Second in a series.
Re “Warily, Pasadena City College Anticipates a Celebration Soon”
Dateline Pasadena – As the latest New York rumor filtered across the Pasadena City College campus yesterday afternoon – that President Mark Rocha has lost his bid to become chancellor of a Brooklyn community college – the once hopeful mood of faculty and students faded and vanished. It was as if depressing thunderstorms and lightning suddenly had displaced the sunshine.
The most unpopular, most viscerally disliked president in PCC history, apparently will return to the turmoil-laden school that has taken a heavy blow in prestige and finances the past year and a half.
At Monday’s faculty Senate meeting, the atmosphere was upbeat amidst talk of paving a path for Dr. Rocha’s successor. By yesterday, the rumor from Kingsborough Community College deflated the most optimism seen here since Dr. Rocha’s earliest days.
With the summer sessions divided into two parts, about half of the unhappy PCC staff is present.
“Until yesterday,” one faculty member told the newspaper, “there was a glimmer of hope, about how we were going to finally get back to normal. We were getting ready. Now, I don’t know what will happen.”
Dr. Rocha is widely regarded by a heavy majority of the faculty and the most involved students as a routine lawbreaker regarding Pasadena City College policies. Long ago, say his critics, Dr. Rocha began operating unilaterally out in the open. He no longer bothered to be nuanced, knowing he had the unwavering backing of the Board of Trustees.
(To be continued)
