To: www.geocities.com/fireshelby

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

Date: 9 May 2004

Justifying End

Dear Friends,

Begging your indulgence, this lowly assistant professor of African history offers a final screed, a justifying end to this disturbing semester.  Upon reflection there may in fact be two other ways to resolve the current crisis.  Indeed one includes Dr. Thames remaining president, as unlikely as that may be.

Dr. Thames’ presidency might continue through the end of his current contract (two more years), though that would be loathe to the many faculty, staff, students and alumni who cannot justifiably abide him further, and with evident good reason.

Recognizing that Dr. Thames is at the half-way mark of his now-notorious tenure as USM’s president, if he were to conduct a thorough reorganization of his cadre of upper administrators he may yet gain sufficient support to remain an effective head of this major state university.  Of course he is not likely to do that, and who could possibly agree to work with him given his well-earned reputation?

It is clear that the number itself of his personally appointed upper-level adminstrators, some clearly hired for superfluous positions and then given outrageous authority to shake things up as they see fit, is only half of Thames’ problem.  Equally troubling is the official personality of some of these key decision-makers.  We all saw this in action with Mr. Jack Hanbury’s notorious e-mail sent to the academic deans.  Of course that job then came to an end, justifiably.  One also hears of similar imperiousness from other key recent executive hires, like the newly appointed “COO” of the Gulf Park Campus.

Note to Dome: why a COO of a branch campus when they already have a provost?  And why two provosts at one university anyway?  How about putting those superfluous salaries directly to classroom instruction, especially with well-known plans for expansion in the works?

In the corporate world, one way an executive shake-up happens is precisely to shake up the executive officers.

A clean sweep of Dr. Thames’ immediate subordinates is called for.  Their substitution by experienced people with sound administrative judgment, combined with real national searches for critical jobs such as the Vice-President for Research (and economic development) as per Mississippi State, and the elimination of outrageous positions like “Risk Manager” (why not re-direct that $140,000 into academic programs?), would satisfy the general demand by Dr. Thames’ many critics for an administration as accomplished as they are. For example the English  Department is staffed with Ph.D.s from many of the finest top-tier research universities in this country. In comparison, look where the current V-P for Research (and economic development) got her training.

Make no mistake, USM was on the verge of being a very good regional university, with a national profile in some programs.  However, and especially in the current circumstances, the assertion that USM was (or is) a “World-Class” university is delusional.  Simply trying to talk it into being and then brooking no dissent while providing little actual investment to make it so, is about as realistic as thinking that a president can singlehandedly mould an entire institution in his own essentially Machiavellian image without a fight.

Do we deserve a university where the ends apparently always justify the means, no matter how low the means (and high the ends) - where nothing succeeds like success?

If we already are “world-class” then why is an essential unit like the Library system so underfunded that it doesn’t even belong to the Association of South-Eastern Research Libraries?  Other aspiring third-tier institutions like East Carolina, the University of Memphis, and the University of South Florida do.  The fact is USM is ranked about 140th out of ca.150 Carnegie I Research Extensive universities in the country.  But we are one of the few who are not members of that definitive marker of “world-class” university status - the Association of Research Libraries - and currently we don’t even qualify.

Simply put we are not there yet.  But in the past two years we have been slipping in two of our three legs of success.  Why?  Dr. Thames’ unwise reallocation of our limited resources largely into new administrative hires.

USM had been approaching greatness on the strength of three main academic legs; the liberal arts, the performing arts, and applied science (including Nursing).  This trifecta of academic success, however, has clearly been undermined, and USM as a whole is now limping along.  And the College of Nursing is no more, even with the dramatic shortage of nurses nationwide. Justify that.  Is this is a sound way to ‘grow’ a university, especially in a state like Mississippi?

But if an ‘A’ team of observant administrators-in-waiting with senior experience here, and yes I am thinking radically of seasoned people like James Hollandsworth, Don Cotten, Myron Henry, and perhaps other particularly thoughtful long-standing members of this academic community like Neil McMillen, whose association with USM also spans 40 years, were somehow humbly invited to step in to manage the damage done by the Amateurs (at least as interim appointments pending real national searches, viz. for Vice-President for Research), then Dr. Thames could avoid stepping down.  Let him serve his term but insulate USM from any further harm.  All we want is what is best for this entire university.  Does he?

Of course, the chances of this scenario (laughable in its improbability) are less than a snowball in hell.  They may even be lower than the chance that the new IHL Board will act decisively to end this crisis in the most logical way, or so it seems.  Plus ça change.

On the other hand, we cannot deny that Shelby Thames has, during his two years as president, apparently accomplished some impressive things, at least on paper.  For example, on the last day of class, a day marked by the justifiable ritual destruction of a great professor’s three USM teaching awards by the raging poet in his own scholar’s self outside the Liberal Arts Building, in the Dome Thames & Co. inked an international partnership in polymers and plastics with a minor Portugese university, complete with an honorable Ambassador in attendance.  These things usually look impressive, but of course in the end the devil is always in the details.

The point is, put Dr. Thames back to doing what he (apparently) does best - working his polymer bailiwick.  Anyone for a new “School of Advanced Polymer Science Studies?”  This model has been used elsewhere to end an ineffective presidency, and it is reasonable.  Look at the list of accomplishments Dr. Thames recently offered to justify his presidency and you can’t help but notice how he has reeled in a number of institutional affiliations supporting Polymer Science (and little else) at USM.  This is his gift - why deny him completely?  But in the end does it justify his administration?

Do the ends justify the means?  As an historian I pose this question to the USM  community and interested onlookers and stakeholders.  Conversely, may the means nullify the ends?  To this observer USM is still an institution in search of itself, and only on the verge of greatness.  Dr. Thames, who cut his professional teeth under the authoritarian administration of General McCain in an earlier age of transition, has come to represent one vision.  In the end we think it self-destructive with means sinistrous.  But this is not the only vision imaginable for a major state university in such obvious and wrenching transition, even with Dr. Thames continuing as a care-taker president. With the means at our disposal one may ask, when does justifying end?