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30 December 1996 From: George R. Garrison
To: Diedre L. Badejo, Professor, Pan African Studies Department Re: Your memo of 17 December 1996 I find it hard to understand why you are "surprised and frustrated by the content, tone and implications of" my memo. My memo of 15 November 1996 is very straight forward, and in no way unusual when compared to others that flow within and between Departments at this uni- versity. The issues that I raised, and the comments and request [sic] that were made were in keeping with the normal responsibilities of Chairs in this College. Hence, I am at a lost in terms of your perception of my memo. So much of your memo is unrelated to the matters contained within my memo, that I will not respond to all of them item-by-item. However, some of the statements that you made are so outrageous and distorted that they cry out for response. It is simply a fabrication for you to say: . . . On another occasion, when I requested to meet with you again, you said that I'd have a hard time catching you because you were so busy. This has certainly been the case. . . . Your inaccessibility, your unannounced disappear- ances from the office, your lack of response to my messages in your mail box to please let me know when you are in, and your disregard for my time and commitments to tasks at hand are serious impediments to meeting deadlines for extramural support. . . .This demonstrates what appears to be a reckless disregard for the truth. I have never told you that I am to [sic] busy to meet with you. Meetings can always be scheduled with me on mat- ters that are important to the operation of this Department, or of important professional interest to you. I am not, and will not be made responsible for any delays in your submission of propo- sals. You along [sic] are responsible for that. If you get me copies of you [sic] proposals in a timely matter, I will get them back to you in a timely matter. The one proposal that I did receive before you sent it off, was passed to me in the late afternoon of the day it Was due. This is a matter that you need to correct. It is not due to my inaccessibility.. All Chairs that I know, including myself, encourage proposals. I will do all that I can to facilitate their submis- sions. ' I was perplexed by you statement: "Dean Danks has agreed to work with me on the UGRR project in an advisory capacity. If you have a problem with that, perhaps you should discuss it with him." I fail to see the relevance of such a statement, given the matter that we have been discussing. Furthermore, you and I have never discussed this. Hence, I was not aware of Dean Danks [sic] involvement with your project. But, be that as it may, I certainly do not have a problem with the Dean's involvement with projects emanating from this Department. To suggest otherwise is contrary to fact. Regarding your request "to discuss a mission statement with the entire faculty," there are two responses: 1) This Department has a mission, that has been articulated in various places and you have seen a copy of this mission statement; and 2) Your request for a discussion of the current and/or future mission of this Department, could have taken place by now, if we had not had the many interruptions to the execution of the business of this Department, as those that occurred during this last semester. which have delayed action on a number of important matters before this Department. I would like to take up all these matters early in the semester. Regarding you [sic] goals and strategies for IAAA, I agree, that this is an area that you and I need to sit down and discuss again, for we do not have a meeting of the minds on that very crucial matter. The goals and strategies that you keep referring to, must be consistent with the already established goals and objectives of the Department. Let us address this early in the semester, so that we might move on. You can arrange meetings with me through any of the following ways: personal communication; Carol [sic] or Gladys; e-mail; a knock on the door; etc. Like all other administrators at this university, Chairs are indeed busy. Generally, however, we are not inaccessible. I certainly am not. c: Dean Joseph H. Danks
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