Virginia
Tech argues that Cho’s actions were not predictable. Well, that is not what the
experts say. Take a look at the
analysis of Virginia Tech’s response to Cho’s warning signs done by
internationally known and respected mental health expert, Dr. Gerald Amada. Dr.
Amada is the former director of the Mental Health Program, City College of San
Francisco. He was speaking at the National
Association for University and College Center Directors, on
October 17, 2008.
“Even a
cursory review of the events that led up to the massacre (at Virginia Tech), as
delineated in the report of the governor’s panel, indicates the university’s
abiding faith in three general approaches that it abortively used for dealing
with his behavioral waywardness. (First), was to resiliently accommodate his
strange and offensive behavior by, for example, arranging to have him individually
tutored by a department chairperson, an arrangement that was evidently endorsed
by the university’s so-called care team, a diverse group of staff representing
the Counseling Service, Residence Life, Legal Counsel, Judicial Affairs, and
Student Life, that investigated the case of Mr. Cho and provided guidance to
instructors who were struggling to deal with his misconduct. This accommodation
of providing individual instruction was, please keep in mind, adopted after Mr.
Cho’s menacing presence in her class had caused an English instructor such
terrible anguish that she threatened to resign.”
“The
(second) tack repeatedly taken by Cho’s instructors and others was to prod,
cajole and shoehorn him into psychotherapy; to the point that one instructor
actually offered to chaperone him to the service. This particular tack of
championing psychological treatment to Mr. Cho, although no doubt
well-intentioned, should have been, in my view, recognized by someone at the
university as terribly misguided and worse, doomed to fail with adverse
consequences of some kind in its wake.”
“The
third (and most dangerous) tack taken by the university in dealing with Mr. Cho
was to eschew using the disciplinary system of the school to admonish, warn and
if necessary discipline him for his chronic and flagrant violations of the code
of student conduct … When Cho stalked (harassed), he was given a tempered
warning by a police officer but no direct admonition or warning came from
Judicial Affairs or a designated administrator with disciplinary authority,
ordinarily the offices most responsible and effective in meting out discipline.
When Mr. Cho took impermissible photographs of female students in the class, he
was reported to a dean, who clearly stated in an email message to the instructor
that Cho’s behavior fell under the rubric of disorderly conduct, meaning, I
would assume, that it should meet with some form of discipline. What was the
response to this incident? The Judicial Affairs officer agrees with a plan to
once again refer Cho to the counseling program, suggests nothing about the use
of discipline and limits her remarks to (and I quote), “I would make it clear
to him that any similar behavior in the future will be referred.” Presumably,
she means referred to the Judicial Affairs office or to counseling. Once again
Cho walks away with impunity by not being held accountable for his misconduct.
… the university was fixated, it seems, on getting Mr. Cho repaired in the
psychological service rather than on harnessing and correcting his disruptive
and frightening behavior through the use of disciplinary measures. …”
Dr. Amada also adds the following: “In his book called Moral Mazes the
author, sociologist Robert Jackal, points out that one of the greatest fears
that plague corporate managers is that they will be caught in the wrong place
at the wrong time and will not be able to outrun their mistakes when
blame-times arrive.”
Amada then adds, “Tech President Charles Steger and his administration were caught in
the wrong place at the wrong time—clearly, the school is twisting and turning
everyway possible to explain its failure to act decisively when confronted with
Cho’s threatening behavior.” (To be continued)
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