New statement from President Schill

[mshelton33]

Ensuring Northwestern Athletics Program Reflects Our Values: Leadership Notes - Northwestern University

I write to you today to give you my commitment that I will continue to do whatever is necessary to address this situation and ensure that our athletic program remains one you can be proud of and one that is fully aligned with and reflects our values.

www.northwestern.edu

Not much new information from Schill about the results of the investigation or the looming lawsuits from Fitz and from former players. He did announce an outside firm will be engaged to further evaluate Northwestern Athletics:

"We will implement the Faculty Senate’s prior request that we engage an outside firm to evaluate the sufficiency of our accountability mechanism including the Committee on Athletics and Recreation and our ability to detect threats to the welfare of student-athletes. I also believe it is important to examine closely the culture of Northwestern Athletics and its relationship to the academic mission. Both of these reviews will be conducted with feedback and engagement of faculty, staff and students, and both will be made publicly available."

 

[peatymeanis]

Surprising how bad NU is at public comms when it has perhaps the world's best marketing school

 

[BillMedleyFan]

History will look favorably on Dr Schill. He is active and accountable. Northwestern is lucky to have this man!

 

[ashley0623]

History will look favorably on Dr Schill. He is active and accountable. Northwestern is lucky to have this man!

Thanks, Dr. Schill.

 

[FeralFelidae]

History will look favorably on Dr Schill. He is active and accountable. Northwestern is lucky to have this man!

I suspect you are the poster formerly known as catscratch (among others).

 

[CatManTrue]

Thanks, Dr. Turk.

FIFY.

Welcome back, Turk AKA @BillMedleyFan . We’ve missed you.

 

[BosCat]

History will look favorably on Dr Schill. He is active and accountable. Northwestern is lucky to have this man!

Key word: "Schill"

Maybe we can call Bill a Schill Dr

 

[ashley0623]

FIFY.

Welcome back, Turk AKA @BillMedleyFan . We’ve missed you.

Last time I checked Turk's FB group, he was campaigning to start a groundswell movement among the students to picket outside of Fitz's house to capture national attention.

 

[StreamCat]

FIFY.

Welcome back, Turk AKA @BillMedleyFan . We’ve missed you.

Until BillMedleyFan writes “Fans wanna know!!!!!”with a liberal use of exclamation points, I won’t believe it. 😀

 

[CappyNU]

History will look favorably on Dr Schill. He is active and accountable. Northwestern is lucky to have this man!

Ok, he's finally done. Apologies for slow-playing this one.

 

[PurpleWhiteBoy]

History will look favorably on Dr Schill. He is active and accountable. Northwestern is lucky to have this man!

History already shows that Oregon president Dr. Michael Schill served as chairman of the Pac-12 CEO Group, which is comprised of the 12 university presidents for that conference.

The day before his tenure as chairman ended, UCLA and USC announced they were leaving the Pac 12, a devastating blow to every school in the conference.

Dr. Schill did not issue a statement on behalf of the Pac 12 or the University of Oregon, leaving that to everybody else.
Nor did he publicly address the University of Oregon students, faculty or athletic teams on the ramifications for the university.

 

[fcmchi]

Schill and the AD dealt with this in a ham-handed, sophomoric way. But the interview in the Trib with former NU player Lloyd Yates suggests NU has a bigger problem than those two.

And the revelations in that article, at least to me, makes defending Fitz a lot more difficult.

 

[FeralFelidae]

Last time I checked Turk's FB group, he was campaigning to start a groundswell movement among the students to picket outside of Fitz's house to capture national attention.

How large is Turk's FB group and are there lots of students or are they mostly boomers? I thought I read here that it's a closed group, so I wonder how many members it could have and how he intends to spur a groundswell movement of students with what I presume (but correct me if I'm wrong) to be a limited audience of mostly older fans.

 

[FeralFelidae]

Schill and the AD dealt with this in a ham-handed, sophomoric way. But the interview in the Trib with former NU player Lloyd Yates suggests NU has a bigger problem than those two.

