Greenfield Community College Union Votes “No Confidence” in Administrators

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This is a breaking news story and may be updated.

Unionized faculty and staff at Greenfield Community College have voted that they have no confidence in the leadership of the school’s top two administrators.

Members of the Greenfield Community College Professional Association, the union representing GCC’s faculty and professional staff, organized the votes of no confidence against Provost Chet Jordan and President Michelle Schutt after they said the administrators refused to release a consulting firm’s report that questioned the school’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. Union leadership has alleged that was the latest example of a “culture of secrecy, dissembling, evasion, stonewalling, disrespect, and sometimes outright abuse” the two had created on campus.

After voting closed Tuesday afternoon, union president Trevor Kearns said that 73 members voted “no confidence” in Jordan and four voted in favor of the provost. Kearns said that 67 members voted “no confidence” in Schutt and 10 voted to support the president. In a statement, Kearns said he hopes the school’s Board of Trustees “will take our working conditions as seriously as we did when considering the first [vote of no confidence] at GCC in over 20 years.”

“Our working conditions are GCC student learning conditions, after all, and we strive to support student success over all else,” Kearns wrote. “Administration can make that harder or easier for us, and I hope that we will turn the corner soon on our daily struggles at the College.”

Jordan did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent shortly after the voting closed at 3 p.m. In a statement sent by a private PR consultant working for the college, Schutt said that she has “enormous respect for our faculty and staff.”

“My goal is a workplace environment that acknowledges contributions, works collaboratively to address challenges, and builds relationships,” she said. “I hope to continue working collaborative with our faculty and staff around the values we share.”

The college’s Board of Trustees also issued a statement, which the PR consultant said “reflects the opinion of the entire board.”

“The Board supports the College’s DEI efforts,” the statement said. “We will continue this work and the Board plans to be involved by having its own DEI training. The Board has heard the President’s response to the concerns of the college community and her plan to address these concerns. We support the President’s plan.”

The saga reached a crescendo last week, when Schutt answered questions during an urgently called meeting of the Board of Trustees. She had called the meeting after the revelation of a previously unreleased report from the Hartford-based consulting firm RE-Center Race & Equity in Education — a document first reported by The Shoestring. College leadership had hired the firm to work on campus after two failed searches for an administrator to lead the college’s diversity, equity, and inclusion work, which is commonly referred to as DEI.

However, after paying the firm $60,000 of its $112,900 contract, college administrators terminated that contract in November of last year — earlier than the parties had agreed to. In the Board of Trustees meeting, Schutt said the firm’s process and philosophy did not match the college’s expectations. She pointed to several examples, such as a consultant reportedly telling a participant in a focus group on campus that they had asked a “racist question” when the participant inquired if economic status or class should be considered as part of DEI work. 

On June 10, the Greenfield Community College Professional Association announced its members decided to hold votes of no confidence in Jordan and Schutt. The union said Schutt had attempted to suppress the DEI report, a full copy of which The Shoestring has obtained.

The report listed several alleged instances of racist behavior that unnamed school leaders had committed during the firm’s work on campus, including one white administrator who allegedly used the N-word four times in front of consultants when referring to an art exhibit on campus that used the slur in its title. RE-Center had also accused Jordan and Schutt of “incapacity and performativity” when it came to racial-equity work.

RE-Center did not respond to a request for comment last week.

Schutt and her administration initially declined the union’s public records request for RE-Center’s report, claiming the document was “unsolicited self-serving material from ReCenter that while using the word ‘report’ was not a report within the terms of the previously-terminated contract.” 

“Accordingly, no documents sent by ReCenter following termination of its contract are factual work product and any release would inhibit the ongoing DEI work by the College,” the college’s response to the union read.

Eventually, administrators allowed union leadership to see the document in person, but Kearns said it was heavily redacted. By that point, though, the union had obtained an unredacted copy of the report and had sent it to its membership. 

During last week’s meeting, several trustees expressed frustration at having only just learned of the report’s existence. Schutt has said she had to balance transparency considerations with protecting the privacy of those who spoke during confidential learning sessions with RE-Center. She also accused the firm of creating the report “out of frustration of a canceled contract and to insulate themselves from a potential request from GCC for a refund on work that had been paid for but had not occurred.” 

Kearns said that Schutt’s lack of transparency about the report was unacceptable. In a statement he read to the college’s trustees last week, he said that he and his members understand consultants sometimes don’t work out for the institutions that hire them.

“But instead of communicating that bare minimum to the campus, and instead of advancing DEI work at the college, the president spent her time trying to hide the report from the community, and, apparently, from you,” Kearns told the trustees. “At best, her actions are evidence of poor leadership; at worst, they are evidence of institutional racism and favoritism that might protect misconduct.”

The union’s complaints about the two top leaders went beyond the report and its suppression, Kearns said.

“During their time here, the president and provost have managed to systematically dismantle the caring, inclusive, and collaborative culture that made GCC unique,” said Kearns, who has taught at GCC for 15 years.

It is ultimately the community college’s Board of Trustees that has power to make decisions about the president’s employment. When the board is full, it has 11 members. The state’s governor appoints those positions. 

Kearns said that what comes next depends on the trustees. He said there is a “frustrating tendency to elevate and value more the perspective of leaders at the top of a hierarchy.” But while the trustees decide their next steps, Kearns said his union is compiling and voting on a “demand for change” they’ll present to Schutt.

“The burden of reestablishing trust is entirely on her,” Kearns said in a text message. “If the Board wants to give her that chance, fine. If they don’t, fine. Faculty and staff at GCC will keep doing what we do best: supporting students of all backgrounds in their journey through higher ed, with genuine caring and excellent professionalism.”

This spring, at a neighboring institution of higher education, faculty and librarians at the University of Massachusetts Amherst voted “no confidence” in the university’s chancellor over his decision to call in police to arrest community members at a pro-Palestine encampment on campus. In that instance, the university’s board expressed its strong support for Chancellor Javier Reyes, who remains as the head of the school.

Update 5:00 p.m.: This story has been updated to include a statement from Michelle Schutt and the Greenfield Community College Board of Trustees, as well as additional comments from Greenfield Community College Professional Association President Trevor Kearns.

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Dusty Christensen is an independent investigative reporter based in western Massachusetts. He can be reached at dusty.christensen@protonmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @dustyc123 or on Instagram @dustycreports.

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