U of O Watch mission, in the words of Foucault...

"One knows … that the university and in a general way, all teaching systems, which appear simply to disseminate knowledge, are made to maintain a certain social class in power; and to exclude the instruments of power of another social class. … It seems to me that the real political task in a society such as ours is to criticise the workings of institutions, which appear to be both neutral and independent; to criticise and attack them in such a manner that the political violence which has always exercised itself obscurely through them will be unmasked, so that one can fight against them." -- Foucault, debating Chomsky, 1971.

U of O Watch mission, in the words of Socrates...

"An education obtained with money is worse than no education at all." -- Socrates

video of president allan rock at work

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Final hearings in the dismissal case of Professor Denis Rancourt

In May and June 2013 are the final hearings in the binding labour arbitration tribunal in the case of the dismissal of tenured Full Professor Denis Rancourt from the University of Ottawa.

The schedule for the 14 final hearing days is:
May 13, 14, 15, 21, 22, 23, June 5, 6, 11, 12, 13, 14, 25, 26 2013 at 9:30am.
Hotel Indigo Ottawa (Indigo Room), 123 Metcalfe Street, Ottawa.

Arbitrator: Claude Foisy
Lead counsel University: Lynn Harnden
Lead counsel union: Sean McGee

Professor Rancourt finished his testimony in chief on May 14th. He will be cross-examined starting on May 15th.

In the course of the first days of testimony, the University has abandoned its discipline of Professor Rancourt for refusing to produce the final examinations of his students. This is no longer one of the causes for discipline.

The remaining alleged causes for discipline include:
  • using improper speakers in his Fall 2006 SCI 1101 "Science in Society" course;
  • giving anomalously high grades (too many A's) in his Winter 2007 PHY 1722 "Principes de Physique II" course; and
  • assigning fraudulent A+ grades to 23 students in his Winter 2008 PHY 4385/5100 "Solid State Physics" course.
The University is also charging that Professor Rancourt incites violence and should therefore not be allowed back on campus even if his dismissal was not warranted.

Background document: HERE.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

How many bumper stickers have you seen on cars that say

"If you don't stand behind our troops feel free to stand in front of them"

?

http://therocketreport.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/troops-on-electiondayzoom.jpg

Does supporting the military mean supporting violence? If you do not support the Canadian military, does the above bumper sticker not incite that you *should* be killed?

Anonymous said...

Let me get this straight. If any student in any teacher's class ends up committing an act of violence that a school can do whatever it wants to invent connections as a pretext to fire that specific teacher. Quite a stretch there Harnden!!!! You and Rock should try being fiction writers in your spare time! That is quite a stretch. Beware all teachers of who might be lurking in your classrooms and who might at some point years in the future might do!!! What the two of you are doing is completely shutting down freedom of expression and academic freedom under the flimsiest of guises. Shame on you both!