To: www.geocities.com/fireshelby

From: Dr. Douglas Chambers, Asst. Prof., History Dept., USM

Date: 5 May 2004

cc: Institutions of Higher Learning Board [IHL Board] 

“Memo To IHL Board: Clean Up The Mess” 

On May 3rd The Clarion Ledger editorial board wrote “...it’s time the College Board cleaned up this mess.” The outgoing IHL Board, having created the Thames administration in the first place, perhaps against their better judgment, should clean it up on their watch. With the impending change in Board membership, now is the time to resolve the deepening crisis at this “great educational institution.” Since the half-way settlement of last week, ironically President Thames has again gone on the offensive while his “risk manager” Jack Hanbury has simply been offensive. And the special hearing clearly raised more troubling questions than it answered, from email surveillance to possible perjury. 

How did a major state university ever wind up with a President whose major senior administrative experience was twenty years ago? And didn’t that end with scandal and his resignation back then? How long can we afford a president who spends more time (mis)managing his own administration’s unwise bombshells than doing what modern presidents of comparable universities do, which is raise money and cultivate institutional allies?  

More tellingly, throughout the current crisis two of Thames’ most public supporters have been a notorious convicted felon (“Bud” Holmes of Petal) and a divisive demagogue (Billy Hewes of Gulfport). The former publicly called for the punitive ‘removal’ of certain unnamed faculty, while the latter will be the commencement speaker at the Gulf Coast campus. It is difficult to tell which is more embarrassing. Certainly both do not flatter a normal major state university. 

How did a major state university ever wind up with a Vice-President for Research (and economic development) who has produced almost no published scholarship at all? And who has spent most of her career in community colleges rather than research institutions? And who has never earned academic tenure anywhere? And who was hired under unusual circumstances? 

In a revealing contrast, look at Mississippi State. They just hired a new V-P for Research in a transparent national search. Now there is a truly world-class scholar. Dr. Scanes has over 500 publications to his credit, real academic accomplishment and substantial administrative experience at major research universities (Rutgers, Iowa State). And his CV is on the MSU website for all to see. In comparison, how can we ever aspire to Dr. Thames’ oft-invoked “world-class” status when we have such a bush-league administration?  

How did a major state university ever wind up with a highly paid Director of Risk Management (whatever that is) with absolutely no experience in higher education law? His $140,000 salary would pay for THREE new assistant professors. In this time of limited budgets why are scarce resources going to redundant legal positions? Do we not already have a well-regarded and prudent University Counsel? At the least the IHL Board must order a comprehensive audit of USM finances, including all the recent upper-level administrative hires. Just how much of those chimerical “reorganization savings” actually went to classroom instruction? How much was diverted to administrative hires? How much is unaccountable? Why are major contracts let to sweetheart companies like Pileum in no-bid deals? 

How did a major state university ever wind up with a desperate need for a hastily conceived “University Advisory Council” in order to (somehow) facilitate communication in this academical village? Has any other major university in the state or region been rendered so low by a self-destructive president? Can a single hand-picked professor, staff and student from each of the five existing colleges, respectively, realistically expect to speak for the hundreds, even thousands, of disaffected others not invited to participate? 

Why do the Faculty Senate, the Academic Council, the Staff Council, the SGA, the AAUP and the many other committees and councils already existing (as is wont at great universities), exist? Optimistically cherry-picking a tiny few (in this case, 15) putative discussants will not deafen the larger uproar. 

Simply put, fixing the muffler will not help a car with a blown engine. And note that since the hollow “settlement” last week, the motto of the anti-Thames movement has shifted dramatically to “No Quarter.” 

But we must recognize that the IHL Board itself is constrained by generally accepted norms of good governance. Accrediting agencies like NCATE and SAC, which are in the middle of re-accrediting USM, admonish against micro-managing state boards. 

Therefore, in reality the IHL Board has three basic options at its decision-making level. 

The first is difficult but eminently reasonable. It is to remove Dr. Thames as president. He can either resign or be fired or perhaps placed on leave pending appointment of an interim president by the incoming Board. Is this not why USM has a president emeritus, able to step in and provide steady leadership in times of institutional crisis? 

In one fell swoop this would solve the crisis, or ‘clean up the mess’. It would also reaffirm what a major state university is supposed to be, that is, an institution of higher learning rather than simply an institution of higher earning. To be a motor of economic development a major state university must function first and foremost as a University. Our mission is the production and dissemination of knowledge, in service to the public.

But Dr. Thames has been trying to put the cart before the horse, subverting our central mission to important but essentially ancillary aims (even in Mississippi), and then simply trying to whip it all down the road. Of course, the whole enterprise has been driven straight into the ditch. 

The second option is more radical and risky, basically imprudent and unwise, and ultimately destructive of the ends for which USM exists. Theoretically the IHL Board could simply direct President Thames to fire the scores of faculty and suspend the hundreds of students whom he could be empowered to declare “grossly insubordinate.” Presumably such an order would include several deans as well, at least according to Jack Hanbury. 

The legal consquences are mind-boggling, the cost would be open-ended, and the state legislature would then have to intervene. More importantly this would, of course, destroy the university. Clearly this is not a viable option. 

The third is simply to pass the buck, hoping to muddle through by doing nothing, letting disaffected faculty leave and disgruntled students transfer somewhere else, and leaving this mess for the newly constituted Board. However, most of the Board members are business leaders. In a similar crisis in the corporate world, how would a board of directors act? Losing their nerve and simply temporizing would risk a collapse of investor confidence and a crash of the corporation’s stock. The decisive stake-holders in USM (faculty, students, now some deans) have already largely declared our lack of confidence in Dr. Thames and his administration. And unfortunately in the market of academe USM’s brand may be in free-fall already. 

This unresolved crisis is affecting the entire university system in the state, and if left to fester will soon affect the cultural economy of South Mississippi. It must be fixed, the sooner the better. 

Why else would the state’s newspaper-of-record call for the College Board to ‘clean up this mess’? The central question remains, does the Board understand the depth of what is happening here? Are they willing to do what needs to be done?