Transparency State University

We came across an article written in 2007 after Slade left our campus leaving a trail of destruction and nearly bankrupted our HBCU. We wonder how eerily similar the current situation is compared to 2007- will we ever rise above our weak, corrupt and ineffective leadership? Will we always put our students last?  Will we always be a prisoner of our history?  These are important questions to ask ourselves as we have a new year and a new opportunity for improvement and changes coming up soon.   https://www.texasmonthly.com/articles/school-for-scandal/

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 Still no updates on the Faculty and Staff Excellence Awards- what is going on?  Still no clarification as to what happened in May 2020.  Why?   We are proud that TSU has been doing the annual fundraising extravaganza- all online.  And we want to congratulate all our students whom we raised money for annual fundrasier- all online..Hopefully this money will be better used on our STUDENTS than spent on King Lane's empty mansion and basketball tickets!  Let's not forget all the issues with the Maroon & Gray fundraising - https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/01/will-king-lane-lose-his-kingdom.html And congratulations to our B.R.A.G. students!!  Kudos to you!! all online!  Will we have our Faculty & Staff Excellence Awards ONLINE this year?  All signs point to.....??? https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/05/faculty-excellence-award-winners.html

What is so secret in the Berkley Report that it hasn't been released yet? Why won't the Board of Regents release the full report?   We have speculated for months what could be in this report.  Will we ever know?   https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/07/still-no-release-of-berkley-report.html

Rumors are confirmed that someone from the Provost Office called several faculty who previously served as administrators and asked what the salary adjustment was (removal of administrator pay stipend) for returning to faculty status after leaving administration.   The unofficial rule for salary adjustment upon returning to faculty status is that the administration plays favorites of course.  Whomever the administrators like, they allow that individual to keep their stipend salary.  But the rumors are that some individuals are not allowed to keep their stipend, I.e. punished.....if the administration doesn't like you.   It seems that someone inside the Provost Office is returning back to full-time faculty.  We wonder who it could be.  Or could it be 2 individuals returning, not 1? We will find out soon.  Perhaps an October surprise may turn into a Christmas surprise?  ;-)

It seems that Ms. Marilyn Square, TSU's decades-long Registrar and the second-most powerful TSU administrator has abruptly retired in August without any recognition or well-wishing from TSU for all her years at TSU. Not even a single email announcing her retirement!   Ms. Square was extremely well-known and recognized for all her hard work on behalf of our students.  Routinely Ms. Square would spend weekends and nights assisting students and faculty to make sure our students were able to graduate on time.   The Registrar is actually more powerful than the Provost and is the only administrator (besides the President) who can over-rule the Provost.  Rumors are that the Provost repeatedly did not agree with the Registrar on certain academic issues and is possibly the reason why Ms. Square has left the university without any fanfare or thanks for her service.   We find it very disappointing that a personal disagreement between 2 administrators has po...

 Emails from Provost Harris confirm that he is trying to remove Chair Wu and Vice Chair Jackson from their positions using a dubious and impotent method of claiming that since they have a reduced workload, it makes them ineligible to serve as Chair and Vice Chair.  Both Wu and Jackson have a reduced workload due to their duties in the Faculty Senate not due to any other reason we can assess.  The Provost seems to be relying on the law school fall modification schedule which ends on Nov 4 for his assessment they are ineligible for their elected positions in the Faculty Senate.  Moreover, by this logic since all of the schools are on a modified work schedule, doesn't this make the entire Faculty Senate ineligible for work?   The Provost seems to be twisting the Faculty Manual definition of resigning as well as trying to involve the General Counsel to back up his desire to remove these 2 professors.  He claims that  his opinion is "aligned with General Co...

