Good afternoon, fellow students & alumni.

Please see the below response by student leaders in rebuttal to recent communications you may have received from the current administration.  With today being the first day of the new term at our RPI, tensions are high on campus.  Poly article attached for more info. Full text below:

Dear students,

On Friday, Assistant Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students Travis Apgar released a statement to the community to seemingly clarify student involvement in the hiring process for the Director of the Union.

Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, this email omitted key facts and aspects of the situation to paint a misleading—and in many cases false—narrative of the hiring process as well as the roles students and student government played in the process.

According to Andrew Kiselik ’19, one of only six students who participated in the interview process, “The hiring process for Director of the Union differed from the process used to fill other administrative positions in the Rensselaer Union. The greatest difference is no candidates were presented to the Executive Board.”

While Apgar explains the lack of Executive Board involvement with the claim, “Directors of the Rensselaer Student Union have always been hired in accordance with the standard university processes and procedures,” this does not align with the fact that HR regularly honors the promises outlined in the Rensselaer Union Constitution when hiring for Union positions. A Polyinterview with Former Director of the Union Rick Hartt confirms this further, “The Executive Board would vote to either approve or disapprove the recommendation. Now, there would be a number of people from student government who would be involved in that process. A lot of Executive Board members would be involved in that process, and those individuals who were involved would make that presentation to the Executive Board.” In this case, however, the Executive Board was intentionally excluded.

Additionally, Apgar claims “Rensselaer Student Union leaders continue to run its activities, clubs, and programs, and fully administers its budget.” However, as of May 2018, the Vice President for Finance issued a memo we have attached to this email, stating the administration has removed the Executive Board’s ability to make decisions on reallocations and purchases above a threshold, which differs from over a century years of precedent and directly conflicts with the Union Constitution, a legally-binding enactment of the Board of Trustees which the administration and Trustees regularly violate.

From the aforementioned interview, Hartt points out “I think when student decisions are overturned, or student decisions are negated in the running of the Union without significant discussion, that’s when the Union becomes something other than student run.” Unfortunately, it appears that the administration has decided to violate student rights by crossing this line.

Apgar proceeds to claim, “There was consistent student participation in the interviewing process for the new Director of the Rensselaer Union, including the Grand Marshal (GM) and President of the Union (PU).” He fails to mention the GM was excluded from the invitations to interview, and the administration only added her to the May interviews after it was pointed out that she had been notably excluded. Additionally, of the 9 additional students Justin had requested to be included, only 2 were invited and both had been considered before the student recommendations were submitted.

Apgar’s most misleading claim may be regarding the clandestine meet and greet events hosted in June. We were informed of the June 13 event just several hours before the event occurredonly after we confronted them on failing to notify us about the event. Given the administration’s failure to notify us and how late they waited to admit our exclusion from the event, it would have been physically impossible for us to commute to campus to attend.

Finally, this email also only covers the major inaccuracies in Apgar’s statement. Some of the others included the incorrect listing of invitations and attendees for certain events, the last-minute changes and cancellations, and the failure to quantify “Did Not Attend” with pre-notified conflicts with final examinations, to name a few.

Student involvement is a right afforded to our student body, not a privilege as the administration seems to believe, and quality of involvement is just as important as quantity. We will continue to advocate for improvements to both quality and quantity. If you have any questions or comments, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at gm@rpi.edu and pu@rpi.edu.

Thank you,

Stefanie Warner  
153rd Grand Marshal

Justin Etzine  
129th President of the Union