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Exorcize*
this Devil
from
DPAS
Immediately!
When Dr. George
R. Garrison was interviewed prior to being selected to be the chair
of the Department of Pan-African Studies, he avowed that he would not change
any of the programs, practices and policies that faculty and staff had
developed over the preceding 25 years. He also avowed that he would preserve
the Department's student-friendly atmosphere and its openness to others.
However, it seems he has
lost his direction
or that he was lying when he uttered that avowal. Shortly after he assumed
the chair, he began to show this true spirit, for he demonstrated his reluctance
to work with faculty who dis- agreed with him and he began to act as if
his mind was the only mind that was worthy of being followed. Participatory
democracy would not be his way of leadership. Several DPAS faculty began
to seriously challenge him, and in October of 1996, two thirds of the faculty
(all that is required by the Collective Bargaining agreement between the
University and the AAUP) petitioned for an extraordinary review of the
chair to assess whether he should be retained in that position. The University
obstructed this review process for over a year. Finally, the review is
underway. We therefore present to the general public the following BILL
OF PARTICULARS . . .
• This
Demon defies his faculty with his disgusting administrative actions concern-
ing merit, travel, summer teaching assignments, promotions, sabbaticals,
faculty, grad- uate assistants, part-timers, etc.;
• His
leadership is ineffective and unethical; he lies remorselessly;
• The
DPAS curriculum is in shambles; the major and three minor sequences will
soon crumble under the weight of his incompetence;
• He speaks
of having a vision for the Department's future, but he has never communicated
this vision to his faculty in writing;
• He violates
in collaboration with the central administration official University,
AAUP and
DPAS policies; he has barred DPAS graduate assistants and others
from attending
general faculty meetings;
• He claims
to want to create a graduate studies program in DPAS, but fails to attempt
to strengthen the undergraduate curriculum which is essential to any serious
attempt to add a graduate pro- gram; what's even more important, he himself
is not a member of the graduate faculty, a crucial ingredient to his being
able to even pro- pose a graduate course much less component;
• He discourages
qualified DPAS faculty from teaching graduate Africana Studies- related
courses in other departments;
• He continues
to show his disrespect for his female colleagues and his utter contempt
for the Black United Students and their legitimate claim to be the creators
of the Department of Pan-African Studies and the Center of Pan-African
Culture;
• He discourages
some faculty from seeking extramural funding;
• Let's
not forget that he also holds unbounded disrespect for many, if not all
of his male faculty;
• When
he pontificates about all he has done for the Department, he forgets to
say how the Henry Dumas Memorial Library is an embar- rassment, how three
DPAS publi- cations — The African American Monograph Series, E-JAS
(The Electronic Journal of Africana Studies), and the incipient
DPAS Occasional Papers — have gone out of existence since his arrival
on campus; how within Arts & Sciences, DPAS is the only department
without a webpage, how he relies on a universally disliked faculty mem-
ber who refuses to attend faculty meetings as his only intradepartmental
support, how he develops programs with the provost and other outsiders
without ever informing his faculty and staff; he appears to be afraid to
show his faculty DPAS's budgets;
• He has
a knack for citing the work of others as his own;
• He resigned
precipitously from the presidency of PAFSA when PAFSA refused to blindly
follow his recommendation. Now he declares that PAFSA does not represent
black faculty as he has formerly
argued.
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