows he has bad eyesight. I don’t endorse ruining anyone’s life and preventing people from obtaining gainful employment is a not cool. But, again, this doesn’t strike me as “Oh Smith what have you done?” That is to say, I don’t blame Kathleen for advocating for her student in the first instance given the facts.

Stealing wine? Different story.

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[quote=“circuitrider, post:33, topic:2106617”]
But, in answer to the OP, do a series of missteps on both sides really add up to a toxic atmosphere? I don’t think so.

This right here.

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