To the Editor:

During August of 1999 many received a blue booklet, neatly designed and expensively published, containing the thoughts of Provost Triggle. "It is sure to be the subject of many discussions in the years ahead," he writes in a cover note. "I trust you will find it thought provoking and interesting."

The trust is ill-founded.

It would be unspeakable torture to read the whole 44-page document, but we are saved this fate because the three-page introduction clearly proves it would be a monumental waste of time to read the subsequent text.

In this introduction, Research, Learning, and Service are highlighted. Research is "our intellectual currency and the key to our reputation." Then: "We will support organized science, technology, and social-science research in key areas deemed intellectually important, key to our own development because of their empowering characteristics, and with the promise of long-term social and economic benefit to the region and nation."

It would be interesting to put this up on a foreign-language Web site with the request that it be translated into proper English. Despite all the keys around, it is hard to unlock the secrets this sentence hides.

"Learning is indelibly associated with the creation of knowledge," the provost writes. Surely, "indelibly" is not le mot juste. But whatever word, or no word at all, it is complete and utter nonsense: 99.9 percent of all learning has nothing at all to do with the creation of knowledge. From a kid learning to count to a student learning calculus, no new knowledge is created.

The provost continues to say that the hallmark of undergraduate education is students working and learning with active research practitioners. If true (quod non), I would like to meet the undergraduate students so educated at UB. Our students, instead, rub shoulders with teaching assistants on-the-learning-curve.

Later the provost speaks about "credentialing experiences" (?!) Does he mean graduation ceremonies? No, he means just plain credentials. Hifalutin gobbledygook.

On Service, Provost Triggle states: "Service is the relationship between the university and its local and regional communities and represents the application of its intellectual capital to the economic, infrastructural, social, and technological issues of nation and region." Once again, deplorable English, and behind the time.

With the time is the notion of engaged institution. Traditional service is a one-way process in which universities transfer expertise to key constituents. Engagement is viewed as a partnership, a two-way street, defined by mutual respect for what each side brings to the table. [For more on this, see The Engaged Institution, a Kellogg Commission report received on campus 3/8/99.]

And this brings me to the main problem I have with Provost Triggle (the man) and his little blue book. It is not that the words are pedantic, the grammar (kindly put) stilted, the observations hackneyed. It is the mindset of arrogance which bypasses the services of an editor and the inputs of colleagues. The result is an acute embarrassment to the provost, and derivatively to UB.

Rendered here with economy of speech, the provost concludes with "We will not be all things to all people, but what we decide to do we will do well." The evidence in hand belies that statement.