You've put the same post up three different places.  I don't think Fire Shelby will like that.  Might sic Tom Cooley's Risk Manager's associate on you!

See my response to the first time you posted this.

If you remember, in the early 1980's the IHL took away several USM Centers of Excellence, including Journalism and Computer Science and gave them to State and Old Miss. MSU got the CSS program and others, UM got Journalism and others. What did we get in return? Not even a kiss on the cheek.

Because the south half of the state has never stood up for USM or even for themselves, the north half of the state has always gotten its way. When this debacle happened at USM, AK Lucas gave his standard, "Our friends in the legislature" speech. Local individuals sued the IHL under the FOIA (sound familiar) to determine what had happened. Aubrey tried to disuade them from finding out the information.

Well, when J. D. and others received the information it was very revealing. After a two year IHL review of all programs at all universities in the state, the only university with no programs that were below expectations was USM. And we were only one of two universities having programs that were ranked as being excellent regionally or nationally. We had four or five programs (Polymers, CSS, Journalism, English and one other I think), while MSU had two programs. I do not remember Old Miss having any programs that were considered regionally excellent.

Bobby Chain has had articles in the HA about how the IHL Board had already tried to steal the Polymer program and move it to Old Miss.

Note: The Computer Science and Statistics program at USM was one of the first five programs in the nation in computer science.

The short and long if this is...Old Miss could not maintain the excellence that USM had maintained and Journalism has been reborn at USM and is still the dominant program in the state. CSS was later determined to be a basic skill, like English and Math, so the program was continued at USM...although not the same program as it was before.

Why does this happen?

Until the south half of the state decides it will work together in the legislature, the good old boys in the horth half will win. Twenty people working as a coordinated group will always beat a random herd of a hundred people. We are finally catching on to this fact, but the representatives have to do a better job in this area.

If Shelby has taught us anything about us as faculty and the university as a whole, it is we have to be always vigilent to the political environment.

For the first time in our history we have two people on the IHL Board that are identified with USM. It is a start.

Shelby will eventually be removed, but we will always be vunerable to future attacks from the IHL as long as we let ourselves be marginalized.

BOTTOM LINE: The MSU and UM certel know that the power has shifted to the southern part of the state. They are getting their licks in now, in hopes of permanently removing us as a threat to their power. Once we survive this attack, and we will, let us be sure to return the favor in a positive way.

We are in the population center and the wealth center of the state. By IHL decree, we are the only university in the southern third of the state. ASU and JSU are in the central third and the other five are in the northern third. We own the southern part of the state. But MSU and UM are trying to get their presence on the Coast.

Remember, this is a fight that will go own for some time.