There are a boatload of articles/blog entries/etc. available via The Ann Arbor News:
- Much coverage seems available on a blog space that I didn’t even know they had until now– go to http://blog.mlive.com/annarbornews/breaking_news/emu_report/ There are way too many entries/articles here for me to comment on this morning. I think that most of this material appears as “sidebars” to the main article in the paper today– I mean the “paper version” of the paper, not the online one.
- “Report rips EMU over dorm death Probe: Officials broke law in slaying case” is the headline for the online version of the AA News article (by Geoff Larcom) in today’s paper; the “Report rips EMU on killing” is how it appears on the front page.
Here are the opening three paragraphs from the AA News article:
Eastern Michigan University officials violated federal law and compromised campus safety by failing to warn the public about the circumstances surrounding a student’s death in December, according to a report released Friday that sharply criticizes several top administrators.
The report says EMU officials knew police immediately suspected that Laura Dickinson had been murdered, but they failed to report that possibility to the public for more than two months while the suspect remained on campus.
The independent investigation by the Detroit law firm of Butzel Long faulted EMU for a variety of systemic administrative failures, including lax reporting of crime statistics, inadequate disclosure of campus security policies and failure to update its daily crime log. Some university administrators gave investigators conflicting accounts, complicating the probe, the report said.
The article goes on to say that the regents told EMU administrators (presumably they meant cabinet-level types) not to show up at the press conference and not to comment on this.
Here’s another passage from the article that I found a little disturbing:
The investigation found that circumstances surrounding Dickinson’s death showed immediately that homicide was a strong possibility. Within a few days, a drop of fluid found on the body was determined to be semen. In addition, multiple law enforcement agencies responded to the scene, and the county medical examiner believed by the end of Dec.15 that the conditions of Dickinson’s death were suspicious.
The findings say Hall also believed by the end of that day that Dickinson might have been murdered. Hall was in Dickinson’s room that day and observed the condition of her body, the report said. The report said Hall and Vick discussed the investigation numerous times over the two months before the arrest.
Regent Jim Stapleton, who chaired a board subcommittee that acted as the liaison with the law firm, said the report revealed a significant amount of miscommunication at EMU “and, quite frankly, dysfunction.”
According to the article (and I haven’t read enough of the official report yet to fully grasp this yet), the thing that is key about Vick (allegedly) shredding this DPS report is that had it been circulated to the University lawyer (Ken McKanders), “it would have raised a flag.” So jeez, a lot of people seemed out of the loop, and those folks who were out of the loop– Fallon and McKanders, for example– didn’t seem interested in asking a lot of questions.
The article also says that the Board of Regents would decide on personnel and policy issues and that some of these changes might come before their next meeting on June 19.
Another passage, which kind of sums up my feelings:
“I was fearing a whitewash, and this is not that,” said S. Daniel Carter, vice president of a national campus crime information watchdog organization, Security on Campus.
Carter said the EMU incident is the most serious violation of the Clery Act since it was enacted in 1990. “None were a murder with a suspect at large,” he said.
Carter said he hoped EMU would heed the report’s recommendations. “They need to make sure this is fixed, that something like this will never happen again,” he said. “And if anyone deliberately withheld information … if a person did that, they don’t deserve to work in higher education ever again. They don’t deserve to be responsible for student safety ever again.”
One last thing:
At the press conference, the Butzel Long folk said that they’ve so far billed EMU about $220,000 to $225,00 for half of the work they’ve performed. Granted, this is probably money well spent, given the outcome here. But I have to wonder: if we add up all the money that this administration has spent this year on lawyers– on contract negotiators, on fact finding, on this, on Lord only knows what else– how many faculty lines is that? How much of a percentage does that represent to the faculty contract or the PT contract? How much health insurance does that buy? How many newly keyed doors could that have bought? How much can that be put toward buildings and grounds? How much of that could have been spent on technology upgrades? On student scholarships? Heck, on just beautifying the campus to make it a better place?
