To preface this article, I would like to iterate that there are honest, hardworking student management members who are dear friends of mine. Therefore, this article should not be viewed as all-encompassing. The reasons for this article are two-fold. My termination from the Pause kitchen was the result of two e-mails I sent to the Pause kitchen student alias. The first included references to “dank music,” which should not have been offensive to anyone, unless the person in question has a particular distaste for “dank music.” My second e-mail was in response to an invitation to a Pause employee party. I casually (and somewhat sarcastically) responded with the humorous response, “I’m assuming this party is BYOB?”
For this, I was dragged into the Pause office to sit and listen to four fellow Oles criticize my character. The second reason for this letter is the realization that something is intrinsically wrong with allowing student workers to manage (to the extent the Pause has allowed them to) student workers. It reaches as far as the St. Olaf College honor code. Certain members of the Pause management act a certain way when the administration is looking, but change their behavior when they are not. This behavior costs students their work-study jobs.
As a three-year veteran of the Pause kitchen, I have had the pleasure of sitting in on numerous stories told by kitchen managers – “my supervisors,” – concerning their “wicked party” the night before. Freshman year one kitchen manager showed up to my room, as it was once his. He whipped open his backpack and offered me a “cold one” right on the spot. Now, I understand that there is a difference between professional and private life, but when I see a particular manager drink on the weekend and walk into work the next day with the malodorous stench of day-old booze, telling everyone of his/her previous night, that difference becomes blurred. I remind readers that these individuals are the same people responsible for enforcing the rules at Pause functions. These are the same people kicking you out for drinking.
The problem lies in the power given to these student managers. Pause managers have no set rules, excluding basic work and cleaning functions. This is because student workers have no incentive to adhere to the administrations’ policies as does a “real” employee such as a professor. For example, if a professor was caught drinking in the Pause, he or she would likely be fired. A student worker at the Pause, in the same situation, would keep his job and be fined a paltry $25. This enables student workers endowed with leadership the opportunity to treat “their” employees with bias. A Pause manager is able to set an example to “his/her employees” without the fear of punishment. As soon as the administration takes interest, or the Pause staff feels “threatened,” they turn on their employees (as in my case). If the administration wants an egalitarian and equal student body, leave the hiring and firing of student workers up to people with real authority.
– Tyler Wadsworth ‘11 (wadswort@stolaf.edu)
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