Today is the anniversary of the USM Faculty Senate no confidence vote on Shelby Thames. It would appear that our friends in Starkville now have a better understanding of what went on here. It would also appear that the IHL view of the kind of president it prefers didn't change much until very recently. The local USM AAUP chapter and the USM Faculty Senate did an excellent job exposing the flaws of the previous administration. The MSU faculty leadership appears to have been less robust in that we are just now hearing of problems.

MSU Reflector

BREAKING: Faculty Senate passes resolution to improve presidential search
Unanimous passage indicates desire for transparency in selection process

3/7/08

..."Those of us who've been in higher education know that there are two models that do not work out at universities: military and business," Wolverton said. "The IHL brought in someone with a totally different culture, tried to fit them in to university life, and it was not a very workable scheme."

Mark Goodman, a senator from the College of Arts and Sciences, moved for the formation of a standing committee to assist in the transition and the presidential search process that the university will be facing. The motion carried unanimously....

http://media.www.reflector-online.com/media/storage/paper938/news/2008/03/07/News/Breaking.Faculty.Senate.Passes.Resolution.To.Improve.Presidential.Search-3259399.shtml

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BREAKING: 'Doc' resigns to 'help university move forward'
MSU president says he will step down by end of June

3/7/08

...MSU President Robert H. "Doc" Foglesong has resigned, effective no later than June 30.

In a State-Gram posted Friday afternoon on the university's Web site, Foglesong said he has resigned "with the express purpose of helping the university move forward."

The retired four-star general met privately with Commissioner Thomas Meredith at the IHL's headquarters in Jackson. Immediately following that meeting, Meredith accepted Foglesong's resignation....

...This transition could become subject to controversy. The IHL's previous search was done secretly. Many MSU faculty and students expressed the need for an open presidential search process in 2006.

Mark Goodman, MSU's Faculty Senate president during that search process, criticized the IHL's method in choosing the university's president.

"I led a very public and strong opposition to the way the search process was done," Goodman said.

Goodman said Friday that the IHL brought Foglesong in without support of faculty or alumni, and in doing so established the notion it can do what it wants.

"Foglesong didn't have a support group. He wasn't our candidate and we didn't owe him anything," he said. "How do you count the raw deals here?"

Academic freedom questions were scheduled for discussion in today's Faculty Senate meeting, which began at 2 p.m., but were cut short by the university's decision to close the university due to winter weather concerns....



http://media.www.reflector-online.com/media/storage/paper938/news/2008/03/07/News/Breaking.doc.Resigns.To.help.University.Move.Forward-3259046.shtml

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Foglesong represses pedagogy
Letter to the Editor
Architecture student body

2/22/08

This letter is an open and public request by us, Mississippi State University School of Architecture students, for clear reason and prudence to be restored to the Office of the President at MSU and for the IHL to reconsider its decisions on the leadership for our fine university. We speak from the position of design-oriented students offended and appalled by the way this university administration has conducted itself over the past year. The cult of individual power and secrecy promoted by Dr. Robert H. Foglesong is damaging the rationalization of the university system that the democratic process provides.

In our four years at MSU, no other administrator has micro-managed the aesthetics and pedagogy of the university in the way it is now being done. President Foglesong leads our university with a dictatorial attitude that disregards and disrespects the views of faculty professionals.

Our School of Architecture has been under a barrage of intolerable orders from the Office of the President. ...

...First, the president has demanded...

...Fifth, the immature and irrational nature of President Foglesong's replies to many students and alumni over the removal of daffodils is only an instance of a larger issue of belligerence and an atmosphere of fear. Faculty complaints about his domineering leadership style have been widely known since November (See The Reflector's article "Faculty Senate fed up" printed on Nov. 20).

All of the aforementioned instances serve only as examples to which we as students are directly connected. Many other instances of systematic oppression of those who disagree with this president are known to faculty and administrative staff. The irrationality being perpetuated by Dr. Robert H. Foglesong is inexcusable, especially for a president who professes leadership yet fails to recognize the fundamental purpose of a university as one of the few places left for open, uncensored pursuit of knowledge.


http://media.www.reflector-online.com/media/storage/paper938/news/2008/02/22/Opinion/Foglesong.Represses.Pedagogy-3226842.shtml

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CL, 2/12/08

Foglesong won't release names of MSU AD finalists

Mississippi State has finalists for its soon-to-be-vacant athletic director position, school president Doc Foglesong said this afternoon.

Who they are, though, remains a mystery....


http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080212/SPORTS030102/80212024/1287/SPORTS