sent by a faculty member to the faculty senate leadership

Dear Virginia, Steve, and Nigel:

I am prompted to write you, as Faculty Senate leaders and the faculty rep to the BOG, by Mike Garrison's statement in response to the BOG's directive following release of the Bresch panel's report. The BOG directed Garrison to take responsibility for the errors made as well as to implement the panel's suggestions. In his official statement, Garrison failed to take responsibility for the mistakes made in granting Heather Bresch an MBA and so flouted an important part of the BOG's directive. Garrison's failure to take responsibility and his comments minimizing the gravity of the error(s) necessitates a response from the Faculty Senate.

The report was clear, comprehensive, and unequivocal in finding that administrators' actions were "seriously flawed"; that awarding the bogus degree entailed "failures of process and failures of leadership"; and that these failures were "unique to this particular, high-profile case, rather than . . . systemic" ("Bresch Panel report" 4).

Speaking for the BOG, Steve Goodwin directed Garrison to take responsibility for these problems: "It is the recommendation of the Board that you as president of West
Virginia University accept responsibility for errors in judgment and
procedures relative to this matter made by members of, and personnel
affiliated with, the administration" (WVU E-News, 4/23).

In his response statement, Garrison took responsibility for implementing the Panel's suggestions but did not "accept responsibility for errors in judgment and procedures relative to this matter." In the only passage to mention taking responsibility, Garrison said, "As president, I take full responsibility for implementing the recommendations of the panel as required by the Board" (WVU E-News, 4/23).

Garrison further evaded responsibility and minimized the impact of the errors in judgment and leadership for the WVU community by expressing regret for the investigative process rather than for the actions that resulted in awarding Bresch a false degree: "I deeply regret that the West Virginia University community, here on campus and around the state and the world, has had to endure the lengthy process that led to this day." The lengthy investigative process that led to such a comprehensive, frank, and objective report, rather than taxing the WVU community, works to restore faith in WVU's academic integrity. It is the flawed process of awarding the false degree, not the fact-finding process, that damaged the WVU community.

Further, Garrison seemed to defend as systemic a process that the panel found not only flawed but unique to this high-profile case: "As an institution, we celebrate the fact that we have a culture that invites students and alumni to bring their questions and concerns to the
Office of the President. My practice has been, and will continue to be, to refer individual academic concerns to the appropriate office - the provost, or a vice president or dean - for disposition, or the Office of Student Life to assist with questions." While I also support the university's open-door policies, it is clearly not typical that student complaints get referred from the President's office to the Provost. It is disingenuous to claim otherwise. In fact, the panel found that "the rush to judgment in Ms. Bresch's case was driven primarily and inappropriately by concerns about public relations and by Ms. Bresch's high profile" ("report" 16).

Although Garrison said he would implement the panel's suggestions, he seems to refute the validity of its finding that this constituted a unique and problematic situation of special treatment and, instead, offers to see that WVU "adhere to the best practices and highest standards in the area of student and alumni record keeping" (WVU E-News 4/23). In fact, the Panel report clearly stated that the flawed decision making process regarding Bresch had nothing to do with flawed record-keeping. Moreover, the report was at pains to stress that WVU's record-keeping systems worked well enough to ensure the value of all other students' MBA degrees. Thus, Garrison's commitment to implementation erroneously focuses on record-keeping rather than on the lack of safeguards ensuring that all students are treated equally and fairly.

I am not one of those faculty members calling for the heads of administrators in the wake of this scandal. If our top administrators, and especially the president, had responded to the panel's findings with humility and integrity and had taken responsibility for the flawed decision-making process, I would have been satisfied with a commitment from them to set up safeguards ensuring that such events did not recur. However, in the wake of Garrison's evasive response, which directly flouted the BOG's directive to take responsibility, which did not acknowledge the damage done by the administration's actions, and which did not evince understanding of the nature of the problem (administrative leadership, not record-keeping), I would argue that it behooves the Faculty Senate to take further action in the immediate future rather than waiting for Garrison's report to the BOG at their next meeting. I do not have a particular Senate action in mind, but I would suggest, at a minimum, that the Senate propose and attempt to pass a resolution outlining the ways that Garrison's response to the panel report and to the BOG does not adequately address crucial issues and fails to take the institution forward and past this damaging event.