Totem poles

All I wanted was a checksheet. You know, one of those pieces of paper that lists all the classes a student has to take to graduate. It has a little section for the core curriculum, and then a section for their major classes. It’s one page, surprisingly well-organized, and a must-have for any student, or adviser during advising season. The season opened yesterday, and as usual, we have already run out of our supply of checksheets. So I decided to be pro-active, and call our department secretary to see if she could email us new checksheets. A simple request, one would think. However, it was not meant to be. Our coordinator had recently put in a request for some minor changes to the checksheets, and therefore they could not email us the new checksheets. No, they had to be approved by our coordinator first. Never mind the fact that the coordinator had already handed us and several students copies of these new checksheets. Never mind that we were able to tell her that we knew he was fine with the new checksheet. Never mind that our coordinator is out sick today. And never mind that we have tens of students in need of advisement today. We will not be receiving our checksheets until the poor man returns to work. The secretary wasn’t even sure if she was supposed to send me the old checksheet, as it was outdated.

You know, I don’t mind having a boss. I was just telling husband-dear the other day that at times I like being told what to do, because it makes my life so much easier. But I still can’t get used to the steep and intricate hierarchy that is an American university. Our coordinator is outranked by our chair, who is outranked by the dean, who answers to the Provost, and various other Vice-Presidents, who answer the President himself. It’s a totem pole that would make the military proud.

I understand that large organizations need some sort of structure. We can’t just all run around and do whatever feels right. We tried that in the 1970s, and look at what happened, it produced rebellious little people like me. All universities have some sort of hierarchy with fancy names and impressive robes. But what surprised me about this particular university is that everyone takes the hierarchy seriously. Very seriously. There is no joking around with the president or the dean. Or, at least when you do, and I have, people look at you as though you have lost your mind. There is no use of first names, no bantering, and no doing favors. Ever. Are you on a Xerox machine that won’t make more than 60 copies, but you need 70 copies and you’re in a rush? Too bad. And no one will do anything without the explicit permission of their immediate supervisor. It’s mind-boggling that people with advanced degrees are so afraid of making their own decisions, and it’s beyond irksome that you can spend days waiting on a simple answer because someone’s boss is out of town. It’s one thing to not call your boss by his nickname, as we did in Holland, or to call him “boss” as I have done in the past, but it’s another when all decision-making processes are so formalized everyone seems to leave their common sense in their cars in the morning. Sometimes I feel as though the south is stuck in the 1950s, with their pantyhose, big hair, “ma’am” and “sir” and “let me talk to so and so.”

I’m not asking for a lot here. Really I’m not. They can call each other “Mr. President” and “Dean so and so” all they want, wear their pantyhose and throw babyshowers, it’s all fine by me. All I really want is my checksheets so I can keep my students happy. But I’m guessing that’s just not going to happen today.