IHL May 19th Agenda - USM Forum -- Message Board

Date: May 12, 2005

IHL May 19th Agenda

Date: May 12, 2005

Questions: In reviewing the text (below & underlined by me), What's the item on "annual performance goals", duties of the commissioner?

From IHL text:

"4:30 p.m. Strategic Planning. The agenda will include further discussion on proposed annual performance goals and other business.

5:00 p.m. Institutional Executive Officer Evaluation. The Board will evaluate Dr. Charles Lee, Mississippi State University.

Thursday, May 19, 2005 in the 9th floor Board room of the IHL building.

8:30 a.m. Committee Reports and Recommendations.

Administration/Policy. Agenda items will include approval of a new institutional executive officer assessment policy, discussion of proposed changes to the duties of the commissioner and institutional executive officers, changes to committee structure, and other business.

Personnel/Foreign Travel. The agenda will include a discussion of personnel matters, foreign travel requests at the universities and other business.

An Executive Session may be held in accordance with the Open Meetings Act."

Date: May 12, 2005

5:00 p.m. Institutional Executive Officer Evaluation. The Board will evaluate Dr. Charles Lee, Mississippi State University.

Is that all there is?

Date: May 12, 2005

quote:

Originally posted by: Is that all there is?
"5:00 p.m. Institutional Executive Officer Evaluation. The Board will evaluate Dr. Charles Lee, Mississippi State University.

Is that all there is?"

SORRY! But that's all that was listed. SFT will survive again!!!!!

Date: May 12, 2005

Why are they evaluating Dr. Charles Lee and not SFT? They had a special meeting to get the facts on SFT and now the evaluate someone else? Something is going on here. Maybe the new policy will have Crofts evaluate SFT.

Date: May 12, 2005

I go for the David Johnson Theory. July 1, Crofts is Thames' boss and then watch out.

Date: May 12, 2005

Somebody ought to evaluate Lee. Poor old MSU can't get a break on President's. Croom could probably outperform Lee.

Date: May 12, 2005

Trade ya!!

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: Third Witch
"I go for the David Johnson Theory. July 1, Crofts is Thames' boss and then watch out."

Woohoo! I don't get my MSW until 2:30 this afternoon and the PhD is probably 4 years away, but thanks to Third Witch, I have my own Theory named after me! Is this a great country or what?!?

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: David Johnson
" Woohoo! I don't get my MSW until 2:30 this afternoon and the PhD is probably 4 years away, but thanks to Third Witch, I have my own Theory named after me! Is this a great country or what?!? "

Four years, huh? There are alternatives you know!

Anyhow, congratulations!

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: Bulldogger
"Somebody ought to evaluate Lee. Poor old MSU can't get a break on President's. Croom could probably outperform Lee."

The Croom-Lee analogy on this post defies my immagination. Statement's like this, which are appearing with greater and greater frequency (on this message board, on the Eagle Talk board, and in the media) are beginning to lead me to believe that big time athletics at universities warps the brain.

Date: May 13, 2005

Woohoo yourself, David Johnson. Heartiest congratulations! I would love to see you get your hood, but maybe we'll make it to Texas instead.
Thanks again for everything you've done at USM.

Date: May 13, 2005

I'm a real outside observer who thought I could find the truth on this board. I have spent the last few days reading and have come to the conclusion that you're all just a bunch of unrealistic, dissillusioned, malcontents.

Date: May 13, 2005

We're sorry you feel that way. I do suggest that before you leave, however, you might check out Dr. Robert Campbell's "Liberty & Power" postings. Dr. Campbell is a professor at Clemson University who has been an active participant on this board and is doing research on issues of university organization and governance. I believe you will find his material enlightening and intellectually "respectable."

You should also be aware that this board is totally open and most posters are anonymous. Therefore a fair amount of junk gets posted along with the good material. There are sometimes deliberate efforts to stir up discord by people who post untruthful or outright slanderous material. That's why I suggest you look at Dr. Campbell's blog for the "real" deal.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: LVN
"We're sorry you feel that way. I do suggest that before you leave, however, you might check out Dr. Robert Campbell's "Liberty & Power" postings. Dr. Campbell is a professor at Clemson University who has been an active participant on this board and is doing research on issues of university organization and governance. I believe you will find his material enlightening and intellectually "respectable." You should also be aware that this board is totally open and most posters are anonymous. Therefore a fair amount of junk gets posted along with the good material. There are sometimes deliberate efforts to stir up discord by people who post untruthful or outright slanderous material. That's why I suggest you look at Dr. Campbell's blog for the "real" deal."

