Dozens demand firing of UWM senior lecturer
Schoeller says comment was taken out of context
Pictures of Vanessa Guillen hung by a table with candles and flowers.
Dozens yelled chants that echoed against the walls of Spaights Plaza at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee campus Wednesday night.
Protesters demanded the termination of Betsy Schoeller, a senior lecturer and former colonel in the Wisconsin Air National Guard, after she made a controversial comment on Facebook in response to an article about the killing of Guillen, the Mexican-American soldier whose remains were found near the Fort Hood, Texas, base last week.
Schoeller posted on a private Facebook group: “You guys are kidding, right? Sexual harassment is the price of admission for women into the good ole boy club. If you’re gonna cry like a snowflake about it, you’re gonna pay the price.”
Guillen had made accusations of sexual harassment against her sergeant.
Emily Cruz, a junior, who was repulsed by Schoeller’s comment, helped lead the protest and launched a change.org petition calling on UWM to fire Schoeller. As of Thursday morning, the petition had nearly 160,000 signatures.
“As a student at UWM, as a Latina and as a woman, it’s very important for me to speak up and to be a voice for the voiceless,” Cruz said in an interview. “What happened to Vanessa was very unfortunate and never should have happened. For someone who represents our university to say that, I was appalled.”
UWM issued a statement Saturday that condemned Schoeller’s comment but said it could not fire her.
“There are legal reasons why UWM cannot fire Ms. Schoeller for her social media postings, as some have demanded,” UWM stated. “This type of speech is protected by the First Amendment, as UWM cannot regulate the private speech of its employees.”
“As someone who is going into law, I understand that is her right to free speech,” Cruz said. “I also feel that UWM should hold her accountable as an educator because everything that she does represents our institution and if they don’t reprimand her, that looks bad on us.”
In a statement made public by UWM on Sunday, Schoeller wrote that her Facebook comment was taken out of context. Schoeller explained that she was replying to someone else who was trying to understand why Guillen was killed.
“I did not mean to imply that this is how I feel,” Schoeller wrote. “I was giving voice to the messaging that women hear in the culture of sexual harassment: The message we receive from the culture is not only will you suffer from sexual harassment, if you squawk about it, you will suffer even more.”
After a moment of silence in honor of Guillen, speakers shared stories and attendees made signs to tape around campus that condemned UWM for not taking action against Schoeller.
“Before she made her statement, UWM took it for what it was,” said Margarita Garcia Rojas, a UWM graduate and organizer of the protest.
“The simple fact is that they don’t listen to their students, that’s why we’re here,” Garcia Rojas said.
Organizers are planning another protest to honor the life of Guillen from 3 to 8 p.m. Saturday, with a march from the Rockwell Automation, formerly AllenBradley, clock tower to the Milwaukee County War Memorial at 750 N. Lincoln Memorial Drive.
Jessica Rodriguez is a Report for America corps reporter who focuses on news of value to underserved communities for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Please consider supporting journalism that informs our democracy with a taxdeductible gift to this reporting effort at JSOnline.com/RFA.