 Looks like our enrollment has dropped 22% more than any other university in Houston.  Some of it can be blamed on the pandemic, but not all- some universities actually went up- in fact we hired someone as recently as May for enrollment improvement-  https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/05/why-are-we-spending-110000-on-job.html again.....WHAT IS GOING ON AT TSU????? https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/education/article/Houston-colleges-enrollment-not-experts-predict-15657866.php

Recall that we posted that a new Title IX coordinator had been appointed after Toni Gray resigned/terminated(?).  Dr. Fisher was appointed in June.  https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/06/new-title-ix-coordinator-announcedon_26.html It looks like someone named Bobby Brown has now been quietly installed as the new Title IX coordinator- no official announcement we can find however they are now listed on the TSU website- http://www.tsu.edu/about/administration/title-ix/index.html WHAT IS GOING ON AT TSU?????

This past weekend we were surprised when a SOPA professor emailed her congratulations to Dr. Ewoh, the Associate Dean of SOPA.  We weren’t surprised by her congratulations…but rather the timing of her congratulations.  It was 7 months late! :-(   Often we joke that SOPA seems to exist in an alternate universe and Covid certainly has slowed us down…..but 7 months to respond to an email?…..the strangest thing was that Dean Kieh jumped on the  same email and offered his congratulations to Dr. Ewoh almost immediately.  Very strange.    Unless of course, this was all planned in advance?  A self-congratulatory, feel-good, group admin pat on the back?  Maybe.    Stranger things have happened in SOPA.    

We want to welcome the 3 new BOR members of TSU just appointed by Gov. Abbott! https://gov.texas.gov/news/post/governor-abbott-appoints-three-to-texas-southern-university-board-of-regents2  And just in time for our Thursday meeting-  https://meetings.boardbook.org/Public/Agenda/2066?meeting=402709 Welcome to TSU!

When Mayor Turner set up the police reform advisory committee, there was immediate pushback and criticism, even as recent as September 16, 2020:   https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Civil-rights-activists-call-for-police-reforms-in-15573053.php   In July, the CJR set up their own police reform committee while Director Henderson had been placed on the Mayor’s police reform committee:   https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/TSU-assembles-group-of-Black-researchers-to-15394528.php#photo-19649410   While we cannot question the urgency, necessity and desire for police reform, we have to question the potential conflict of interests which exist between the CJR in connection with the Kochs’ and Koch Industries providing supplies to law enforcement as well as the HPD Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed between Director Henderson and the HPD in summer 2018.  Although we cannot verify this document is lega...

In our previous post on Dr Cavil, he appointed or rather chaired a committee which allowed him to have a joint/dual appointment with School of Education.  Rumors were that Dr Cavil could become the next Dean after Dr Poats stepped down. Now it appears there may be some truth to the rumor- Transparency State has learned that Dr. Cavill may be appointed as the Associate Dean at SOE as that position is now vacant since the Associate Dean has now been promoted to Dean.  We will find out soon   https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/06/did-dr-javus-kenyatta-cavill-appoint.html?m=1

Recently, Transparency State was informed that a professor received an email that the Provost had suspended/cancelled/postponed (we still don't know the reason) the Faculty Excellence Awards because for the category the faculty member had applied in, there were not enough applicants to make a decision. Now we find this very strange.  Why did at least some of the committees meet and make a final decision but then turn around months later and inform certain faculty that there were not enough applications to be able to make a decision for some of the awards?  Or all?   Put it this way- would you get into a car with Provost Harris for a 200 mile trip when the car had only 100 miles of gas and the Provost refused to buy more gas?  We hope not.... No, we really hope you would not do that.   So why did some committees meet (we know of at least 2 committees that met and provided their final decisions) but yet other committees didn't meet or.....? Hmmmm.....

 We promise this is our final post on the SOPA Chairs saga (I mean, we really hope).  As previously mentioned-  https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/07/will-tsu-enter-financial-exigency.html Dean Kieh announced his final decision- despite initially informing the AJ Faculty he would not keep Dr. Baker on for another 2 years (based on the Faculty Manual) he made the sole decision to keep on Dr. Baker in the Interim Chair position.   The Provost did not seem to agree with his idea to use a "waiver."   In AJ, Dr. Kalunta-Crumpton tied the votes with 4 votes in her favor and 4 votes for Dr. Baker and yet Dean Kieh decided to keep on Dr. Baker.   We assume the votes are correct as we are unable to verify each professor's votes since Dean Kieh refuses to provide individual votes.     In UPEP, Dr. Pan turned down the Interim Chair position (same reason as Dr. Drake it seems), and Dean Kieh refused to consider Dr. Solitaire (who ...

