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On March 2, Paul Pai, president of the STLCC-Meramec campus, announced to his staff that Stephen Petersen, vice president of student affairs, was no longer with the college because Pai had made the decision, approved by the chancellor, to not renew Petersen’s contract.
Student members of organizations and the Student Governance Council protested this decision. Also, representatives from faculty organizations such as the National Educators Association questioned the decision and criticized the lack of communication between administrators and faculty.
Nearly a month later, on March 31, Pai announced his resignation.
“This morning, I tendered my resignation as Campus President to Chancellor Zelema Harris effective July 1, 2010,” Pai said in an e-mail sent to all staff.
The email, however, did not address the Petersen issue, nor did it show signs of regret for this decision.
“During my last annual performance appraisal with Dr. Harris, she asked me to stay many more years,” Pai said. “I stated that even though I love our students, faculty and staff, my destination is somewhere else. It is time for me to pursue another direction.”
Ever since his resignation, Pai has not returned calls from The Montage, nor was his secretary able to say when he would be in his office or schedule an appointment with him.
In his official job description, George Wasson, vice president of academic affairs, must fill in for the president as acting president.
Wasson confirmed that Pai was no longer performing his presidential responsibilities. He said Pai has been reassigned to duties in the workforce development area at the Cosand Center.
“This is why I am assuming the responsibilities [of the president] because now in his absence I will lead the college until the board of trustees appoints a new interim president.”
Wasson also said that in spite of the difficulties the college is going through right now, he sees this time as a time of opportunity.
Wasson's vision of the future at Meramec
Wasson said it’s been difficult for him to have the top two of the three administrators on campus no longer in their positions. However, he said the college is working hard to move forward from this situation.
"My main concern at this point is providing some stability and to make sure that we continue to provide educational opportunities," Wasson said. "This is a team effort; this is not based on an individual. This is not one person or two or three; this is a team effort and it is our strong faculty that make all of this possible and it’s going to take all of us working together."
Wasson said that within the next few weeks he will be delegating the duties of the vice president of student affairs to the managers that worked under Petersen. He also said that he is going to need help from faculty and staff to carry the mission of the college forward.
"I expect other people to step up for this time period; we will work through it, we will get through it and we will be better and stronger at the end," Wasson said.
Wasson acknowledged that a problem in the past has been the lack of communication between the administration and the faculty. Wasson said what happened with Petersen was the result of faculty concerns not heard by the administration when decisions were made.
"I think that you can see that there are stake holders at the college that do not feel that their views or opinions were heard in that process," Wasson said. "I think that you see some of the consequences of a decision that is made and when people don’t feel that they’ve been heard."
Organizing a faculty voice
Robert Lee, Ph.D., and Meramec history professor, said that in the 11 years he has been teaching at Meramec, he has never sensed the morale of the campus so low due to administrative decisions. Lee said he and other faculty members agreed that this was due to the lack of communication between administration and faculty when decisions were made. "Every day I walked this academic year with the question ’what’s going to happen today?’ And not in a fun way but in a ’what’s the next thing that’s going to be dropped on our heads‘ sort of scenario," Lee said. "This is my eleventh year here and I’ve never seen morale among faculty and staff so low and this absolute feeling that no one knows what’s coming next." Lee, along with other faculty members, decided to start the process of creating a faculty forum to have monthly meetings with the president. In the meetings, faculty representatives would be able to voice their concerns to the president, Lee said. "We, as faculty, generally found out about decisions that were made basically at the same time students found out and the general public found out," Lee said. "The administration can hear faculty concerns about issues and know what it is that faculty are worried about at this moment. Because very often, because of the lack of communication, what the administration thinks faculty believe, or the administration thinks the faculty are upset about is often very far from reality. This is to open the dialogue from the two sides." Lee said he is in the process of gathering feedback from faculty, but said he feels a lot of support coming from them. Lee said the reason he initiated this forum was because he did not want to be a hypocrite to his students. "I am always telling students as a history professor that history is made by the people who show up," Lee said. "I couldn’t think of myself as a hypocrite interpreting history this way and not standing up."Recommended: Articles that may interest you
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