There is also a video of the press conference from the Ann Arbor News:
http://www.mlive.com/aanews/video/flash/index.ssf?070608emureport
You raise some excellent points! If we had ethical leadership, EMU could have saved a lot of money, heartache and badpress. I am reminded of a quote by Ayn Rand: We can evade reality, but we cannot evade the consequences of evading reality.” {WMail Issue #48} . Hopefully this life lesson will bring about positive change for EMU.
Faculty average is, what, 80k? PT average is, I think, 40k. I’m bettin’ CS average is gonna be *maybe* 30k. There are other bargained-for units; but I’m nost familiar with these three; I don’t mean to trivialize or ignore the others.
So the cost is, so far, 3 faculty. Or 6 PT positions. Or 8 CS positions. And the cost was distinctly NOT caused by decision-makers in these ranks. But that’s where the pain will be felt, along with our students getting more “we were stupid AGAIN” increases in fees and tuition.
Chronicle of Higher Education
June 8, 2007
“Eastern Michigan U. Broke Campus-Crime Law Following Student’s Murder, Report Says”
(with commentary)
http://chronicle.com/news/index.php?id=2461
Washington Times
“College accused of cover-up in killing”
Published: June 9, 2007 at 12:02 PM
http://www.washingtontimes.com/upi/20070609-115339-5215
ageing hippie – I wish faculty averaged 80K! I am a tenured, full-prof. I have been at EMU 22 years. My base pay is $73,000.
I wasn’t at all comfortable with that 80k figure, but all I could find quickly were the percentages of raises and not salary figures. If we make it 60k, that makes it 4 faculty lines.
The larger point, and I think Steve said it elsewhere, is that we’d have more money if it didn’t constantly get blown on shameful, wasteful things. Or at least more people who deal directly with students in support of the teaching/learning enterprise here.
I’ll add my recollection and hope it is correct
When salaries among UM, EMU, MSU etc. were in the AA News 2? 3? years ago as part of an article about universities, incoming faculty many big name schools were in the 50′s. Where EMU loses big time is the lack of a reward at tenure. Often it is 10-20k bump, EMU was under 5k at that time IIRC.
Administrators are well up there amongst their peers by default, since you know you have to pay to get the (ahem) good administrators.
I believe that’s close to the articles, I can’t pull up the original online article from years back as I don’t pay AA News for that service.
Rather than look at money, it’s interesting to look at it in terms of who is generating positive news.
For all the (inaccurate IMO) administration negativity about faculty and their actions, it is the consistent negative outcomes from poor administrative judgment (being charitable re: motivations) that keeps hitting the news and damaging the efforts of a lot of hard working faculty/staff/students and certainly not to forget- the administrators who do a good job.
Two thoughts on this:
When I came in at EMU, my salary was pretty competitive to the national averages in my field. But the issue of salary compression– common in many fields of work, frankly– and what noneyet wrote, that of the relatively small bumps in salary when reaching the next rank definitely contribute. And, to be frank, I think a merit pay system of some sort could help solve some of that, but of course, merit pay is a dirty dirty word at EMU.
The other thing is that you can’t really compare faculty/staff lines with legal expenses, simply because the legal expenses are a one shot deal where a salary for a staff/faculty person is a lot longer. Of course, if have an administration doing something stupid like this every year or so and thus costing the university this much money on a regular basis….
“So jeez, a lot of people seemed out of the loop, and those folks who were out of the loop– Fallon and McKanders, for example– didn’t seem interested in asking a lot of questions.”
President Fallon was NOT out of the loop. No president is out of the loop of the actions of their vice president, especially in matters such as this.
I am going to call Greg Jones, Student Body President, and pressure him to put together a Student Body No Confidence vote in President Fallon.
It is obvious to me that President John Fallon is guilty here and needs to resign. Even if it is indeed nothing more than “being out of the loop” that is in itself enough reason to call for his resignation.
