some people go out of their way to make you feel small

[MissMillie]

I work as a faculty assistant at a rather well-known graduate school in Boston.

In this time of year when it is cold, several of the faculty assistants (FAs) in my department gather in a conference room at the end of the floor at lunch. We have been watching The West Wing on DVD for some time now (we're about 6 episodes from the end of season 4). We do not have an employee lounge (the faculty do, and they also have the Faculty Club), and the cafeteria is always filled with students.

There are 3 conference rooms on the floor, so we always assumed that if anyone needed a conference room there are two others available, and if they were not available, we would gladly vacate the space should anyone ever need it.

We got an email last night from the Faculty Support Services department telling us that these rooms were set up so that the faculty could have scheduled and impromptu meetings there, and that these rooms really are not for our use.

In other words, they would rather leave a conference room empty than allow us lowly non-faculty pee-ons to use it.

Anyway, we spoke to our unit head, who is on board telling these folks that if the conference rooms are at his discretion, he'd just as soon let us keep using the rooms. It's good for morale, it keeps us cohesive, and if anyone is ever looking for any of us at lunchtime, they know where to find us. To his knowledge no one has ever complained that a room was not available when they needed it.

This really felt like a slap in the face.

[Hugin]

1. Low-down petty BS...

If you ask me!

I'm glad you're not just letting them push you around.