If you are within earshot of the encampments at UW Madison or UW Milwaukee, please read today’s update silently. The alleged adults running those campuses apparently expect everyone in the state to treat them as spoiled toddlers. They’re hopping to appease them long enough that they’ll eventually just run out of steam and comply. In the meantime, they’re letting them have a public tantrum. Please don’t interfere.
Welcome to Monday and the latest edition of the Dairyland Sentinel’s Key Reads.
First, let’s be positive and recognize that not every institute of higher education is mired in pointless lawlessness. There’s actual, positive, and useful life lessons being taught.
NTC’s new butchery program takes students from pasture to plate | WEAU
There’s a lot to be excited about at Northcentral Technical College. Later this month, the school will complete construction on its brand new meat lab, housing the school’s new ‘Pasture to Plate’ butchery program.
”I’m super excited because it’s almost done,” culinary instructor Chef Travis Teska said. “We’re weeks away from construction being done. The equipment’s in there. We have to do some final connections, things like that, but we’re very close to turning that cooler on and having it ready to go.”
Taska is now leading the brand new program. He helped NTC establish its culinary program several years ago.
The goal of the program is to take students through every phase of the meat processing journey. Helping farmers harvest the meat themselves is a win-win for students and those who are harvesting.
…Through the grant money, NTC has constructed its brand new meat lab, equipped with a variety of processing machines and tools to prepare the meat they harvest back on campus. It doesn’t end there, students will see the final step of the process too, being able to sell the meat they’ve prepared at their own meat counter, called ‘Butcher’s Block.’
Our readers are aware UW-Madison is getting a lot of grief, and rightfully so, for backtracking and not only allowing the Hamas Glampers to trespass on campus, but also negotiating with the lawbreaking students.
But it’s actually worse at UW-Milwaukee, where the Administration is equally feckless and the camping site has been fortified with plywood walls and other materials that has created a more permanent scar on campus.
The campus adults in Milwaukee are as nauseatingly feckless as those in Madison.
Campus Update from the Dean of Students | UW -Milwaukee
On Monday, a protest on campus led to an encampment that was set up on the lawn south of Mitchell Hall. In our email sent Monday evening, and over the last several months, we responded to protesters’ demands. We see what is happening nationally at other campuses, but we are focused on our own students and the needs of our own community.
…I’ve talked and met with students. Students have shared their anger at the war, death and suffering of others, but also their frustration with UWM. I’ve heard some students say they don’t feel safe walking past the encampment or hearing chants. Other students have said that if they speak out, they will be shouted down. And others say they just want to go to class and work and hope our campus is safe for everyone.
I’ve also spoken to faculty and staff who have encouraged us to use this as an educational moment. They have asked how do we help students understand their free speech rights but also the limitations of those rights?
The camping restriction (which is part of state law) represents one of those limitations. This law has nothing to do with the content of the speech or the act of protesting itself. In fact, there have been more than a dozen protests on campus in recent months that did not break the law. So, the encampment must end, safely.
Our campus community has different opinions on what should happen next. Students and others have shared that we should arrest everyone in the encampment. Others have shared that we should be patient, kind and compassionate by clarifying laws with students and providing opportunities to work through their demands.
…As Dean of Students, I am committed to supporting all students. We may not agree on everything, but I believe we can make progress. Along with many faculty and staff colleagues, I am open to engaging in dialogue on how to help us move forward toward resolution. If you are open to that, just reply to this message.
Adam Jussel
Dean of Students
Meanwhile, the law breakers continue to be coddled on the Madison campus as well. But the head of the statewide UW System says, eventually, sometime, at an unknown time in the future, the law will actually be enforced across all UW campuses.
System President Jay Rothman talks a good game but does nothing.
UW System President Rothman says encampments are illegal and ‘ultimately will be gone’| Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
In a pre-taped Sunday morning interview on WISN-TV’s “Upfront,” UW System President Jay Rothman said the encampments are illegal and “ultimately will be gone.”
Rothman said he supported UW-Madison Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin’s decision to authorize police removing the encampment on Wednesday. Asked why the response was not similar at UW-Milwaukee, Rothman said chancellors have authority to decide how to take action on different campuses.
…Rothman said there are “good reasons” why encampments are illegal, including a lack of sanitary facilities and students staying overnight in populated areas. Rothman said it is a “health and safety issue.”
Rothman also said protestors’ demand to remove police from campus is “ludicrous” and a “non-starter.” He added that the divestment issue is a “red herring.”
…Asked whether police could be brought back, Rothman said “every option has to be on the table. At the end of the day, the encampments are there illegally. And they need to come down.”
While nothing changes at the UW, one Madison institution is in the process of a significant evolution.
After 76 years, Kavanaugh’s Esquire Club changes hands | The Cap Times
Kavanaugh’s Esquire Club, a northside supper club with 80-plus years of history on Sherman Avenue, will officially (and publicly) change hands on Wednesday, May 8.
The longest running family-owned supper club in the city by two decades, the Esquire Club has planned a baton-passing party at 1025 N. Sherman Ave. New owner Craig Spaulding will serve “the first Old Fashioned” at 5 p.m. to longtime owner John Kavanaugh, whose family bought the restaurant in 1948.
…According to Cap Times archives, John (Jack) and Jane Kavanaugh purchased the Esquire Club (then listed at 2615 Sherman Ave.) from Robert Hibbard in March 1948.
Hibbard had purchased the “Esquire Bar” himself in 1945 from Leo F. Welsh, who’d run it for at least three years. City records indicate the building Kavanaugh’s is currently in was built in 1938.
By 1966, newspapers ads touted the “newly remodeled” Esquire Club, which was popular for wedding parties, athletic celebrations and city gatherings.
Jack’s son, also named John Kavanaugh, managed the restaurant before buying it from his parents in 1978.
…Spaulding has already put in new carpeting and done some painting, with the intention to refresh the space. He’s hoping for a little bump from “Top Chef,” which flashed up the Kavanaugh’s sign during a recent Madison supper club episode.
“I don’t want to change things too much, so that I alienate the regulars that have been coming in there for decades,” Spaulding said. “But still, I want to be able to attract a whole other client base.
“It’s a very fine balance that I need to strike.”
Quite the contrast between the real world of private enterprise and Capitalism and the socialist-coddling bubble of many college campuses, where the fragile students are protected from reality.
We’ll be back again tomorrow with our next Key Reads. If any significant news develops at the protest sites between now and then, we’ll post updates on the main site and via our social media channels.
Have a great week.
