The fall semester brought a number of interesting and even controversial visitors to campus. In November Republican presidential candidate Arthur Fletcher, who considers himself "the father of affirmative action," spoke on "The Evolution of Affirmative Action: Past, Present, and the Foreseeable Future."
Using the slogan "Send five and keep affirmative action alive," Fletcher entered the race for the presidency in July, urging his party not to abandon minorities and the working poor. He hoped to raise funds through $5 contributions from individuals, intending to campaign by bus and recreate the "freedom rides" of the 1960s.
Fletcher was appointed chairman of the Civil Rights Commission in 1990 and served in that capacity until 1993. A promoter of affirmative action programs while serving in the administrations of four Republican presidents, he laments that current GOP politics dictate that "there's not a ghost of a chance of Republican candidates being nominated . . . unless they engage in the race-baiting, gender-bashing tactics of the moment." He says he's running, at least in part, "to see to it that the party doesn't completely end up abandoning the middle, where the majority of votes live."
Fletcher's lengthy record of civil rights advocacy dates back to 1954 when, while teaching at a rural elementary school in Kansas, he helped raise money for the landmark Brown v. Board of Education desegregation suit. He has since held several positions in the public and private sectors, including assistant secretary of labor for employment standards, executive director of the United Negro College Fund, and deputy assistant to the president for urban affairs. He is currently the president and chief executive officer of Fletcher's Learning Systems and publisher of USA Tomorrow/the Fletcher Letter in Washington, D. C.
Another speaker in November, Shirley Malcom, proved even more controversial since she addressed a topic, ability grouping, that has caused much acrimonious debate in the Ithaca City School District this year.
Head of the Directorate for Education and Human Resources Programs at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Malcom is particularly interested in what schools can do to educate larger numbers of students more effectively in the sciences and ways in which effective instruction can be achieved in heterogeneous, mixed-ability classrooms. She is also a member of the President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology and the governing board of the New Standards Project, a group established to create national education standards in the sciences.
In addition to her presentation on campus, Malcom met with teachers at Ithaca High School. Her visit was part of the Educational Forums Series sponsored by the Ithaca College Center for Teacher Education.
Finally, the Gerontology Institute's Distinguished Speaker Series presented SeniorNet founder and president Mary S. Furlong, who spoke on "Creating an On-Line Community for Older Adults." Her talk included a description of SeniorNet's on-line services and its World Wide Web page. A not-for-profit organization for older adults interested in computer technology, SeniorNet now has 75 learning centers and more than 17,000 members.
Furlong, a faculty member at the University of San Francisco who
currently serves on the U.S. National Commission on Libraries
and Information Science, began her work with computers and seniors
in 1982 by organizing a series of computer literacy workshops.
Soon after, she coauthored the book Computers for Kids over
Sixty.