Battle On Campus

Battle On Campus Third of a series of articles By Robert W. Butche from University School Unforgettables Sereis Published in AAUS newsletters in 1999 The sixties were politically and socially tumultuous at America's colleges and universities. There was an unpopular war in Viet Nam, and unparalleled social change at home. That era left ugly scars at Ohio colleges and universities by way of National Guard shootings at Kent State and a student protest at The Ohio State University that closed the university. Early on in the 1960's struggle for control of Ohio State, a failed Presidential candidate made the University's legendary laboratory school a political issue for the Novice Fawcett administration. As a result, University School became one of many contentious battlegrounds in the war over control of The Ohio State University.

Shortly after a proposal to close University School issue became a public issue in 1964, parents, faculty and staff joined together to mount a spirited defense against an unseen enemy. Little did they know the fix was in. The Fawcett administration put out the word: Anyone on the wrong side of the University School issue did so at their own peril. The effect was chilling. Many in the College of Education toed the line. Many, but not all.

Outside supporters of the school, led by Palmer and Esther Sitckney, mounted a spirited defense. Some University School faculty members joined in the fray. Margaret Willis and Mary Tolbert were particularly outspoken attacking the proposed closing on academic grounds - but the Fawcett administration was not listening. When all appeared lost, and the decision to close the school had been officially anointed by Dean Cottrell, the Stickney led SUS group confounded the university by sidetracking the issue to the Ohio Statehouse. It was in this environment that one of the School's former Directors would refuse to stand down, refuse to go along, and refuse the direct orders of his Dean and his University to stay out of the fight.

In a scene reminiscent of Frank Capra's Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, one man stood his ground, put his academic career in jeopardy and publically accused his college and his university of wrong doing. Here's how it all began one cold morning so many years ago.

Going Public By the early morning hours, a light frost had begun to crystalize on the Ohio Statehouse lawn. The darkness and calm of the Statehouse grounds were in stark contrast, however, to blazing lights and bustling activity across the street - at The Columbus Dispatch. There, as the city quietly slept, giant presses slowly, but noisily roared into action. In a matter of minutes, newspaper delivery men began loading the Tuesday, March 30 As the Sun began its climb in the eastern sky, the city slowly began to come to life. By 9 o'clock, the frost on the Statehouse grounds was shimmering brightly in the early morning sun. Along High Street, office workers, still bundled in winter coats, hurriedly made their way to work. Inside the Statehouse, in an overly heated hearing room, spectators began assembling for a public session of the powerful Ohio House Finance Committee.

Growing Restlessness Behind the scenes, committee members sipped coffee and scanned the morning paper. Meanwhile, inside the small hearing room, spectators greeted one another, shed their heavy coats and made their way to their seats. A quiet titter likely arose when OSU President Novice G. Fawcett and Dean Cottrell entered the hearing room - for most of those present knew of the enmity between them.

The hearings were an outgrowth of spreading restlessness in Ohio over the proposed closing of OSU's laboratory school. Articles concerning the proposed closing appeared in all of the Columbus newspapers that spring. One result of widespread media interest in the matter was a letter writing campaign that deluged state and university officials

with complaints and demands that University School be continued by legislative action. Several hundred letters concerning the University School closing arrived at the offices of University President Novice G. Fawcett, College of Education Dean Donald P. Cottrell and even the Ohio House Finance Committee - the legislative body responsible for university appropriations. There was such a clamor in fact, especially from Democratic groups, that Ralph E. Fisher, Republican Chairman of the House Finance Committee, scheduled a public hearing to consider whether the Ohio General Assembly should provide separate funding for the University School.

In Session By the time Chairman Fisher called the House Finance committee to order, around 9:30, the hearing room was nearly filled. On one side of the room were OSU President Novice G. Fawcett and Education College Dean Donald Cottrell. Although Cottrell was little known around the State Capitol, Novice Fawcett was a frequent visitor - as befitting his leadership position at the state's foremost university. Never before could anyone remember the OSU President having been called before a legislative body to explain a decision on what appeared to be a routine administrative matter. Although Dean Cottrell and President Fawcett publically stood together on the issue of closing the University School, neither man fully trusted the other - as evidenced by both men having left oral histories which each sealed until the death of the other.

On the other side of the room were the SUS contingent and other supporters of the University School - many of whom had traveled to Columbus to attend the hearing. From the moment the hearing started, the Fawcett Administration was to some degree on trial - or at the very least, on the defensive.

