(10-21-2020 09:25 PM)Deez Nuts Wrote: (10-21-2020 03:23 PM)Dukeman2 Wrote: 3 of our top 5 donors have ceased contributing to JMU until Alger is gone
This is unsubstantiated. There's no evidence to back this up.
Yes, and to repeat (if it’s been missed in all the commentary on this topic) Hartman (who just made a huge gift to name the COB) was the Rector of the BOV when Alger was hired. I think if there were problems with major donors this gift would not have happened, nor would the gift naming the School of Hospitality, or the countless other successes in fundraising.
IMO...informed by the level of frustration during the pandemic I’ve witnessed by students, parents, faculty, staff and others who love JMU...the Breeze article was a thinly disguised (and poorly thought through and exercised) effort to hurt Alger and the administration over the student’s frustration with the on-again, off-again opening and then closing of campus and adoption of on-line instruction. Nobody likes what’s happened, is still happening, and nerves are worn thin and frayed. People say (and do) stupid things when their normal levels of control are absent, and often the first people who bear the brunt of our anger are those we love.
To be frank, I don’t like many of the decisions made by the administration in handling the pandemic. Hindsight is always 20-20, however, and so while I have questions about the actions taken, I don’t question the administrations motives. They were doing what they thought best for JMU.
Any person who has ever sat on a board (I have and many on this site have) know the worst boards are composed of people who haven’t done their preparatory reading before the board meeting and waste everyone’s time at the monthly (or quarterly) meetings in minutiae.
I believe the pre-meeting BOV calls by Alger to 2 members were designed and executed for exactly the reasons he wrote about in his response. The Breeze has naively come to the conclusion that they have the right to be privy to all administration communication with members of the BOV. They do not. Both as a matter of law, and as a matter of simply doing the BOV’s business in an effective manner that best serves JMU.
The Breeze editors are doing JMU a disservice by continuing to pout. This entire sequence of events reminds me of a dust-up when Dr. Carrier was President. On Friday, January 13, 1995 Carrier announced (by fiat) he was dissolving several colleges, reconstituting them in a new organization, and eliminating the old distributive education foundation into what today we refer to as “General Education” requirements. Well, the faculty were furious. A band of about 40 faculty put their money together and sued Carrier.
The case came to court, and the presiding judge pointed first to Carrier and then the the faculty reps, and said “he’s in charge, you’re not” and dismissed the case ruling in favor of Dr. Carrier. Carrier had a copy of the news article covering the decision (it was only a 2-3 inch piece in the DNR) framed and hung over his private toilet in his office suite.
The point is, the President...any President...is in charge. Unless the Breeze has real evidence of malfeasance or illegal behavior by Alger their continued harping is childish. Again, just my opinion.