Over the course of the past week, as The Mirror’s story on “Fairfield’s Enron Ties” was circulating on U-Wire across the country, many students were wondering whether or not the Joseph Berardino connection was that big of a deal.
It is.
This man’s client betrayed hundreds of workers. Their actions went against anything and everything this Jesuit institution embodies. Perhaps if someone at Arthur Andersen had spoken up, none of this would have happened. Yet, it did happen, and now Fairfield’s most (newly?) famous alum may soon be at the center of a horrendous scandal.
“Horrendous” is an appropriate term. As a Catholic school, isn’t that what we call a situation in which people are blindly robbed? Duplicity, lies, obfuscation, poverty; are these not the things that Fairfield is supposed to fight against?
It does not matter if this story dies down. If this university does not speak out against the actions of Joseph Berardino’s firm then our mission statement is useless. Our ideals are gone, and what this school stands for is as green as the sign in front of the Alumni House.
Nor does it matter if Berardino himself was directly or indirectly involved in the scandal. As the chief executive of what was once a well-respected firm, he cannot shrug off the responsibilities of his company’s improprieties like a flu season cough. Like Richard Nixon nearly 30 years ago, Berardino must also realize that this scandal will ultimately appear at his door.
Above all, this hurts. A member of Fairfield’s Board of Trustees has brought a great cloud over our 200 acres. Where is the outrage? Where is the statement from the administration condemning what has happened?
We at The Mirror are not calling for the removal of Berardino form the Board of Trustees. Rather, we are calling on someone high up at Fairfield to stand up and say: “This is not right.”
If we do not do that, then this institution has failed. It has failed to show students that we believe in the ideals of our education. We might as well start sending our Mission Volunteers to Beverly Hills. That way, we can still keep our “ideals” and “beliefs,” but enjoy ourselves and look the other way when it comes to injustice in the world. At least, that’s what the administration’s silence on Joseph Beradino is telling us as students.
If we remain silent, if we look the other way, then we have failed. The donations we receive are rife with lost life savings, salaries and destroyed livelihoods. We have joined the ranks of so many Catholic schools that choose fundraising over faith, connections over convictions, and money over morals.
But, it’ll get us a nice high tech classroom in the business school, won’t it?
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