There will be another KLAW meeting tonight at the Coffee House at 9PM.  If you are unable to attend, the meeting will be streaming live a few minutes before we begin at www.stickam.com/albionklaw and will be available for viewing online sometime Friday.  So, stop by, tune in, or download, but whatever you do, be there. Remember:  THIS MATTERS TO US!

Tomorrow is the big Senate meeting with Drs. Randall and Conner.  Please e-mail your question to albionklaw@gmail.com or post them on the Facebook page.

Our questions need to be answered!

Mission Statement of KLAW:

On the 24th day of February in the year 2010, students and alumni came together to establish a group hereby called “Keeping Liberal Arts at Work” (KLAW). This group was formed in response to the recently issued resolution by the Board of Trustees, and is explicitly separate from the private interests of faculty and/ or staff. Most importantly, KLAW exists to express the student body’s commitment to:

1. Preservation of the liberal arts standard at Albion College;

2. Protection of the institution of tenure, in accordance with student and staff handbooks;

3. Creation of budget transparency policy and accountability of its administration via preserving the fiscal integrity at Albion College, without compromising the academic integrity of this institution;

4. KLAW decides to remain actively in support of this matter.

We have received approval for a table for all of next week between the hours of 11AM and 1PM.  Please drop your letters off or simply come by if you have any questions or want to talk.  We will have door decorations/window flyers available.

*Attention Everyone Writing Letters*

The members of KLAW were denied a table in the KC on friday as the school does not (yet) recognize us as an official group.  As stated last night at the meeting, we were hoping to be in a public location to collect letters written regarding our discontent.  If you were unaware of this, there is an outline below on our Tumblr page.  Please Please Please take 5 minutes and write one, sign it, and have it be sent to KC Box 5827.  Suggest also for a few friends to write them too - we have power in numbers.

Thanks so much and KLAW is looking forward to receiving them.

-KLAW

Here’s a nice little door dec, window hanging, general sign you can print out if you’d like.  Special thanks to Ally Norris!

We at Keeping Liberal Arts at Work would like to thank the Pleiad for reporting and running at such a turbulent time on campus and urge each and everyone of you to have your say through that venue as well. The Pleiad would love any information you may be able to give them and is more then willing to post any and all op/ed articles that students and staff write. You are also able to comment on their articles either providing a name or anonymous. The Pleiad is a fantastic source here on campus and please use it. They are protected under the Constitution and are able to print whatever they need to (so long as its true)! That being said, if you want to send the Pleiad anything anonymously feel free to email us (albionklaw@gmail.com) and we’ll send it to them that way.

One fantastic article written by Albion senior Mark Kluk on this situation can be found here.

Any and all articles can be submitted to the Pleiad via Mikki Burger (mwb10@albion.edu).

As promised at the meeting last night, here is the list of actions we will be taking on a day to day basis.

FRIDAY: THIS MATTERS TO US! Put up sheet signs, post signs in your windows, etc. That say “This Matters to Us” and “Support the Faculty”. Basically, we’re trying to make the Administration aware that we know what’s happening, and we’re not happy.

MONDAY: ALBION GEAR SOLIDARITY AND SENATE MEETING! Monday night is the student senate meeting and Donna Randall will be there to both explain her side of the story in this situation and (hopefully) take questions from concerned students. So, this is an important day for solidarity. Wear your Albion College gear and Albion College colors. Show the whole campus-students, faculty, staff and administration-that this is our school and we have pride for the school. Please continue to wear all of this gear to the Senate meeting as well.

A note about the Senate meeting: There are going to be a lot of us there and a lot of us are going to have important things to say. We urge you to come prepared with your own letter and your own questions. But for the take of time management and the fact that this time needs to be well spent, we will be taking any and all questions you may have at our email address (albionklaw@gmail.com). That way if we receive a huge amount of questions we can consolidate, plenty of people have the same concerns.

TUESDAY: SUPPORT THE FACULTY DAY! This is day for showing our support to the faculty. We at KLAW are personally getting together to cook some goodies for the professors as well as a write a letter of support in behalf of Keeping Liberal Arts at Work. This letter will be made public at this time via both this tumblr and the Pleiad. What you can do is help us out? Don’t have time to bake? Just make sure you let your staff know that you appreciate their work here on campus and you support them in whatever may happen. Write an email, drop a letter off, bring a stressed prof a cup of coffee, just give them a hug. Do what you want, just show them you care!

WEDNESDAY: BUDGET TRANSPARENCY DAY! One of the biggest goals here at KLAW is budget transparency. We understand that this college and the entire nation is under economic stress, especially here in the state of Michigan. We as students and paying members of this institution, however, have no access to the budget or idea as to where our money is going. On this day, we please ask you to go to Ferguson and ask for the budget. Please do so politely and respect the people in the building. Not more then one or two students should go in at a time. You will probably be told no. Do not make a fuss. Just thank the staff for their time and be on your merry way. There is no harm in asking for the budget and you will not get in trouble. The simple fact that a large number of us will be asking is enough.

If you in any way, do not feel comfortable in doing this do not do so. There are plenty of other ways to get involved. It is just important that you do get involved.

THURSDAY: POST IT! Today is another faculty and department day. Have a favorite prof (or five)? Write some post it notes and stick them up around campus and keep doing it all day. Tell your profs you love them and why all around campus. This way the whole campus can see. We recommend logging into ACIS and doing at least one note per prof you’ve had. I know we’ve all got favorites, but its important to support everyone. KLAW will meet to create a mass of post-it notes the night before. This meeting time will be shared.

Pending information received before this day, there may also be another step to Thursday. We will keep you posted.

FRIDAY: PRESENTING THE PETITION AND LETTERS DAY! All week we will be in the KC with both a petition as well as collecting letters. Please stop by and drop off a letter into the box. We will personally be delivering them on Friday to Donna Randall’s office. The form letter is below, feel free to just copy that out and hand write it or write your own.

Let this be known to everyone who was or wasn’t in attendance at the meeting:

We are not supporting or condoning any sort of action that breaks local, state, or federal laws. In addition we are not going to be violating any of the rules of the student handbook. If any of these actions are done in the name of the staff and faculty they are not done in our name (KLAW).