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UCLA Faculty Documents
The document below left was written by my graduate faculty advisor and my division head: UCLA-GSEIS; Blurton-Jones & Val Rust Memo. This memo was their first formal statement on my termination, addressed to the Graduate School of Education. Therein, these faculty members recommend my immediate reinstatement, as the fall quarter was then in progress: "[W]e would like to recommend that Tom be allowed to continue in the program for Fall Quarter, 1996."
"We hope you will honor our request and allow him to enroll this term."
The two-page document below center and right was again written by my graduate faculty advisor and my division head: UCLA Ombudsman (p.1) / UCLA Ombudsman (p.2). This letter to the UCLA Ombudsman was cc'd to the Department Chair of the Graduate School of Education. The following paragraph in this letter sheds much light on how the university makes its crucial decision to terminate a student:
"More importantly, neither of us had been asked for any background information on Mr. Wilde's case. Nor apparently was much effort taken to verify the apparent facts of Mr. Wilde's academic record. Incompletes that had been cleared were listed as Fs and no enquiries about their real status or about the student's general progress were made."
And here again my advisor and my division head were requesting my reinstatement along with a review of the termination decision. The letter to the UCLA Ombudsman:December 16, 1996
Howard Gadlin
Ombudsman Office
1172 Career Cnter. Bldg.
Dear Howard
We are writing as advisor, and division head, in support of an appeal from Tom Wilde concerning a notice of dismissal from this department. This is a difficult time of year to deal with such a matter but the student's financial situation is desperately threatened by the department's action and so we feel the need to take steps right now. We are sending a copy of this note to our colleagues here, and to the committee originally involved.
In August Mr. Wilde received a letter from GSEIS's Committee on Graduate Degrees, Admissions and Standards (CAGDAS) dismissing him from the program. While a copy of this letter was sent to his department head, no copy was sent to his advisor. More importantly, neither of us had been asked for any background information on Mr. Wilde's case. Nor apparently was much effort taken to verify the apparent facts of Mr. Wilde's academic record. Incompletes that had been cleared were listed as Fs and no enquiries about their real status or about the student's general progress were made.
Mr. Wilde is understandably distressed about this, and while he is in receipt of a letter offering to reconsider his case if he meets a series of conditions before Jan. 8th (upon which one of us was consulted), he feels that the basic issue - dismissal without careful enquiry and verification of facts (due process?) has been ignored, and that he has been wrongly suspended from the University.
While we can certainly debate our department's procedures with our colleagues in the normal way next quarter, this is of little use to Mr. Wilde. His financial support was all based on his having student status and he is thus in immediate hardship. We would like to know whether there is any rapid intervention that you can instigate that makes it possible for him to regain his student status pending a review of his case.
Sincerely,
/s/
Val Rust,
Professor, Head of Division on Social Science and Education
/s/
Nick Blurton Jones
Professor, Advisor
cc: Eva Baker, Harold Levine, Amy Wells
Still more questions are raised by these documents on how the university operates, since these UCLA faculty members' recommendations and requests did not result in my reinstatement or a review of the termination decision.
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