The rector of the University of Piedmont Daniel Silber abruptly resigned on Tuesday in protest of the proposed budget cuts and the layoffs of the Faculty, which the Board of Trustees will vote this week.
in a very critical email to colleagues announcing his departure, Silber wrote that the proposed budget cuts, which would be the second round of this year, were "morally incorrect" and that the budgetary process "does not It could be properly inclusive. " He also argued that notifying the faculty that they were being sent after the end of the academic year did not give them enough time to find a new job for the next semester.
"I refuse to be part of the endings in the endings that are carried out in such an ethical way," Silber wrote, who also served as senior vice president of academic issues. " Now that this draconian measure is being implemented, I have no choice but to leave the institution. " The academics subject (opinion)
University representatives in Destore, Georgia ,,,,,,, Georgia. He declined to comment for this article.
Steve Nimmo , Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, will assume the position of Vice President of Academic Affairs on an interim way. Piedmont has to t, to appoint an interim rector. After the Senate of the Faculty of Piedmont issued a vote of non -confidence in the president of the University, James Mellichamp, partly on the "mismanagement" of the F School Invancies and the lack of budget transparency, according to the resolution of the Faculty. The Board of Trust dismissed the call of the Faculty for the resignation of Mellichamp, expressing "full confidence" in the president.
googetag.cmd.push (function () Googetag.display ("dfp-ad-ntricle_in_article"););););););););););););););););););););Piedmont cut 8 percent of its faculty in February and has not yet given any of its current faculty contracts for the next academic year.
'Very surprising', but 'not unexpected'
dale van Cantfort, communications professor and president of the Senate of the Faculty of Piedmont, said he was "very surprised" by Silber's resignation. He had met with the former rector only 48 hours before his resignation and had no idea that he was considering leaving.
But while the abrupt nature of the resignation made him bewildered, Cantfort said that he agreed with many of the Silber frustrations expressed in his email.
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After a meeting to discuss the initial round of budget cuts February, Cantfort said, the administrators promised that there would be no more reductions in the faculty. But in April, the Trustee Board rejected the budget that Mellichamp presented for the next academic year. Mellichamp announced that more cuts would have to be made, including 15 additional faculty positions.
"We are approximately two months from the autumn semester," he said. "Telling a member of the Faculty for a long time:" You have no job "and leave them without hope to find one for next year because everyone has already occupied their positions, I think that is not morally defensible."
<< P> Cantfort said that through negotiations with higher administrators, he and other members of the Faculty managed to reduce the amount of positions that will be reduced in the proposed budget presented to the Board on Thursday from 15 to four. The Board has not yet voted on that budget. googetag.cmd.push (function () Googetag.display ("dfp-ad-article_in_article_low"););); Brian Mitchell, former president of the University of Bucknell and co -founder
