By Derek Spellman
dspellman@joplinglobe.com
In the wake of this month’s no-confidence vote, Missouri Southern’s faculty senate leader has asked the university’s Board of Governors to re-evaluate President Bruce Speck during a planned retreat.
Roger Chelf, the faculty senate president, made the request Friday even though that retreat now will not take place until early next year.
The MSSU board on Friday voted to slate its annual retreat in late February, although some board members had previously looked at December for the meeting.
Board Chairman Rod Anderson told the Globe the selection of February had nothing to do with the Nov. 2 no-confidence vote, the results of which were formally presented to the board by Chelf, but stemmed from “timing” and scheduling for board members.
Asked whether the vote and Speck would be a retreat topic, he replied, “It could be.”
But Chelf had told the Globe earlier in the week that he had hoped the retreat, which he considered an appropriate occasion for the board to discuss the direction to take in the wake of the no-confidence vote against Speck, would have been sooner. There is a problem on the campus, he said of the dispute between the faculty and Speck, and “the only people that can fix it at this point is the board.”
The board took no action Friday when Chelf officially presented the results of the Nov. 2 election, which saw a no-confidence vote in Speck’s leadership by a margin of 140 to 44. Turnout was 78 percent.
Anderson after the meeting told the Globe that the board is not taking any action, at least for now, and instead affording Speck and the faculty the next few months to work to resolve their issues.
“I think both parties are in that mode,” he said, referring to the faculty and to Speck.
Asked if he thought those months would either help mend relations or only worsen the situation by leaving it in limbo, Anderson replied, “I hope that it helps.”
Measures
Speck, in a separate interview with the Globe earlier this week, outlined a number of measures that he said were designed to mend relations with faculty over the coming months.
He said he has revived an administrative council composed of administrators from all across campus. That council, which had not met in some time, will again start meeting monthly.
The administration also has approved the creation of an executive budget committee including Speck, the vice presidents, the deans of the four schools, Chelf, and an at-large faculty member. That committee met for the first time last week.
A faculty senate ad hoc committee earlier this year accused Speck of withholding information about the budget and of failing to understand some of the information that he did release.
Speck said the new budget committee will partly serve as a conduit of information. He also said he would renew efforts to educate the faculty about the finances and the funding outlook. He will respond, in writing, to a report on the university’s International Mission and make that report available campuswide. He will plan to offer more “listening sessions” with the faculty next year, perhaps in January.
“It’s not going to happen overnight,” he said of improving relations with faculty.
Skepticism
But even with those measures, Chelf said the underlying issues still have not been resolved. He had previously told the Globe that he thought the faculty wanted a culture change at Missouri Southern, although he did not see how that was possible without a new president.
Even now, for example, a few weeks after the vote, “communication still hasn’t improved a whole lot” and Speck still seems to isolate himself, Chelf said. Faculty members still do not know why there is a hiring freeze when it comes to tenure-track positions — a dominant theme and concern during the listening sessions put on by Speck — and there is still no plan for how to address what has become a pressing concern.
Chelf also cited the failed search for a vice president of academic affairs as a symptom of failed leadership by Speck.
He raised the failed search on Friday with the board.
“We are extremely disappointed that Dr. Peter Johnstone (one of the three finalists for the academic affairs post) was not made an offer,” Chelf told the board.
Johnstone, one of two finalists remaining after a third finalist withdrew the previous week, officially pulled out on Monday. Speck told the Globe that Johnstone offered “nothing” in the way of reasons.
For his part, Speck acknowledged that he thought the no-confidence vote played some role in the failed search. He rejected characterizations that the university had become “tainted.”
Speck said a new search likely would not be mounted at least within the next few months, partly because of a need for the “healing process” to get under way.
Asked about an impasse with faculty, he replied, “I think you can’t move forward with some people unless there is goodwill.”
He said he would “continue to try to reach out to faculty,” but that he could not “change them in some sense,” only provide them with “tangible evidence” of a “good-faith effort” to mend relations.
In other business
The MSSU board voted Friday to support a plan announced by Gov. Jay Nixon earlier this week. Under that plan, which still must be approved by the Legislature, universities would freeze tuition, while the state would only reduce its higher education appropriations by a little more than 5 percent next year.
