Quinlivan, Rachel < 1. currently the editor of The Student Printz; 2. carrying on Robbie Ward’s legacy in search of the truth.
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Ramsey, Marshall < 1. Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist appearing in The Clarion Ledger; 2. spoofs thee Thames administration by depicting Shelby Thames as the evil doctor played by Mike Meyers in the Austin Powers movie series.
red-blooded American male < 1. common usage: a man’s man; 2. a double-dog dare that Shelby Thames uses in the media to get underpaid USM faculty to take on his million-dollar public relations machine in the "court of public opinion".
resume < 1. employment document listing all one has done and been in his/her professional life; 2. for USM administrators, what you wish you had been able to do and be can also be included without negative consequences (they have Thames job insurance).
Risk Manager < 1. useful henchman for iron-fisted leaders; 2. helps administration of an organizationget around, for a time, the pesky legal restrictions and constitutional protections.
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sanitizing the website < routine (daily) practice by iTech officials at USM of removing exaggerations and untruths from various parts of USM’s official homepage, especially after feeling the heat of geocities.org/fireshelby and other watchdogs.
Schilling, Ryan < 1. USM alumnus who was removed from Reed Green Coliseum by USM police officers for participating in a calm, orderly protest of the Thames administration during a USM mens basketball game; 2. USM alumnus who protested Thames in the Greenhouse, and has since become a community icon.
Shanteau-Newton, Virginia < 1. IHL Board member from the Gulf Coast; 2. the only board member with a USM degree (currently); 3. Nostradamus-like vision: "I feared this would happen . . . this is what I feared...."
Siltanen, Susan < 1. Assistant Provost at USM; 2. committed the unthinkable — human error — during her service to the Thames administration when she misreported USM enrollment figures, leading to Shelby Thames’ false claim (see The Student Printz) that USM had surpasses Mississippi State as the state’s largest university; 3. mis/overcounted USM’s Fall 2003 enrollment by 674 students (see phantom students); 4. if you don’t believe the miscount theory, the Thames administration asks that you buy the theory that Siltanen, acting as a maverick, "broken arrow"USM administrator, took it upon herself to knowingly misreport USM enrollment figures (Roy Klumb and Carl Nicholson apparently bought one, or both, of these theories); 5. Siltanen relieved by Thamesfrom enrollment reporting responsibilities on solid grounds.
Slay, Lisa < see Lisa Mader.
solid grounds < 1. the standard of evidence/proof employed by the Thames administration in its investigations; 2. a standard of evidence/proof more sound than "beyond any reasonable doubt"; 3. this standard is met if, and only if, a risk manager and a group of unnamed "outside attorneys" review a packet of evidence from an investigation conducted by someone with a conflict of interest (e.g., that same risk manager, who is a good friend of the person he is asked to investigate)and decide that a punishment is indeed necessary. This standard is also most likely to be met when unnamed sources voluntarily provide useful information that indicates that the alleged transgression "was worse than anyone ever imagined."
Southern Diversified Products, LLC < 1. Mississippi MURA Company, located on Hardy Street across from Lake Byron on the USM campus; 2. employs USM polymer science students to mix American Pride Paint for the Shelby Thames Research Group.
Spigener, Sarah < 1. former Vice President of the Hub SGA; 2. refused to criticize Angeline Dvorak’s credentials even after discovering she and the rest of the Hub SGA had been misled by Dvorak (see Chad Cornett); 3. maintains now that Dvorak has done too much good for USM students to question her credentials (see Van Hook Golf Course for example of the good things Dvorak has done for students).
Stringer, Gary < 1. Moorman Professor of English at USM, fired without due process; 2.product of a national search decades ago; 3. world-renown scholar, the Donne Variorum, etc; 4. has(d) tenure, but not Thames job insurance; 5. USM faculty and Faculty Senate both overwhelmingly voted that they would rather have Gary Stringer as a colleague than Shelby Thames (statement attributed to Noel Polk).
The Student Printz < 1. USM’s official student newspaper; 2. independent of the USM journalism department; 3. newspaper whose scathing editorials on the corruption at USM that led Thames to conclude that we aren’t properly educating our journalism students any more; 4. broken more Thames-scandal stories than Hattiesburg American.
The Sun Herald < 1. the Biloxi-Gulfport area news authority; 2. middle-of-the pack coverage.
Swan, Randy < 1. WDAM-TV news anchor; 2. conducted interview with Shelby Thames where Thames debuted the phrase well-oiled machine.
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Taylor, Gene < 1. U.S. Representative from Mississippi; 2. goaded Thames into announcing that USM would take over operation of the Gulfport V.A. Hospital, even though Thames did not have IHL Board permission to accept such a responsibility.
tenure < 1. special employment status granted to those in the academy, in an effort to secure academic freedom for the professorate; 2. apparently, it is a somewhat inferior protection to Thames job insurance.
third side < 1. fictitious, nonexistent side of a(n) argument or controversy, where spineless political leaders run and hide when the heat turns up; 2. political term coined by newly-elected Hub SGA president Walt Cain.
Thames job insurance < 1. employment protection provided by USM president Shelby Thames for upper-level administrators at the school; 2. job protection for administrators at USM ,superior to tenure, and unavailable to USM faculty; 3. phrase coined by Abbenyi Abbenyi in a editorial cartoon.