In other news, Edward Rene turned himself in- Now we wonder.....what will he tell the prosecutors?   Will he spill the beans and implicate other people in the law school scandal?   Will King Lane get into trouble again?     We will find out soon.   https://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/education/campus-chronicles/article/texas-southern-tsu-official-arrest-warrant-turns-15484705.php https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/education/article/Warrant-out-for-arrest-of-former-TSU-official-15481898.php

Rumors are that Dean Poats has formally stepped down as Dean of the School of Education.  There has been a long-time rumor that she would be either retiring or returning to teaching full-time.   The rumor is that Associate Dean Bernell Peltier-Glaze has been confirmed as the new Dean of the School of Education.   http://tsu.edu/academics/colleges-and-schools/coe/faculty-and-staff/faculty-profiles-department-of-educational-administration-amp-foundations/bernnell-peltier-glaze.html

The Faculty & Staff Excellence Awards are a YUGE deal for TSU.  YUGE!!  Last year King Lane had a big ceremony in the MLK auditorium.  It was like the Oscars broadcast via live webcast.  There was nominee names placed up on a big screen and names were called out and people went up to clapping and cheers and awards handed out with handshakes with the King himself!    The awards ceremony was probably one of the best (maybe only) thing King Lane ever did for all of TSU, showcasing years of hard work, sacrifice and dedication for just 1 afternoon in a year of recognition and pride. Now it appears that the Faculty and Staff Excellence Awards have mysteriously been postponed, delayed or cancelled.  We can't quite figure out which category to fall into since there hasn't been any TSU mass emails ;-) Certainly it is puzzling .  Below is an email from Dr. Rasoul Saneifard extending the Faculty Excellence Awards deadline by 14 days and yet the entire s...

We wonder about the rumors ongoing for several months now that Chief Mary Young may be terminated.  Rumors have been ongoing that she is about the get the axe mainly because of a supposed strong friendship and connections with deposed King Lane that had an expiration date once he was banished from the kingdom.  The clock is ticking fast on a lot of Lane cronies and appointees once King Lane had to make a fast dash with his ca$$h to SIU.     We wonder how much truth is those rumors as we viewed this social media statement from Chief Young during the week immediately after the BOR meeting of August 12.  We applaud all the obstacles she has overcome, but we wonder what it may suggest for her future at TSU.  

The latest rumors are that enrollment at TSU is  significantly lower  from fall 2019 when we were over 9000 students. The numbers are rumored to be much lower. Additionally, a vast majority of students still haven’t paid their tuition, and we wouldn’t blame them if they decided to take a gap semester or a year. If this is true ... TSU could be in a serious financial mess.   https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/05/why-are-we-spending-110000-on-job.html  We are still scratching our collective heads wondering why Dean Kieh offered to provide a “waiver” for Dr. Baker in Administration of Justice (after Dr. Drake rescinded her application for Interim Chair- see our previous post) to allow Dr. Baker to serve another 2 years beyond what the Faculty Manual states, but would not extend the same offer to Dr. Adams in Political Science.    https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/07/sopa-pass-popcorn-please.html There is no such thing as a “waiver” and ...

When will the full report be released?  On TSU's website, the summary report is still showing up.  BOR had said they would release the full report when discussed on June 1, 2020 but no specified date for release has been set.  It's almost like BOR doesn't want to release the full report.  http://www.tsu.edu/about/board-of-regents/pdf/brg+enrollment-executive-summary.pdf Will the full report ever be released?  What's in the full report?   