Novice G. Fawcett The first witness called by the committee was President Fawcett. When asked why the University School was to be closed, Fawcett provided a lengthy, thoughtful and detailed statement concerning why the School was no longer relevant to the mission of the University. At the center of Fawcett's thinking was a question no one had been able to answer to his satisfaction: Why should the Ohio State University divert taxpayer monies allocated for higher education to the education of children? Wasn't the education of children the job of the public school system? It's no surprise given his approach to the question, that President Fawcett cited economics as the central issue. His considerable experience in the administration of public schools convinced Fawcett that it was the job of the public school systems, not the Ohio State University, to educate children. His lack of experience in developing educational programs and managing experimental studies in education made it effectively impossible for President Fawcett to grasp the important role of laboratory schools in general, and University School in particular, in the advancement of educational thought and practice. To Fawcett the issues were simple: The University was growing by leaps and bounds and was therefore continuously pressed for funds. For one thing, he explained, the expansion that had previously been planned for University School was beyond the University's resources to either build or operate. So, reluctantly, Fawcett told the committee, he had accepted Don Cottrell's recommendation that the school should be closed - something, in fact, Dean Cottrell never recommended - for it was Novice Fawcett who proposed and pursued the closing of the University School.

When asked if the University would continue the school, in the event the General Assembly specifically earmarked an annual $250,000 appropriation for its operation, an idea openly promoted by the SUS group, President Fawcett responded negatively. If the General Assembly were to provide such an increase in support earmarked for the University School, Fawcett told the committee, the funds would be applied toward other, more needy programs ones that better fit the administration's missions and goals for higher education.

Donald P. Cottrell Later that morning, when Dean Cottrell testified, he echoed President Fawcett's principal points - even to the issue of what the Education College would do if it were to receive an additional appropriation earmarked for University School. Whatever the pressures that caused Don Cottrell to support Fawcett's decision to close University School, once on board, his public stance was one of total support of Fawcett. Accordingly, Cottrell explained to the committee that the re-organization of the College, as proposed by the College's Advisory Committee, created many new programs and activities which were themselves deeply in need of additional funding.

Circling The Wagons

The Fisher committee might well have been dumbfounded by the apparent inflexibility portrayed by the Fawcett and Cottrell. For months the University had publically stated that it must close its University School because of inadequate funding - and now that the General Assembly was offering, perhaps even demanding to provide additional funds to keep the school open, neither the University nor the College seemed interested. What had changed, one might reasonably have wondered? Was there some concealed Quid Pro Quo, or was there something more sinister involved? Both, as it turns out.

For his part, Fawcett seems to have been happy to implement the conservative trustee's desire to throttle the College and close its University School. While ridding the University of what he believed an unnecessary appendage was fully congruent with Fawcett's own views, going along with the conservative trusteess, a bloc he openly feared and sought to break up, promised to help solve yet another festering problem at that time - the Speakers Screening Rule.

Coincidentally both issues centered on Don Cottrell and the College of Education and both were high on President Fawcett's action agenda. What was clear, after Fawcett's and Cottrell's testimony, was that from a legislative perspective the University School finance issue was a sham. Once the University Administration - and the Dean of the College of Education - both asserted their unwillingness to apply any additional funding to continuing University School the legislature was effectively blocked from further action.

Resources were an issue, as is always the case in higher education, but University School was neither cause nor solution. The real problem - suspected by many but known only to insiders - was something close to a conspiracy between the administration and conservative trustees to starve Don Cottrell out of the College of Education. As long as Cottrell didn't resign, or even complain at his own salary being frozen during some 12 years of hyper-inflation, Fawcett wasn't satisfied, and the college suffered. Good people in the college left or retired and their positions were filled with large numbers of new, instructor-level faculty that were required to staff ever increasing class sections during years of swelling student enrollment. Monies were no longer available to bring in the great thinkers in education, but were always available for opening new undergraduate class sections. Gone were the heady days of Bode, Hullfish, Alberty and Zirbes. Under Fawcett's leadership, body count had replaced educational leadership at Ohio State.

It would soon be abundantly clear that whatever the administration's motives may have been - they were not revealed by testimony presented at the House Finance Committee hearings. Doubtless the House Finance Committee recognized that the University was close-minded and inflexible on the University School issue. It was increasingly apparent, as well, that The Ohio State University was adamantly opposed to even discussing the University School matter - even with the Ohio General Assembly. Something seemed wrong, terribly wrong. Was it President Fawcett?

