[nabs-l] Clarification Re: Support for Vee Gaspa for Bice president

Sat Jun 17 23:37:45 UTC 2017

Dear Shannon:

Let me begin by thanking you for your efforts to respectfully clarify what
you perceive to be "miscommunicated information" in recent posts to this
list. More importantly, let me express publicly my appreciation for the
dedication and hard work which you have put into NABS in the past year,
often without receiving the recognition you deserve. You have made
yourself indispensable to the Board, and we could not have achieved all
that we have achieved this year without your help. Thank you!

Your note has given me cause for some reflection, so I should like to
offer up some comments of my own for the consideration of our members. As
you know, collecting personal testimonies from students in support of the
AIMHEA Act and obtaining letters of support for the bill from institutions
of higher education are two of the most significant projects with which
NABS has concerned itself in the past year. Moreover, it is very easy to
track the number of letters we are getting from each state using such
tools as the Dropbox folder to which you refer. Therefore, it is tempting
to use this project as a means for judging the quality of a leader's
work--after all, the easiest and arguably most convincing test of a leader
is the "tangible results" he/she produces. However, it must be noted that these results are, in part, out of our control. In order for a leader to "collect" an AIMHEA letter from a member, the member from whom the letter is to be collected must first actually write the letter. Though it is important for those who are working on this project to follow up with potential supporters, the choice to submit a letter is ultimately in the hands of each member. As much as we leaders would love to see each member write a letter, call their Congressman, and request a meeting with their university officials, the fact is that some of our members are not as active as they could be. As leaders, then, our job is to encourage our members to remain active in advocating for the causes for which we fight. If they remain inactive despite our attempts to get them involved, that choice should not reflect on us. With that in mind, I ask you: Do you know how many people Vee contacted to solicit letters? Do you know the ratio of active members in New Jersey to letters written from that state? Do you know what role, if any, Vee played in the collection of the letters you cite? Surely she must have played some role as the state President in New Jersey. And what about letters collected from other states? What role, if any, did she play in acquiring those? If you have such information (information which I do not have,) please feel free to fill me in and I will be happy to take this into consideration at election time. Until then, frankly, I remain unconvinced.

I am often reminded, however, that I can only speak for myself. Therefore, let me do that in the context of the present discussion. As you know, I serve as President of the Maryland Association of Blind Students, a position which I have occupied since November of 2015. In July of that year, I was elected to the board of the National Association of Blind Students. It will be observed, then, that I had 4 months of national leadership under my belt before being elected a state President. It will also be observed that I have been on the NABS Board a year longer than Vee has—a year in which I could have flooded my state's delegation with letters from students from whom I "collected" them. Indeed, my own AIMHEA letter was written on January 10, 2016—6 months before Vee was elected to the NABS Board, and approximately 2 weeks before she attended her first Washington Seminar, at which she had her first real exposure to our legislative work. Yet, according to the latest update I have received from the Chairman of our Legislative Committee, Maryland students have submitted a total of 7 letters.

Is this a lapse in my leadership? Perhaps it is, and, if so, I would love to hear any tips you might have to offer on how to improve. But let us consider the stakes. This is Maryland—the state which serves as home to our national headquarters, home to President Riccobono himself, and home to the very governmental affairs team which we are helping by submitting these letters. Moreover, many of us in the Maryland student division consider our national leaders to be personal mentors, and these national leaders are often intimately involved with our work. In this context, what a dismal record! Even in Maryland, a state which other state leaders consider a model for them to follow, we only outnumber the statistic you cite by 1 solitary letter. Therefore, if we are to accept your premise, what unimaginable shame I must feel! What unspeakable fear I must have when I must admit to our members and leaders the deplorable results which my efforts have produced! What utter terror I must live in, always afraid that someone will find me out! Perhaps someone should appeal to the membership and mount a campaign to have me ousted from my current position. Perhaps my affiliate President should intervene and hand over all the important work to someone who will produce better results. Or perhaps I should simply resign in embarrassment and defeat. Yet, somehow, our members still trust me. Somehow they still call me seeking advice on Federation activities. And somehow they still elect me as their President. With such a completely disgusting showing of results, how can this be?