I agree with you that Dr. Campbell's blog is much more respectable than most of the common posts on this board. At the same time, I disagree with him most of the time.

Something is just not right. I can't put my finger on it, but ya'll seem to be . . . I don't know, can't put my finger on it. Nothing will please you. Dr. Thames never had a chance.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
"I'm a real outside observer who thought I could find the truth on this board. I have spent the last few days reading and have come to the conclusion that you're all just a bunch of unrealistic, dissillusioned, malcontents."

Could you at least inform us as to how you determined that we are a "bunch of unrealistic, dissillusioned, malcontents", ...Observer? (Omit "dissillusioned" because I think that everyone in H'burg is "dissillusioned" with SFT.) Other than the occassional trolls, I have found good information on this Board. Most of the "good stuff" ends up in the newspaper a few days later. What threads have you been reading and how do you determine what is true in a few days?

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
" I agree with you that Dr. Campbell's blog is much more respectable than most of the common posts on this board. At the same time, I disagree with him most of the time. Something is just not right. I can't put my finger on it, but ya'll seem to be . . . I don't know, can't put my finger on it. Nothing will please you. Dr. Thames never had a chance. "

Shelby did have a chance. He had a real chance from the time he was given the office until he fired the Deans. Once the faculty took a vote favoring both other presidential candidates over him but he was still appointed, folks settled down and took a cautious but hopeful atttude. You can reference Bill Scarborough's comments on the day the announcement was made. The administration utterly failed to act in good faith on that hope -- instead it seemed to take every perverse action it could to prove that it was in control, to strike fear, to let us know who was boss.

I'm sorry -- but you are wrong. Shelby had a chance to prove himself. Instead he fired staff by locking them out of their offices, failing to acknowlege long years of service. He appointed a cabal of people from outside USM, gave them fat well paying jobs -- even inventing new titles for new people -- and those administrators immediately began a campaign of intitmidation and regulation. He fired the Deans and consolidated the colleges with little evidence of advance planning -- we are still suffering from the great promise of "change" that had very little evidence that it had been well-thought out. The last three years have been a chaotic mess in terms of management. And then of course, there was every faculty member's nightmare -- Gary and Frank, fired, accused of criminal behavior, and humiliated by the university they served so long.

Sorry -- I'm not much moved by your ambiguous "something's just not right . . ." which I take to mean that you have some "intutive" "felt" sense that the faculty are wrong on this. Something's just not right all right -- but evidently you have to not be from Mississippi to see it.

Oh well, welcome to our hell.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
"

Something is just not right. I can't put my finger on it, but ya'll seem to be . . . I don't know, can't put my finger on it. Nothing will please you. Dr. Thames never had a chance.
"

Also, there is no "y'all" -- even among the regular posters who know one another there are many areas of disagreement. There is no uniformity of opinion or outlook, which is one thing that makes the board interesting and lively. It's the last free place many people at USM have.
You cannot make blanket statements about what this board is "like" -- and you should also remember that posters include retired and relocated faculty, present faculty, staff and former staff, faculty from other universities, and interested community members. So whatever you think is wrong, does not apply to the board as a whole.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: David Johnson
"Woohoo! I don't get my MSW until 2:30 this afternoon..."

CONGA-RATS!

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: Knock the doc
"The Croom-Lee analogy on this post defies my immagination. Statement's like this, which are appearing with greater and greater frequency (on this message board, on the Eagle Talk board, and in the media) are beginning to lead me to believe that big time athletics at universities warps the brain. "

Aw, c'mon! There are probably a few folks here who would argue that Jeff Bower wouldn't make a better university president than Shelby Thames. Very few.

Maybe MSU will give Noel Polk his chance for a 15-minute presidency...

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: LVN
"

Also, there is no "y'all" -- even among the regular posters who know one another there are many areas of disagreement. There is no uniformity of opinion or outlook, which is one thing that makes the board interesting and lively. It's the last free place many people at USM have.
You cannot make blanket statements about what this board is "like" -- and you should also remember that posters include retired and relocated faculty, present faculty, staff and former staff, faculty from other universities, and interested community members. So whatever you think is wrong, does not apply to the board as a whole."

LVN--I've said it before, and I'll say it again: YOU ROCK! Thanks for being the voice of reason and good manners on this board....and for playing nicely with trolls (I've lost my patience with most of them at this point--even the ones who only look vaguely troll-ish).

