Quote:
Originally Posted by preciousjeni
When I was a teenager, one of my former teachers was convicted for having a sexual relationship with a fourteen year old student. This woman was a Bible teacher at a Christian school and she had won awards for her teaching successes.
The students LOVED her and she was well respected, so we were particularly devastated when the news came out. Looking back, this incident shattered the sense of trust and community on the campus and it was embarrassing for all of us.
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And I think that's exactly why many Penn Staters are taking this the way they are. Their sense of trust in the institution and in people at that institution has been violated, and they now find themselves losing something that forms part of their identity (and Penn State is hardly unique among schools in that kind of loyal identification with the school). There is a reason we call our colleges
Alma Mater -- "Nourishing" or "Nurturing Mother."
What you say about what can come of this eventually is spot on, I think. But right now, many people for whom Penn State is
Alma Mater are still trying to absorb the news and come to terms with it. It's a
very fresh wound. Those people need to grieve for the trust that has been lost, so I would expect to see people working through the stages of grief.
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