Those who walk the grounds of UTD know that a horrible spirit has settled within the campus, evident to all who walk by the endless construction, the empty reflection pools, and the looming brutalist architecture. There is a clear reason that the campus is ranked as one of the most depressing across the United States, and it has been the tireless duty of one man to undo this. The wise and generous Vice President of Student Affairs, Gene Fitch, has graced UTD with his many precepts which, if followed, will allow each student to prosper.
Precept 1: Students must be seen, but never heard
When Fitch first came to UTD, the students were still respectful. They played their part in the grand performance of university life, and managed to go about their days without causing a ruckus. Today, students protest and deface very good rocks with their idealism and messages. Such action, such speech, ought not be tolerated. Fitch tells us that if a student yells at a parking attendant, efforts must be made to suspend that student. If students graffiti rocks with their political stances, those rocks must be destroyed. And, if students protest at the Chess Plaza, state troopers must be brought to arrest them. Thus, students may be seen, but swift consequences must fall if they are heard.
Precept 2: Never let them criticize you
The role of the administrator of a university is not, as many would believe, to ensure the facilities on campus work or to make sure students derive value from their education. Instead, their role is to be correct in all things while serving the divine interests of donors and the state legislature. If people criticize your transparency, send in the Dean of Students to call them uncivilized. If people call for divestment from war and apartheid, go forth on a pilgrimage to Israel. If people criticize you for violating their free speech rights, ban chalking and destroy the student newspaper. Criticism sows discord, and students will never learn if there is discord on campus. The role of the administrator is to maintain harmony by bending the will of the students to that of the state.
Precept 3: Respect your superiors
Hierarchy is the most important thing to any true administrator. Fitch would learn to adore hierarchy and the comfort it brought — there was always someone above you that you could defer to and someone below you to carry out your orders and take the fall for your alleged misdeeds. Hierarchy is comfortable, and it is maintained through a standard of respect. Students must respect their professors and administrators, for these groups are above the student in power. Professors must respect administrators, and administrators respect only that which is directly above them in power or impacts the university’s bottom line. Fitch teaches that respect must only go upwards; those below you in hierarchy have not earned respect and thus should not be given it. Consideration and common courtesy for students and faculty is not necessary — they are at most perfunctory towards the mission of a school, which is to make profit.
Precept 4: Obey no law but your own
Bylaws, policies, guidelines, laws — these are all complicated regulations that, honestly, aren’t necessary. All they do is provide “civil rights” groups and students something to complain about. But Fitch knows that those who rule the school need not adhere to laws, they shouldn’t even consult lawyers, as doing so only clouds the mind with doubt. Doubt and introspection are the greatest threat to administrators. If you allow doubt to permeate throughout your office, your divine domain, then you will begin to ask yourself if you have made mistakes or ever erred in how you’ve handled crises on campus — and that would be unacceptable! An administrator can never admit to mistakes, for that is not possible. The only law that exists is the law Fitch sets forth on a case-by-case basis. Regulations are malleable and can be easily rewritten and changed without telling people. Why waste months navigating through a bureaucratic maze just to get an approval you already have? Otherwise, you wouldn’t have been given such a powerful position. What Fitch teaches is to live in the moment and follow your heart, to seize every opportunity to develop the Comet community, irrespective of what rules might actually already be in place. Final authority ultimately rests in the administrator, and so students, faculty, staff, and outside meddlers should know that the only law, the best law, is that inscribed within the mind of Fitch.
Precept 5: Don’t hesitate
Everything is always changing. An administrator must be wry and quick on their feet. Hesitation is weakness which feral students will immediately pounce upon; as such, there should be no hesitation in how an administrator acts. Each action is already ordained by the institution, and the use of violent force, of a censorious regime, and of chilling words and funding threats are all ample tools that can, and ought to, be used the moment the need arises. Fitch teaches his followers that it is always easier to demand forgiveness after the fact than to ask for permission beforehand. If you have already done something, it is difficult for the institutional structure of a university to undo it, so you might as well go ahead and do as you wish. No one can or should stop you, and if students do consider interfering, Fitch teaches that one should simply refer to earlier precepts: by quickly and aggressively suppressing students, disorder is replaced with prosperity.
A Final Postulation
The five precepts of Fitch are a core part of Student Affairs operations, and students who wish to truly embrace the Comet spirit and avoid the cruel ire of Temoc must bend the knee. As a business and STEM school built in the style of a brutalist fever dream, UTD makes no space for independent students. Fitch has seen that the Vice President of Student Affairs does not merely facilitate student life and events on campus, but instead dictates precisely in what affairs students may partake. While religious chalking is, of course, permissible, students who engage in political art have stepped beyond the pale. Fitch knows that universities are not political, for how could maintaining and facilitating the status quo ever be a political action? Fitch teaches that it is not. What is political is to dissent, to be different. As an aspiring Texas university, such flights of fantasy will no longer be permitted at UTD.
All glory to Temoc and Benson.
Thus spoke Fitch.