Truth

Date: May 13, 2005

I'm not from Mississippi

Date: May 13, 2005

just from reading. nothing is good enough for you. it wouldn't matter what the administration did. it wouldn't be good enough.

Date: May 13, 2005

sorry, there is a "ya'll" just like there is a "they"

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: truth4usm/AH
" LVN--I've said it before, and I'll say it again: YOU ROCK! Thanks for being the voice of reason and good manners on this board....and for playing nicely with trolls (I've lost my patience with most of them at this point--even the ones who only look vaguely troll-ish). Truth"

Truth,

I am not a troll, I am though:

1. from outside MS

2. was interested in your plight

3. done with you

it is obvious why "ya'll" will lose, you dont know how to play the game. it's not by running off possible supporters.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
" ...it is obvious why "ya'll" will lose, you dont know how to play the game. it's not by running off possible supporters. "

Now this sounds familar. Which troll was it? Was it Seeker who used to say this over and over? Or was it Kudzu King? I lost my list of trolls.

Please, please tell us what we should do, "A real outside observer". How should we play the "game"? How are we "running off possible supporters"? Please provide some substance, pretty please.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
" ... it is obvious why "ya'll" will lose, you dont know how to play the game. it's not by running off possible supporters. "

I suppose the "real outside observer" is gone now. I am sorry. Reading back through the thread, I don't know what y'all said that was so offensive. Sometimes you just never know.

For myself, I wonder how SFT and USM will win by running off actual, as well as possible supporters.

My child is a senior at USM. Both my wife and I are alumni of USM. All three of my siblings graduated from USM, with eight degrees amongst the four of us. My mother has three degrees from USM. My mother-in-law graduated from USM, as did her sister and her mother before her. That's sixteen USM degrees in four generations of my family -- not a record, I'm sure, but an indication of a certain connection to the institution.

I have a second child who will be finishing high school in a few years. Unless (1) things change a lot in the next few months, or (2) perverse adolescent rebellion dictates otherwise, my second child will not attend USM.

We are not the biggest donors the university has ever seen, but it takes a fair amount to tear those kinds of ties.

(Just as an aside, real outside observer, I know you were just using a figure of speech; but it stopped being a game for some of us a long, long time ago. For most of us, it never was.)

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
"just from reading. nothing is good enough for you. it wouldn't matter what the administration did. it wouldn't be good enough."

real outside observer,

I started blogging about USM in March 2004, after Shelby Thames had already carried out one of his very worst actions as President of USM. Not only had he tried to fire two trusted, respected senior professors, locking them out of their offices and ordering them off the campus, but he had done it to protect one of his hand-picked administrators who had misrepresented herself on her vita. And it was obvious that he didn't care a hoot about the right or wrong of misrepresentations on an administrator's vita--he merely wanted to punish anyone who might deprive him of a loyal enforcer.

I've been around academia long enough to see the good, the bad, and the ugly when it comes to administration. In the American system of higher education, Thames has set new standards for bad administration. When I describe samples of his conduct to professors at other universities who don't know about the USM situation, their jaws drop. Future students of management and organizational behavior are going to know about USM because their textbooks will feature case studies of Shelby Thames and what he did to the institution.

If you review Thames' management record, I think you will realize that the contributors to this board are dealing with one of the worst university presidents in American history...and perhaps then you will be more inclined to sympathize with the folks here. If the tone of my blog entries on Thames is generally harsh, that's because he is truly world class when it comes to incompetence and malevolence. And to make matters worse, a significant faction on the IHL Board and many in the community have continued to support him despite the obvious evidence of incompetence and malevolence.

Robert Campbell

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
" Dr. Thames never had a chance. "

It was Professors Stringer and Glamser that never had a chance.

Date: May 13, 2005

quote:
Originally posted by: a real outside observer
" Truth, I am not a troll, I am though: 1. from outside MS 2. was interested in your plight 3. done with you it is obvious why "ya'll" will lose, you dont know how to play the game. it's not by running off possible supporters. "

Dear Roo,

Please see the professionally written, well-reasoned, and respectful communications from the official faculty representatives - Faculty Senate, AAUP, Graduate Council, Academic Council. Their votes, letters, and resolutions professionally represent what most of this academic community supports. We, as posters on an anonymous website, do not represent any official position. Even the most reasonable among us is weary beyond words. There are the unreasonable among us and those who pretend to be among us. There are times that even the reasonable become unreasonable with frustration. Please look to our official spokespeople who do yeoman's work against unbelievable odds for official positions and don't give up on the many who are fighting the good fight.