NU is facing disastrous lolsuits precisely because of the way those two handled it. So yes, I consider them to be big problems.

But even if they are "smaller" problems, they are still problems and NU would be wise to dispense with them.

 

[fcmchi]

You’re probably right on both counts. But they didn’t create the problems in the locker room nor be at the helm of the teams that perpetrated them.

And even if they had been in front of the tide with a four game suspension of Fitz, these lawsuits would have been filed and these horrendous revelations would have become known.

 

[PurpleWhiteBoy]

You’re probably right on both counts. But they didn’t create the problems in the locker room nor be at the helm of the teams that perpetrated them.

And even if they had been in front of the tide with a four game suspension of Fitz, these lawsuits would have been filed and these horrendous revelations would have become known.

Just to play devil's advocate, you used the word "horrendous" presumably to describe actions that were alleged to take place between the players...

Yet it appears that no player is facing discipline from the university. Does that make sense to you?
Or do you think suspensions / expulsions are forthcoming?

 

[fcmchi]

Just to play devil's advocate, you used the word "horrendous" presumably to describe actions that were alleged to take place between the players...

Yet it appears that no player is facing discipline from the university. Does that make sense to you?
Or do you think suspensions / expulsions are forthcoming?

Given the privacy concerns I doubt that there will be any official announcements if in fact someone is disciplined.

 

[HappyNUyear]

How large is Turk's FB group and are there lots of students or are they mostly boomers? I thought I read here that it's a closed group, so I wonder how many members it could have and how he intends to spur a groundswell movement of students with what I presume (but correct me if I'm wrong) to be a limited audience of mostly older fans.

1.5K last time I checked.

 

[FeralFelidae]

1.5K

How many of them are Turk?

 

[HappyNUyear]

How many of them are Turk?

1

 

[CappyNU]

How large is Turk's FB group and are there lots of students or are they mostly boomers? I thought I read here that it's a closed group, so I wonder how many members it could have and how he intends to spur a groundswell movement of students with what I presume (but correct me if I'm wrong) to be a limited audience of mostly older fans.

Based on the absolutely horrific spelling and grammar found throughout the group's posts, along with the fact that current students wouldn't touch Facebook with a 30-foot pole, I'm leaning mostly boomer

 

[WestCoastWildcat]

Ensuring Northwestern Athletics Program Reflects Our Values: Leadership Notes - Northwestern University

I write to you today to give you my commitment that I will continue to do whatever is necessary to address this situation and ensure that our athletic program remains one you can be proud of and one that is fully aligned with and reflects our values.

www.northwestern.edu

Not much new information from Schill about the results of the investigation or the looming lawsuits from Fitz and from former players. He did announce an outside firm will be engaged to further evaluate Northwestern Athletics:

"We will implement the Faculty Senate’s prior request that we engage an outside firm to evaluate the sufficiency of our accountability mechanism including the Committee on Athletics and Recreation and our ability to detect threats to the welfare of student-athletes. I also believe it is important to examine closely the culture of Northwestern Athletics and its relationship to the academic mission. Both of these reviews will be conducted with feedback and engagement of faculty, staff and students, and both will be made publicly available."

I have mentioned I served on the UC San Diego
version of the oversight committee for intercollegiate athletics and recreation. It was composed of a mixture of staff, faculty and boosters. I think there were 4-5 faculty members including the faculty rep to the NCAA. My experience serving on the committee for 5-6 yrs that members were heavily dependent on staff esp the AD and to be honest we basically rubber-stamped proposals brought before us. We would have been ill-equipped to have dealt with issues the magnitude NU is facing with hazing. We were generally informed of employment issues like hiring and firing after the fact. I don’t know the level of authority NU’s committee on athletics and recreation actually has. I think the faculty generally had some authority, esp the faculty rep to the NCAA has had impact as a close advisor to our AD and his staff.