Had he mounted a one man crusade to eliminate a school he believed to be superfluous? Many reached this conclusion - even before the Fisher Committee hearings. Few might have sensed that the University School issue had become deeply intertwined with an ongoing struggle, within the administration and the Board of Trustees, to retain unbridled control of the University.

The issues before the decision makers were many and complex. It was more than whether the College of Education was productive, more than where and how precious resources should be put to use. It was about power - who had it, and who would run the Ohio State University. Would it be powerful Deans like Donald Cottrell, who traditionally operated their colleges like private fiefdoms, or would it be run from the top-down by appointed trustees and hired administrators? The battle lines were drawn - and Donald Cottrell and University School soon found they were on the outside.

Meanwhile, at the Statehouse No doubt President Fawcett felt himself under attack that morning - from many quarters - on his handling of the University School issue. Whatever responsibility he had to share governance of The Ohio State University with faculty, students, outside groups - and even the Ohio general Assembly - had become obscured in the ongoing battle for supremacy and control. What no one but Fawcett himself knew that morning - the battle for control of The Ohio State University was not between Fawcett and Cottrell, but as we shall learn later, between Fawcett and John Bricker and his conservative minded friends on the Board of Trustees.

The result of these complex pressures - and multiple hidden agendas was increasingly manifested by an overt circling of wagons amongst the principal powers in and around the administration. As a result, the number of people

with any real influence in University affairs dwindled in the decade after Fawcett assumed the Presidency in 1956.

For years, students and faculty would later argue, the OSU administration was increasingly less open - desensitized to the legitimate rights and needs of other stakeholders at the University. In the background of the University School matter were increasing tensions between the administration and those on the outside - especially pressure groups like Ivan Gilbert's SUS. In an environment where dialogue was increasingly foreshadowed by authoritarian actions, the cries to save the University School fell on deaf ears. So did nearly every other contentious issue that spring. The University School issue was but one episode leading toward rapidly deteriorating trust between the governed and the governors.

As Cottrell's testimony before the Fisher Committee continued, the Dean and the Committee became increasingly cantankerous. The Dean was barely half-way through his testimony when Representative Walter E. Powell became openly angered at Cottrell's suggestion that the University School decision was the exclusive province of his College - and a matter in which the Finance Committee had no right to interfere. Little might they have known that Cottrell was fighting a lonely and difficult battle for resources - one he was destined to lose regardless of the outcome of the University School issue.

By the time Cottrell finished testifying, it was clear to finance committee members that the University was not going to budge. They may well have been puzzled in that it was traditional for state universities to listen carefully to and openly garner support for their cause within the committee responsible for their funding. Be that as it may, in March of 1965, for reasons unknown off-campus, The Ohio State University was not seriously listening to any outside views. It was clear that the publically stated reasons for closing the School, i.e. its failure to serve the needs of Ohio Schools and insufficient legislative support was an outright sham. The real motives for closing University School were concealed - even from Dean Cottrell.

Witness for the defense For his testimony, Ivan Gilbert lambasted the University administration for the arrogance and thoughtlessness of its proposal. Both President Fawcett and Dean Cottrell are said to have remained stoic during Gilbert's blistering remarks. When Gilbert finished, Chairman Fisher asked if anyone else wished to speak against the University's position. For the longest time, no one in the hearing room stirred. Just as Fisher prepared to gavel the hearing to a close, an unassuming, middle-aged man rose to his feet. Slowly, he made his way to the witness chair. Although his face was very familiar to the Dean of his College, and his President, the man was unknown to many of those present.

"My name is Paul Klohr," the witness said in a firm voice, "and I would like to speak against what has been said here today." With that, Professor Paul Klohr of the OSU College of Education began a point by point rebuttal of what had been said by both Fawcett and Cottrell.

By facing down his President and his Dean, Paul Klohr knowingly put his career and reputation on the line. In the weeks and months that followed, he was increasingly bothered not just by the proposal to close the School, but by the way the decision was made and the cavalier attitude exhibited by those in power. Although some would question why he joined in the battle so late, it would be Paul Klohr, later joined by his longtime colleague and friend, John Ramseyer, who would risk all that was dear to them to right what they perceived as an egregious wrong. In the midst of controversy and uncertainty, Klohr and Ramseyer took strong leadership positions based on principles of academic freedom. In doing so, they personified the values their school endeavored to pass on to each and everyone one of us.