Glamser

Stringer

Hearing information

About $16,000 has been collected toward paying the legal fees of suspended University of Southern Mississippi professors Frank Glamser and Gary Stringer.

Amy Young, secretary for the USM chapter of the American Association of University Professors estimated Wednesday that their legal defense fund still has a few thousand dollars left over to cover other expenses.

Young said she's received more than 200 donations ranging from $10 to $1,000. The money has come from a wide range of sources, she said. Some money has come from Southern Miss students, faculty and staff, but she's also received funds from people across the country who have followed the events surrounding the professors' dismissal on March 5.

"Some are professors who read the Chronicle (of Higher Education) and they're outraged," Young said.

Glamser and Stringer, both tenured professors, have been the subject of statewide and national media coverage since USM President Shelby Thames began termination proceedings against them.

At the time Glamser, a sociology professor, was AAUP president and had asked Stringer, an English professor and AAUP member, to investigate the academic credentials of Angie Dvorak, Southern Miss vice president of research and economic development, while she was president of Ashland (Ky.) Community College. Stringer concluded that Dvorak had misrepresented herself on her rÈsumÈ.

The professors' attorney Michael Adelman could not be reached for comment on Wednesday.

USM spokeswoman Lisa Mader referred inquiries on how much the hearings will cost USM to Jackson-based USM attorney Jim Keith. He also could not be reached for comment.

Young said she spoke with Glamser and Stringer on Tuesday and characterized both men as being confident going into their termination hearings scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday on the Hattiesburg campus.

Many faculty members are also confident that the hearings will result in the reinstatement of the two professors because they believe in their character, Young said.

"It's almost impossible to imagine that they've done anything worthy of dismissal and being treated this way," she said.

It is anticipated that interest in the hearings will be high on campus next week, Young said.

Among those closely following the hearings will be two tenured faculty members who will soon be leaving Southern Miss.

Associate English professor Susan Malone, who has taught at USM for 10 years, recently accepted a job at Mercer University in Macon, Ga., while tenured associate music professor Marian Wilson Kimber is taking a position at the University of Iowa this week. She taught at USM for five years.

Wilson Kimber's husband and professor of music Michael Kimber, also is leaving the university although he does not have a position in Iowa.

"We're going from two jobs to one job and it will be a financial hardship," Wilson Kimber said. "I care deeply about my colleagues at the University of Southern Mississippi. They are very good people and they are caught in an extremely difficult and unpleasant situation and I hope that there is justice done here."

Both Malone and Wilson Kimber said the turmoil at USM contributed to their decisions to take new jobs.

Malone said she had fully expected to retire at USM.

"I never thought to look, and would not have seriously considered it had there not been so much upheaval, she said.

She plans to attend the hearings.

"I'll be there," Malone said, "with my First Amendment T-shirt.

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Originally published Thursday, April 22, 2004