I think UCSD’s Academic Senate has a separate committee on intercollegiate athletics and recreation composed of their members but the impact has been neglible. The biggest role these ad hoc committees have had lately at UCSD was gathering public support on the faculty vote to move up to DI from DII status. There are administrative oversight roles for these committees but their impact in the past has minimal. It will be interesting to see if the hazing scandal will activate more actual power and responsibility for these groups at NU regarding athletics. I have to think current NU committee members are thinking hard about their further participation considering the lawsuits that are coming down the pike.

 

[NUCat320]

It’s really amazing that these dopes haven’t answered a single reporter question since the initial release.

 

[CappyNU]

It’s really amazing that these dopes haven’t answered a single reporter question since the initial release.

It's probably for the best, lest they open themselves up to even more lawsuits unwittingly.

 

[IGNORE2]

Given the privacy concerns I doubt that there will be any official announcements if in fact someone is disciplined.

Ummmm…referral for prosecution has no privacy. Also, not sure what privacy players have during athletic events. I had to sign over any and every right.

Ok, let’s say it’s in the dorm, or argue that locker room is not part of athletic umbrella, then we are talking about black and white assault charges or various types… and again, I find no privacy rights at play.

I didn’t practice in this area, though I aced civ law and con law classes, but maybe one of the better lawyers here can find the privacy right…. Seems like people believe there are a lot more privacy right in this country than truly exist.

 

[FeralFelidae]

I didn’t practice in this area, though I aced civ law and con law classes, but maybe one of the better lawyers here can find the privacy right….

As any good lawyer should know, the privacy right resides in a penumbra.

 

[PURPLE Book Cat]

Amazing how one person can irreparably damage a generational legacy in such a short period of time.

 

[fcmchi]

Ummmm…referral for prosecution has no privacy. Also, not sure what privacy players have during athletic events. I had to sign over any and every right.

Ok, let’s say it’s in the dorm, or argue that locker room is not part of athletic umbrella, then we are talking about black and white assault charges or various types… and again, I find no privacy rights at play.

I didn’t practice in this area, though I aced civ law and con law classes, but maybe one of the better lawyers here can find the privacy right…. Seems like people believe there are a lot more privacy right in this country than truly exist.

Bob,

i was referring to the NU practice of not revealing the reason a player was suspended from play. The case of Venric March, for example. He was suspended for violating “team policy”. If the school suspends anyone for being involved in hazing I suspect they would follow the same policy.

If there are any criminal charges, then you are right, everyone would know about it.

 

[Hkjb]

A non-statement overall, but there is an interesting tell, and an even more interesting contradiction.

1. Gragg in front: Schill states that based on the investigation, 'Combe Family Vice President for Athletics & Recreation Derrick Gragg and I announced....' Not-so-subtle way to point blame? Or is he painting Gragg as part of the solution.

2. The "he should have known" problem: Baseball team members are now saying that they tried to reach Dr. Gragg to report the problems with Foster, and were denied access. That's much worse than the 'he should have known' case against Fitz. We have an AD who prides himself on inclusion and athlete wellbeing, avoiding contact with athletes under duress. Nobody has ever claimed Fitz closed his door on team member - current or former for that matter.

Honestly, Schill and Gragg need to go. Burn it down and restart with a clean slate, and hire people to care rather than weasel-like careerists. Meanwhile, we have basketball....

 

[IGNORE2]

A non-statement overall, but there is an interesting tell, and an even more interesting contradiction.

1. Gragg in front: Schill states that based on the investigation, 'Combe Family Vice President for Athletics & Recreation Derrick Gragg and I announced....' Not-so-subtle way to point blame? Or is he painting Gragg as part of the solution.

2. The "he should have known" problem: Baseball team members are now saying that they tried to reach Dr. Gragg to report the problems with Foster, and were denied access. That's much worse than the 'he should have known' case against Fitz. We have an AD who prides himself on inclusion and athlete wellbeing, avoiding contact with athletes under duress. Nobody has ever claimed Fitz closed his door on team member - current or former for that matter.

Honestly, Schill and Gragg need to go. Burn it down and restart with a clean slate, and hire people to care rather than weasel-like careerists. Meanwhile, we have basketball....

I suppose the Fitz for AD idea has passed…