Thames job search < 1. the type of job search to fill an upper-level (or other) administrative appointment without placing advertisements in the proper venue, seeking candidates across a national spectrum, or following EEOC regulations; 2. job search popularized by USM president Shelby Thames, where family, friends and cronies are hired to important management positions without doing a national job search.
Thames, Dana < 1. Chair of CISE at USM; 2. harbors professional jealousy, runs off competent faculty members; 3. being sued by Melissa Whiting for nepotism; 4. actual biological product (daughter) of Shelby Thames, which is more secure from employment perspective than being a product of a Thames job search; 5. got huge raise (15%) from her dad last year.
Thames, Shelby < 1. the current and embattled President of the University of Southern Mississippi who fired two professors without due process and committed countless other egregious acts; 2. "bucket and paddle" scientist; 3. Dome Gnome (his personal favorite); 4. Saddam.
Thames Underworld < name given to the set of questionable (shady) characters USM’s president sometimes associates with.
truth4usm < moderator of the website firethames.com.
Thomas Cooley Law School < 1. East Lansing institution where Angeline Dvorak received her JD, and also went to pump up her resume.
Towering Inferno < the large conflagration that nearly occurred last year at the Sigma Alpha Epsilon house at USM when a disgruntled USM student doused the place with gasoline and attempted to light it while all the brothers were asleep (happened in the middle of the night). The chapter’s president claimed that none of the house’s emergency exits was functional — a claim Lisa Mader disputed. Mader produced Physical Plant documentation showing that work on the exits had been done on the afternoon that the near mass-killing occurred. The problem is that same documentation showed that the work had been done in the afternoon, while the attack — what would’ve been the largest disaster to ever befall the USM campus — took place in the A.M. The Hattiesburg American published the timing of both events (i.e., the attack and the repairs), but the trouble is no one noticed the discrepancy. The chapter’s president maintains that Lisa Mader’s accounting of the events of that day are inaccurate (i.e., a lie).
Tuesdays against Thames < 1. what Tuesdays with Thames has morphed into; 2. proof that Thames Peter Principled the Peter Principle.
Tuesdays with Thames < Tuesday meetings between Thames and students at the Hub that became necessary after the Peter Principle became clear (regarding Thames’ ability to lead USM).
turtle President < 1. a university president who’s not afraid to stick his neck out and with whom the institution can get on down the road (Bud Holmes quote); 2. the problem is, that road can lead to disaster.
2 Trolleys < 1. the two trolleys USM "acquired" from the City of Hattiesburg, used to transport USM faculty/staff/students to restaurants in downtown Hattiesburg, all under to guise of economic development; 2. brainstorm of brainchild Ken Malone, and apparently a complete bust; 3. known as the Downtown Lunch Express.
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UAC < University Advisory Committee set to hear the Glamser-Stringer hearings in late April, 2004.
university restructuring < 1. plan implemented by Shelby Thames to cut the number of USM colleges from 9 to 5 (leaving the College of Science and Technology intact); 2. plan was claimed to have saved $1.8 million, but administration officials put the decimal in the wrong place (human error) — actual savings were one dollar and eighty cents.
USM’s enrollment < 1. a useless, totally specious statistic from now and into the near term; 2. like a cheating spouse, when you get lied to about the institution’s enrollment figures (one of its most important numbers), you can’t trust it anymore.
USMGC < Gulf Coast branch of the University of Southern Mississippi (Long Beach, MS).
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vacationing in Texas < political codename for president Thames’ absence (or other administrator’s absence) when things get too hot for him to handle, used to disguise the fact that he is hiding from political troubles of his own making.
Van Hook Golf Course < 1. USM golf course killed by Angeline Dvorak and Gregg Lassen to make way for an innovation park;2. Van family found out in the newspaper like everyone else.
The Varsity Voice < 1. new student newspaper to be introduced in the ‘04-‘05 academic year at USM by newly-elected Hub SGA president Walt Cain; 2. new student newspaper to serve as the mouthpiece of the administration, with editorials written by Lisa Mader, "news" coverage provided by Mader’s staff, with the financial backing of pro-Thames people in the private sector.
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Ward, Robbie < 1. former editor of The Student Printz; 2. got the ball rolling on many of the Thames administration scandals as editor.
WDAM-TV < 1. local NBC affiliate, serving Hattiesburg-Laurel; 2. broken several stories during the Thames administration.
well-oiled machine < 1. a Porsche 911; 2. the 1976 Miami Dolphins; 3. Southwest Airlines 4. a state university with a risk manager at the helm.
Whiting, Melissa < 1. former CISE faculty member who is suing the Thameses for falsely reporting her academic accomplishments while at USM and for violating State nepotism laws; 2. has retained famed attorney Kim Chaze and may soon get very wealthy off of the State of Mississippi.
Willis, Russ < 1. former Director of Human Resources at USM; 2. currently listed as Associate Director of Human Resources at USM; 3. all that stands between Mark Dvorak and institutional Chernobyl.
world class university < 1. according to the Thames administration, one that maligns and attacks its own faculty (Neil McMillen quote); 2. fills important posts via Thames job searches.
Per the Printz, Art Kaul is not affiliated with the Printz.
RE the printz:
"The journalism faculty honors and respects the freedom and independence of the student press....The Student Printz has enjoyed the enviable position of being an independent and free voice on this campus...It is a student newpaper and the journalism faculty does not dictate or intrude into its editorial discretion."