Looks like absolutely NO fall sports at all for everyone in SWAC.  I mean, we expected this but still.... .....let's not forget- this was going to be THE YEAR for HBCU sports to finally start attracting some amazing super talented sportsmen and sportswomen from PWI's.  We could have seen a re-surgence of our once proud legacy and dominance in sports.  Prior to PWI's actively recruiting minority players, HBCU's lead the way for sports dominance and proved to the world that we could take on the "best" and be better. And what happens to all our TSU scholar athletes and enrolment? https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/29351930/why-hbcus-again-become-serious-options-elite-basketball-prospects https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/10/black-athletes-should-leave-white-colleges/596629/ https://theconversation.com/star-player-who-expressed-interest-in-going-to-an-hbcu-may-shake-up-how-athletes-select-a-college-140195

We can't believe we are reporting even more SOPA drama.....but Dean Kieh has done a 180 degree turn and agreed to provide the Interim Chair election results.  After a SOPA-wide email from one of the SOPA Faculty Senators requesting the voting results, Dean Kieh agreed and turned over all the votes to the 3 departments.  Individually of course.  No idea why he either ignored or refused requests earlier. https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/07/update-on-musical-chairs-re-shuffling.html More surprises.  After less than 45 minutes from Dean K's email, the presumptive AJ Interim Chair choice- Dr. Drake rescinded her application due to new policy changes regarding earning extra money from grant work (Koch grant we theorize) as well as extra pay from being Forensics Lab Coordinator.  Seems that the Provost or President has a new rule they are trying to enforce- if you are a classified as an administrator (12 months) you cannot make extra money from grant wor...

An update on our post from June 19, 2020: https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2020/06/musical-chairs-re-shuffle-ongoing-at-tsu.html Looks like at least one Dean- Dean George Kieh has quietly announced 2 out of the 3 departments in SOPA- Administration of Justice and Political Science have new Interim Chairs- AJ has named Dr. Jasmine Drake (8th Chair in 12 years) and Political Science has named Dr. Rina Majumdar (3rd chair in 12 years). We say "quietly" because he hasn't emailed a SOPA-wide announcement for the 3 chairs, but is emailing each department separately.  Normally, there is a SOPA-wide email for chair announcements to have full transparency.  Why the secrecy? We wish both the incoming Chairs much luck especially since one of them has NEVER taught a single undergraduate class and will likely be wholly unprepared to understand our undergraduate needs especially in the Age of the Coronavirus and the other Interim Chair has a Ph.D. in Chemistry which we fi...

In a meeting last year in 2019 February we wrote about previously: https://transparencystate.blogspot.com/2019/03/the-center-for-justice-research-stands.html Provost Harris insisted that SOPA is part of CJR and vice versa. But yet at the meeting at least 2 faculty members informed the provost that they were being denied opportunities to conduct research with CJR. It has so divided up one department -Administration of Justice -that rumors are there has been at least one lawsuit inside of AJ indirectly based on the moneyed influence due to Director Henderson.  There are rumors of 3 more lawsuits, 2 pending and 1 already filed possibly due in part to the influence of the poisonous Koch money (2 SOPA professor are being sued by another SOPA professor in a defamation of character and libel lawsuit).  In AJ, at least 50% of faculty are CJR Fellows and despite at least 2 SOPA faculty requesting to work, Director Henderson has refused and has hired an outside faculty member...

The Kochs have a very long history of being antagonistic towards African-Americans because they threaten the Good Ol’ Boys Club (White Men of Privilege). The Kochs’ do not believe in civil rights and have even been supporting Neo-Confederates teaching college students: https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/how-charles-koch-is-helping-neo-confederates-teach-college-students/ https://www.newsweek.com/koch-bros-hide-donations-behind-civil-rights-precedent-477786 There is even a non-profit organization called UnKochMyCampus actively working against the Kochs: http://www.unkochmycampus.org/ The myopic and narrow-minded muppetry of the previous Lane administration appears to be  carried on blindly by the Huewitt administration. The Kochs are not friends of academic freedom, transparency, faculty rights and shared governance as has been made clear in their past universities lawsuits and their interactions with the media. The Kochs have been extremely successful in doi...