Shannon, I, too, write this with no ill will toward you or anyone else. In fact, I write it with the greatest appreciation and respect for you. You picked up much of the work which I had failed in doing in the past year. You could have resented me and refused to do the work, but you simply picked up where I left off and gave your all for NABS's sake. So, this has nothing to do with you. I am only trying to make sure your "clarification" is placed in the proper perspective. I believe in the old adage that "there are two sides to every story." If this is true, it is important to consider weighty issues like these with both sides taken into account. Moreover, I believe that any argument which is to be deemed valid must be able to withstand the test of honest and reasonable questioning. This is why we ask tough questions of our candidates, and this is why we have this list as an open forum for the exchange of opinions. Let us continue to consider the arguments made and questions asked as we decide who our leaders will be.

Yours in the movement,

Chris Nusbaum

-----Original Message-----
From: NABS-L [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Shannon
Cantan via NABS-L
Sent: Friday, June 16, 2017 12:05 PM
To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
<nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
Cc: Shannon Cantan <shannoncantan.nfb at gmail.com>
Subject: [nabs-l] Clarification Re: Support for Vee Gaspa for Bice
president

Aloha Vee:

  Thank you for serving on the NABS Board this past year. I was hesitant
in writing this message, but I feel that it is only fair for the
membership to be made aware of the work the NABS Board and NABS committees
are doing.
I have worked closely with the NABS Legislative Committee for over a year
now. According to our Dropbox folder, there are only 6 letters from New
Jersey students, all of which were collected prior to your election on the
NABS Board. In fact, these 6 letters were last modified on April 4, 2016.
Moreover, they were collected by the previous president of NABS, Sean
Whalen, as well as our current NABS President and our current Legislative
Committee Chair Michael Ausbun. With this in mind, if you have more
letters, that's awesome, but let's not hold them hostage and let's send
them on over to our Government Affairs team in Baltimore, as well as to
Michael, Tarik, and Kathryn.
Now, onto the Outreach Committee. As the point person for social media for
NABS, I thank you for gathering one blog post over the past year, for the
month of May. I hope to see many more in the future.

Again, I do not write this message with any negative intentions. As a
growing leader in our organization, it is best to be upfront and honest
when holding each other accountable, but more importantly, ourselves to
that same standard. I, too, have dropped the ball on occasion, as does
everyone. We are human. Regardless, we are fighting for the same goal, so
let's work together to do just that. ; I just wanted to point out some
miscommunicated information as a leader in this fine organization.

Thanks for reading, and I hope we cross paths in Orlando.

Best,

Shannon KS Cantan

>> On Jun 16, 2017, at 2:17 AM, Gaspa, Vee via NABS-L <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
> wrote:
> 
> Hello Dustin,
> I was actually co-chair of the legislative committee from when I was
elected a board member of NABS last July and then after Washington Seminar
I was moved to being one of the co-chairs of the outreach committee. While
I was on the legislative committee I gathered many AIMHE letters and
started the process of getting a letter from my college, Seton Hall
University. Over the past 5 months much of my energy went to the outreach
committee, getting monthly blogs, working on topics for the outreach calls
and many other things. Thank you for being a part of the legislative
committee and helping us build the Federation!
> Best,
> Vee Gaspa
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: NABS-L [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Dustin 
> Cather via NABS-L
> Sent: Thursday, June 15, 2017 5:30 PM
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> Cc: Dustin Cather
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Support for Vee Gaspa for Bice president
> 
> Hey Nathan,
> It has been a pleasure working on the legislative committee on the
national level. I would love to learn more about the projects that you and
Vee have been working on since I have been involved only since January and
I don't recall Vee being on any of the calls. As I am getting more and
more involved with NABS and NFB on a legislative level and I was just
curious about this past years progress that Vee has made.
> Best.Dustin Cather
> 
>>   On Thursday, June 15, 2017 3:34 PM, Nathan Clark via NABS-L
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 
> 
> I have known Vee for about one year now working with her on numerous
projects such as our legislative committee at the national level in our
mid Atlantic regional similar which we hosted a few weeks ago and have
always been impressed by her great leadership skills, energy and passion
for our organization and I believe that these skills will be beneficial
for her if she wins the position of vice president for our organization. I
know that if she wins the position of vice president for our organization
that her work will continue to do great things for blind students
throughout this country into make our organization stronger than it ever
has been.v I consider the both a leader in a friend of mine in our
organization and I know that I can always talk to her about anything if I
need to. All of the skills I believe are what makes a great leader and why
I will be rooting for her this July in the election for vice president for
the national Association of blind students. Vee I want you to know that
you have my full support for this upcoming election.
> Sincerely,
> Nathan Clark
> 
> Nathan Clark
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