We are in the midst of a peaceful demonstration of unity for Gallaudet. As you may or may not know, our president for 18 years, I. King Jordan, announced his plans for retiring this December. What you probably don't know is that we are in the midst of turmoil over the process that the Board of Trustees used, and subsquently, the Presidential Search Committee, to select Gallaudet's ninth president.

President-Elect Jane K. Fernandes is not the issue.

The issue is that the Board of Trustees has a responsibility to the faculty, students, staff and alumni of the university.

We are currently in an exciting time, where students, faculty, staff and alumni are finding their voices and repeating "Unity, Community, Diversity".

Exploration of this issue will prove very frustrating for outsiders, and even insiders do not pretend that they can keep every possible perspective in their head, because we have thousands of faculty members, students, staff and alumni the world over eagerly expecting the next DPN (Deaf President Now) movement.

To be perfectly clear, this is not deja vu. This is not DPN. Nor does it masquerade as a DPN redux.

All three candidates are deaf, and thus our problem lies not with the candidates but with making our voice heard. If the Board of Trustees re-convenes here in DC to meet with various leaders to understand exactly what went wrong, our voice will be heard.

The thing is, it's already been quite a week. We have come a long way, and we have a long way to come.

I'll post pictures when I can- but for now, check out the news agencies like the Washington Post, DC Examiner, our local Washington news channels and of course, this blog. I'm hoping other Gbloggers will help me with updating you and better informing you what's going on here at Gallaudet.

Unity. Community. Diversity.