[NYTr] Guerrilla Teacher: Ward Chuchill Returns to CU Teach Unofficial Class
 
Date: Wed, 3 Oct 2007 23:30:55 -0500 (CDT)

Via NY Transfer News Collective  *  All the News that Doesn't Fit
 
The Daily Camera - Oct 3, 2007
http://dailycamera.com/news/2007/oct/03/churchill-returns-for-unsanctioned-class-prof/

Ward Churchill returns to CU for unsanctioned class;
Controversial ex-professor bars press from classroom

By Heath Urie

Former University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill on Tuesday began
what he told students would become a series of classes held at the
school despite being fired from his position in July.

Churchill elicited applause and handshakes from the majority of the 30
or so CU students and area residents who came to hear his lecture,
which he titled "ReVisioning American History: Colonization, Genocide
and Formation of the U.S. Settler State."

Churchill, who did not allow the Camera to attend the class, said the
group would come up with various topics to discuss.

"I've been invited by people who are concerned with content of the
mind," Churchill said.

Churchill sparked a national furor in 2005 after his essay on the Sept.
11 terrorist attacks called some victims "little Eichmanns," a
reference to Adolf Eichmann, who helped carry out Hitler's plan to
exterminate Europe's Jews during World War II.

The controversial former professor was invited to speak in a classroom
at CU's Eaton Humanities Building by a group of student supporters who
rented out the space. Churchill handed out a class syllabus, which
includes scheduled classes to be held Oct. 9 about colonialism, Oct. 23
on genocide and Oct. 30 about racism.

A written introduction to the class states that it "carries no credit,
fulfills no institutional requirements, involves payment of no tuition,
entails no paycheck to its instructor. ... It is therefore in no sense
bound by the rules supposedly governing courses offered in the
university catalogue."

Aaron Smith, a 24-year-old senior political science and ethnic
studiesmajor, said he helped organize the class because he and other
students wanted to hear what Churchill had to say.

"We were deprived of his teaching," Smith said of the university's
decision to fire Churchill, who taught American Indian studies. "He was
one of the most valuable professors we've had on this campus."

CU regents voted 8-1 to fire Churchill because of academic-misconduct
violations. Churchill has not been allowed to hold official classes on
the campus since May 2006, when a panel of scholars found patterns of
deliberate academic-misconduct violations, including plagiarism and
fabrication.

Tuesday's class, which student organizers said would likely continue
for three weeks and then reconvene in the spring for a "second
semester," is not sanctioned by the university. University spokesman
Bronson Hilliard on Tuesday emphasized that Churchill was speaking at a
"private event."

The event drew the attendance of former Churchill students and those
who had only heard his name before through media reports of his
controversial tenure at CU.

"I'm coming into this very skeptical," said Russell Hedman, a
21-year-old senior political science major at CU. "I'm skeptical that
there's something here that I'm missing b but I'm also coming into this
with an open mind."

Kelly Tryba, a CU journalism instructor who was holding class next door
to Churchill's lecture, was critical of Churchill for not allowing the
Camera inside the classroom.

"I think any student group should be able to rent out a room and have
someone speak; but anyone should be able to go," she said. "The freedom
of speech goes both ways."

Two men who identified themselves as event organizers turned away three
male CU students at the door, calling them "agitators."

One of the men watching the door, who did not give his name, became
physical with a Camera reporter who tried to enter the room b grabbing
his arm and pushing him b prompting a report to police.

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