As everyone knows from our previous posts, the Center for Justice Research is a Koch front much like centers at Auburn, George Mason and Florida State University. The Kochs and their cronies operate by creating so-called "academic centers" sometimes hiding behind other organizations as they did with our campus, funneling the money through the Thurgood Marshal Scholarship Fund.  These centers typical churn out white papers and other pseudo-scientific documents and official-sounding "reports" in order to give the appearance of a serious and legitimate academic think-tank on a college campus after which the Kochs then go to state legislatures waving the "scientific" papers and lobby for changes in business practices which of course directly benefit them.  The only people who win are the Kochs and their cronies who either directly or indirectly own businesses which benefit from the newly deregulated laws and/or favorable business climate approved by the govern...

Emails provided to  Transparency State  show that 3 times now TSU has had to delay and move their re-opening of our beloved campus from June 15......to June 22......to June 29...... will the 3rd proposed re-opening finally be successful?  Sources say Nope.  Phase 1 has been effectively frozen until..... Will TSU ever really re-open again as a physical university?  We wonder.  Maybe, maybe not. All of this would be simply easier to just go ahead and make everything online for the fall semester except for the labs (duh).  Even HBCU football has taken a beating already (no pun intended!).  If we can't even get Coronavirus away from football on a field with a dozen players.....how can we possibly re-open an entire campus of 7000 plus students? https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/06/19/college-football-players-test-positive-virus-hbcus-cancel-four-games?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=6ca460fea6-DNU_2019_COPY_02&utm_medium=e...

On Sunday, June 7, all of us were treated something rather unusual.....an email from TSU Information Office informing us at 6:51 pm that a new Title IX coordinator had been appointed.  We find it interesting to send out this type of announcement on a Sunday evening. We can speculate about the timing but it is also worth reporting that Dr. Fisher is a TSU insider both working and education (Bachelors, Masters and Ed.D.- all from TSU) and is a former Chairperson (or will remain so?)..... http://coe.tsu.edu/?page_id=1810 We are disappointed that TSU has chosen an insider (and a long-term insider at that) for important issues related to Title IX especially with past rumors of certain administrators and sexual harassment cases (one of whom has now moved to China) as well as the #MeToo movement which King Lane tried to cudgel and bully possibly two faculty members with threats of sexual harassment investigations, including hiring a private Austin law firm (your tax dollars at work). ...

Is it already time for another BOR meeting?  No predictions but.....here we go: https://v3.boardbook.org/Public/PublicAgenda.aspx?ak=1000526&mk=50380774 Lot of IT purchases, possibly dismissal and terminations?  Tenure and promotion. Looks like a full meeting. According to the April 16, 2020 meeting, the BOR is supposed to release the full Berkley Report- so why hasn't it been released yet? Also, what's up with the Admissions Committee- are we really going to deny students below 2.0 GPA?  Ideally we would love to see TSU increase their quality of students' with increased GPA, but in this pandemic with all the stress and uncertainty with high school students not even having reliable high-speed internet access, perhaps this policy can wait another year?  Seems like there are methods to make appeals but we suggest the BOR consider delaying this policy another year. https://v3.boardbook.org/Public/PublicItemDownload.aspx?ik=46569694 https://v3.boardbook.o...

Interesting lawsuit filed by former mayoral candidate Ben Hall.  We have copied/pasted the press release below from Ben Hall's office- Certain facts in the allegations raised seem to mirror complaints in some of the lawsuits filed against TSU recently.   Houston Community College Hit With $100 Million Dollar Racial Discrimination Class Action Suit Filed On Behalf of Black Employees on Juneteenth HOUSTON, TEXAS.   A $100 million dollar racial discrimination lawsuit has been filed in a Houston, Texas state district court on behalf of hundreds of Black former and present employees of Houston Community College (“HCC”).  The suit was filed Friday, June 19, 2020–“Juneteenth—the anniversary date that Black slaves in Texas learned they had been freed from slavery two years earlier by President Abraham Lincoln.  The lawsuit details a damning list of allegations about what is going on at Houston Community College under the leadership of Chancellor Cesar Maldo...