DOWAGIAC — Holding white signs with red lettering accusing Southwestern Michigan College administrators of wrongdoing, several SMC students spent one of the first warm days of the Michigan spring protesting recent developments at the college.

“We, as students, want the administration to know that we do not accept their behavior,” said Constance Taylor, a 28-year-old criminal justice major at SMC. “We do not accept them jeopardizing our futures, our degrees and our federal financial aid.”

The protest was hosted Thursday morning to protest SMC’s current administration over
findings in a February report from the Office of the Auditor General. The audit alleges that from July 1, 2010, through April 28, 2017, SMC intentionally excluded approximately 500 part-time student employees from enrollment into MPSERS, a retirement fund for public school employees in the state of Michigan. The audit also alleged that the college could owe between $388,600 and $10.4 million in fees and interest for not including part time student workers into MPSER.

In addition, the audit alleges that a number of SMC administrators falsely certified documents saying the college was in compliance with state law, which is a misdemeanor.

According to Taylor and fellow protest organizer Brittany Lewis, a 20-year-old social work major, the primary reason the protest was held was due to concerns about what could happen to students’ financial aid if the school is found guilty of wrongdoing, citing language in the Federal Student Aid Handbook that says that a college’s standing with Federal Student Aid.

“I’m not your traditional student. I rely on financial aid,” Taylor said. “I have a job here. I have kids that go to the schools in the area. I cannot afford to uproot my entire family to go to a school that would offer me financial aid if I lose it here.”

While participating students said financial aid was the primary motivator of the protest, they also called out the SMC administration for perceived wrongdoing and said that they would like to see President David Mathews and other administrators involved in the decision to exclude part-time student workers MPSERS step down from the college.

“They have broken our trust,” Lewis said. “They have lied to us. They have lied to the state of Michigan. … I don’t think [Mathews stepping down] would fix all the problems the school has, but it would be a step toward letting the campus heal.”

For the administration’s part, President Mathews said that administrators had reached out to the protest organizers prior to the event to answer any questions they had, but the students declined to meet with the administration. He said the administration is not guilty of wrongdoing nor any misdemeanors, saying that information is missing from the OAG report and that other audits have found no wrongdoing on behalf of the college.

On the topic of how student financial aid is affected, Mathews pointed to information he released to employees on April 16 that stated including part-time student workers into MPSERS would treat part-time students differently than full-time students and that using any portion of work study funding to pay the employee share of retirement costs would be illegal, both of which are in violation of Federal Financial Aid directives.

“Making sure students had access to financial aid went into our initial decision. … In fact, students now have access to more funding,” Mathews said. “The majority of community colleges in Michigan follow the same practice we do. … Do you really think the majority of colleges are in danger of losing federal funding? I don’t.”

Mathews added that, from what he has heard, it is only a small portion of students who are concerned about issues highlighted in the protest, and that he believed the students who organized the protest were influenced by a group of former SMC employees that are calling for Mathews’ resignation.

“I think it is very unethical to get people on your side through fear mongering and using something [financial aid] that is so important to students is at risk when it is not at risk,” Mathews said. “I think that if [the protesters] really had that worry [of losing financial aid] they maybe would have agreed to meet with the administrators who reached out to them and express that worry.”

Though the protest was small — only eight students showed up to participate in the first hour of the protest — Lewis said that she hoped the voices of the students who participated were heard.

“This is a peaceful way to stand up for what we believe in,” Lewis said. “We just want to let the administration know that we have a voice.”

The most recent development in the SMC’s legal battle concerning the audit is that Friday, the Michigan Court of Appeals denied a request to remand SMC’s lawsuit against the OAG back to the Court of Claims. Now the lawsuit, which is over whether the OAG has the right to audit community colleges, will be heard by the Court of Appeals, and will allow SMC to include other 2018 audits of the college that found no wrongdoing to be submitted into evidence.

“This is just a procedural issue we had to do before we moved forward,” Mathews said.