An Iowa State professor reportedly canceled classes for the remainder of the week following the election last month of Donald J. Trump as the next President of the United States.
The professor, a person called KP Williams who declares his pronouns as he/him on Iowa State’s website, wrote a message to students the morning after Trump’s landslide victory.
“I imagine some of you stayed up late last night, and others are waking up to election updates,” Williams wrote. “We all likely have personal feelings about the election results. Some of you may feel pleased, while others might be very upset. One of our core objectives is to be thoughtful and respectful toward one another, especially when engaging with our differences.”
Williams implored students to “be mindful” about expressing their feelings, recognizing the “diversity of identities and perspectives within class, campus and broader community.”
The professor shared a link to this article from the eve of the 2016 election. It was called “The Coming Day After” and was written by Jon Mertz.
He then told the students he remains committed to “leading with authenticity and transparency.”
“Personally speaking, I am unprepared to engage with or manage the range of big emotions that I and others are feeling right now in a group setting,” Williams wrote. “Given this, I will not be on campus or in class today.”
According to a source, the class didn’t meet the rest of the week. Williams was available via email to answer questions.
“I also respect that you may benefit from focusing on something other than our class for the day,” he added in the email. “I will work to prepare and publish resources for continuing our class experience next week following the ILA Conference tomorrow through Sunday.”
Iowa State University did not reportedly find someone else to teach the class while Williams stayed away to “manage” his “big emotions” away from a group setting.
There is no word if Iowa State students will be refunded a portion of their tuition over the professor canceling classes due to the result of America’s democratic election.
Ironically, the class is called “Leadership Theory and Practice.” The course’s learning objectives are:
- Critique the strengths and limitations of a variety of historical and contemporary leadership theories, models, paradigms, and approaches.
- Describe the complexities of leadership and the multi-disciplinary and integrative nature of leadership studies.
- Critically examine messages and images of leaders and leadership as well as institutions and structures that perpetuate them.
- Evaluate leaders, leadership behaviors, and leadership effectiveness in a variety of contexts.
- Evaluate one’s own potential for leadership and develop a comprehensive understanding of their personal leadership style, strengths, and blind spots in order to articulate their own personal philosophy of leadership.
- Explain the moral dimensions of leadership by exploring the areas of ethics, personal integrity, and decision-making.
- Understand and critique how leadership is designed and perceived in American society.
According to records, Kyle Patrick (KP) Williams received annual gross pay for fiscal year 2024 of $70,229.29.
Here is the full message Williams posted for students:
The Iowa Standard reached to Iowa State University on Monday evening and asked a few questions. We let them know that if they do not respond in time for their answers to be published with this story, we’d gladly publish them in an update. Here are the questions we asked Iowa State University:
*Did Iowa State University know these classes were being canceled?
*Did Iowa State attempt to find a substitute to teach the course?
*Was this a common response from Iowa State professors to the election?
*Will students be offered any of their tuition back for these classes that were canceled not due to illness or anything other than professor(s) not being able to manage their “big emotions?”
We also sent an email to Williams. We asked:
According to LinkedIn, he’s been at ISU for 6 years and 5 months. An additional question to ask would be, “did you cancel classes for a week after Biden was elected? Why or why not?”