The performance evaluation of UW President Laurie Nichols has moved forward with praise, criticism and concerns, all voiced at an open meeting with consultant Professor Steve Portch, a former chancellor of the University System of Georgia.
The Feb. 14 meeting allowed any and all members of the UW and Laramie communities to share their perspectives with Portch. The meeting was broadcasted on WyoCast, allowing other individuals to submit statements and questions electronically—and anonymously. A full recording of the meeting is available on WyoCast for those interested in the proceedings.
A major topic of concern that has previously manifested at faculty senate meetings in particular was the issue of the president’s authority relative to that of the board of trustees and to misconceptions regarding who is behind which action that has taken place. Media Producer and Director David Keto, a member of staff senate, voiced his concerns about miscommunication, citing the recent sweeping of funds from some UW departments’ accounts.
“It’s public record, it’s in the board minutes, that was 100 percent the board of trustees dictating to the president what needed to be done,” Keto said. “She fought it tooth and nail and lost and she’s still getting blowback from all quarters on ‘this is something the president and the provost did.’ It wasn’t them, it was the trustees. I don’t pretend to suggest how she might go about communicating this because those are her bosses and it’s a little hard to go about campaigning against her bosses.”
Scott Shaw, professor of entomology and former faculty senate chair, followed up with clarifications regarding the sweeping of accounts and its contribution to feelings of frustration and low morale among faculty and staff.
“Another issue is that the sweeping of those accounts away from the department and individual faculty is taking away funds that were allocated to those faculty correctly, by the regulation that was in place at the time those funds were generated and is still in place—it’s a university-wide regulation endorsed by the board,” Shaw said. “We were creating accounts that we could fall back on when times got difficult—the fact [that] the university didn’t have sufficient reserves is one thing, it’s also damaging to morale to take away the small reserves the faculty had put aside for when these difficult times come.”
The ongoing worries for the integrity of tenure also surfaced in Shaw’s comments.
“The rewrites of all the regulations are going on and we don’t know which way these things are going,” Shaw said. “There’s a feeling, whether or not it’s correct, that tenure and academic freedom are under threat—just the perception of that is damaging.”
Other comments from the audience focused on Nichols’s entry into a position already made difficult by short-lived previous presidencies and a significant budget cut, and that initial efforts needed to be focused on damage control and stabilizing the university to continue forward.
Some audience members asked Portch for his own perspective about the bigger picture and similarities between UW and other institutions. With a long background in higher education and involvements with many distinct institutions, Portch stated that such adjustment periods are common trend for new terms before presidents switched gears.
“That’s a pattern which is almost exactly what’s happened here,” Portch said. “This is a perfect time for people to give some advice to the president for what phase two should look like.”
The evaluation is taking place at the 18-month mark specified in Nichols’s original contract and is more of an opportunity to get a sense of her presidency’s effectiveness and to make adjustments for the future as necessary, rather than a pass-or-fail checkpoint.
“Eighteen months is enough of a period for you to get a good sense of how this president operates, how she’s doing,” Portch said. “And yet, it’s not so long that if we have some advice for her on adjustments, that it might actually be heeded and make a difference.”
