wondering wrote:

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Hi all, I'm a relatively new faculty member and I've just started looking at this and various other message boards...and I'm wondering, why does everyone seem to hate the Department of Psychology? Just wanted to know.  

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Welcome Wondering.  Can you quote a post from this board that gave you the impression, "everyone seem to hate the Department of Psychology" ?  I haven't seem any. 

Psycho bumblers wrote:

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Apparently, the psych profs can't win for losing.  They spit in Thames face about the 2/2 loads, and get rebuffed.  To strategize for the next battle, they have a war room session at Mahogany Bar, thus putting dough into Robert St. John's coffers, Thames' ally.  The first line in St. John's Sunday HA column contains the phrase "my good friend Bud Holmes..."  Now the psychs are aligned in direct opposition to the Dixie Mafia.  Good job guys.  Well thought out.  Good luck with that.

 

what's this mean?

wondering wrote:

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and this... Shorty wrote: Does teaching a mini-term course bring additional compensation? Yes. All that need for research time and they can afford to teach for extra $$$$?

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Troll alert.

The premise of the original post on this thread is not factual. It mistakes disagreement with hate. The Department of Psychology has been a quality department for many years. Psychology faculty have been quite active in research and have achieved national recognition. Many of their faculty members have held leadership positions on campus. Under the current administration, they have not fared well. This not surprising since a strong department usually has aggressive faculty with strongly held opinions. These characteristics are bound to get a department in the doghouse when a university has a dictatorial president who is surrounded by sycophants. Throw in a case of serious nepotism in the college and it gets worse. The disagreements that have surfaced between Psychology and others on campus have been primarily about strategy on how best to weather a bad situation. Since the situation at USM is rather unique, in that previous presidents have employed more of a consensus approach to managing the university, it is not surprising that good departments with competent people will run afoul of a dictatorial administration. Most faculty at universities, particularly those who have successful research careers, are arrogant and out spoken and acting humble is out of character. The shuffling hat in hand approach in dealing with upper level administrators is not how competent people operate. Hopefully, the Psychology Department will hunker down and suffer through the next year. They would be best served by developing a well thought out strategy to present to the new President on how to restore their resource base rather than confronting SFT. It is in the best interests of USM to allow productive units to continue their successes and it is possible that we will have the good fortune to get a real University President after next year.