How would you feel? How would you feel if you were randomly and unexpectedly called into your boss’s office one day and told that you were being moved? No questions asked. You have two weeks to move from the place that you have been working and making a living at for 20 years. I would feel completely disrespected, but at the same time, I would feel powerless. And I would feel powerless because a large institution treated me with so much cruelty, that my 20 years of service to this institution and to an entire community garnered no respect. Not even enough respect to give me any sort of choice whatsoever.

This is apparently what 20 years of Ken Glover’s service means to the Cornell administration. And while Mr. Glover, Resident House Director at Ujamaa, has been temporarily reinstated for this school year — only because there was such a high demand for his reinstatement — the administration has already come out and said that he will NOT be a candidate for the Ujamaa RHD position when Cornell begins a “national search” in the spring.

Mr. Glover has handled this catastrophe of a situation with much more class and dignity than I, or anyone else, would.

What does it mean for Cornell Residential Programs Director Joseph Burke to call Ken Glover into his office on a summer afternoon and give him the news that he had been reassigned to High Rise 5? Mr. Glover was given no prior notice, which obviously means that he had no bearing on the decision. This was the first in a series of strategic moves by Cornell’s administration to reassign Mr. Glover.

Why during the summer? Because there was no students on campus, which would enable direct reaction to Mr. Glover’s sudden reassignment. Additionally, the decision to reassign Mr. Glover had already been made and finalized when Mr. Glover got to Mr. Burke’s office. The decision was so completely finalized that Mr. Glover’s replacement had already been hired.

This means that the Cornell administration must have made the decision to replace Mr. Glover before school had even ended last year. There is absolutely no way that such a decision, which would include an application process and most likely multiple rounds of interviews could be made and carried out within a month. Mr. Glover’s job had to be in jeopardy in May or even in April. But he found out on June 29, when no students were at school to support him.

It should also be noted that Mr. Glover’s reassignment is a breech of conduct. Program house directors CAN NOT be interchanged with house directors of other residence halls on campus. Program houses are different than traditional campus dorms because of their specialized nature. For example, you can’t just move someone from Balch to Just About Music, because they serve a completely different purpose, and because JAM obviously has specific needs, which are different from a place like Balch or Dickson. But Cornell’s administration did this anyway.

What reasons did the administration give for Mr. Glover’s reassignment? Bear with me because the reasons have changed over time.

At first, the administration said that they were moving Mr. Glover due to the economy, and that staff were being moved and/or cut in order to be more cost-effective. But then after Mr. Glover was temporarily reinstated, the administration came out and said that there will be a “national search” for Ujamaa’s new RHD starting this spring. How can you have an expensive national search when you are explicitly saying that the economic downturn is the reason that Mr. Glover was moved in the first place?

Having seen the inconsistencies in their reasoning, the administration repositioned itself and now is saying that it was a “personnel” decision. Apparently, the administration wants to have a quicker turnover ratio with regards to RHD’s of program houses, meaning that having the same position for 20 years is too long. In fact, if it were up to the administration, Mr. Glover probably would have been gone 10 years ago.

One student, who even went and met with Joe Burke himself, has said since that Mr. Burke has been at Cornell for four years, and since Mr. Burke also wants to have a four-year turnover ratio, it would make sense that he would want to move Ken Glover now.

Uh, no, that doesn’t make sense. Why would Cornell want to remove an exemplary worker who has done more for the Cornell community than any one member of the administration? Why do Mr. Glover’s contributions to Ujamaa and to Cornell have no bearing on the decision whatsoever? Or are his contributions the reason why he lost his job in the first place?

Mr. Burke and Vice President for Student and Academic Services Susan Murphy ’73 have asserted that the full reinstatement of Mr. Glover is an issue that the administration is not willing to reconsider with regards to program houses. The administration will not rethink this decision.

Cornell’s “commitment to diversity” follows the policy of “Open Doors, Open Hearts, and Open Minds.” This decision, made in the summer, with no students in site and without Mr. Glover’s knowledge was not made with “Open Doors.” The staunch position of Cornell’s administration to not reconsider full reinstatement certainly does not reflect an attitude of “Open Minds.” And finally, the harsh nature of how the administration got rid of Mr. Glover, by no means shows that administrators have “Open Hearts.” This decision was entirely heartless, and to take it one step further, it was gutless.

Which goes back to the reason why Mr. Glover has been removed in the first place. There is no real explanation that the administration can give. The decision is ideologically based on political and racial motives, and this is why administrators are stuttering. As I said before, Mr. Glover’s work has been exemplary. And the strength of cultural unity and identity at Ujamaa is unparalleled on this campus. Furthermore, Ujamaa provides a political forum to speak about racialized issues. This is a threat to the administration’s image of Cornell’s future — and this is why the Cornell administration wanted to get rid of Mr. Glover.

Navid Farnia is a senior in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. He may be reached at nfarnia@cornellsun.com. Over the “Line” appears alternate Thursdays this semester,