Eastern Michigan University needs a new President and Administration.
Jeff -
I can see where you are coming from in your views on Fallon. I too would follow your logic, if I was not an employee in the division of Student Affairs. Each division at EMU operates as it’s own entity – especially Student Affairs. Why? Because the dominant culture in SA is static. The key SA leadership has been at EMU for over 30 years and they are going to govern the division the way that has always worked for them. When you line that up against a new President, the Division will stonewall in order to maintain it’s identity and sense of culture. Bottom line? Student Affairs (which is linked to the entire cover-up) overseas housing, DPS, (before they were moved to Business in May), the ombudsman, Student Judicial Services and many other departments. Since all of these areas are governed by Jim Vick, it would be easy to keep key pieces of information under raps and away from Dr. Fallon and the general public.
As far as cleaning house – I can not even imagine how much money it would cost EMU to seach, recruit, and hire an entire new administration. So many PT and CS positions have already been cut – and even more would happen in effort to fund a house cleaning. It would be easier and more cost effective to release the key players in this scandel.
Raven,
Except if Dr. Fallon never received the Police Report (and I would hope he asked for a copy) then he is at fault for reporting facts on the case back in February which have turned out to be false.
Dr. Fallon went so far as to say the Ann Arbor News was not reporting the truth.
And yet here we find Dr. Fallon never had access to the facts?
In a “common sense” universe… No one should voice their opinions, attack a Newspaper, when they have not gotten any of the facts for whatever the reasons are.
President John Fallon is without any doubt guilty of not bothering to get the facts.
I don’t care whose responsible for what or what the “culture” is.
No one that high on the Podeum should play GOD and over-rule Police Departments and Medical Examiner Reports, based on “heresay” from their subordinate officials.
As Ronald Reagon said, “Trust but verify.”
At least Ronald Reagon knew how to lead.
I need to correct something.
Dr. Fallon was not voicing his OPINIONS.
He was voicing things as indisputeable FACTS.
It’s perfectly reasonable for someone to voice Opinions if the intent is to “figure out what the truth is.”
The problem is that he was making Official Statements to everyone that contained false information….
If he was not given the Police Report…. What is he doing pretending he has the facts?
In regards to my phone call with Greg Jones:
Greg Jones has disputed that he ever defended Jim Vick on EMUTALK.org.
The truth? He did.
“Comment from Greg Jones
Time: March 6, 2007, 2:14 am
The Student Perspective:
http://emich.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2246565448
You may or may not have access to facebook. However, as I write this, it is less than 24 hours since Jim Vick was put on administrative leave. At present there are 185 students in a group to show support for our VP of Student Affairs and counting. I expect this will only continue to grow.
The only thing that the University has done wrong in this situation is acting like they might have done something wrong by putting Mr. Vick on administrative leave. They’re trying to save face for something that was handled admirably. This is how students feel and that is what is important.
This is a tragedy, but EMU has done nothing wrong. Reinstate Jim Vick now! ”
This is more evidence that not even the Student Government’s Student Body President was willing to get the facts before they made their stance.
The EMU Student Body doesn’t vote in a dictator. They vote in a Student Body President and he must be held accountable to make sure he’s doing the right thing.
I will not have my good name tarnished by GREG JONES as it was tarnished (wrongly) by Jim Allen and Dan Cicchini and countless other SG members who didn’t do their job.
GREG JONES has a clear conflict of interest BIAS in favor of JIM VICK and EMU Administrators as seen clearly from March 6th, 2007.
Given GREG JONES wants his opinion over the opinions of the Student Body, by intentionally not providing any Public Means like a VOTE / SURVEY / PETITION / ETC….
To gather student opinions…. But instead talk to a “few students…”
GREG JONES needs to be held accountable for his CONFLICT of INTEREST. He’s Biased. He should understand that and take himself out of the DECISION.
The Decision belongs to the EMU Student Body, not to Greg Jones on this one.