diversity

(January 10, 2011) "Part 1, Introduction How do we credibly inform each other about important behavior of our leaders, administrators, and colleagues? Organizations, including universities, announce good news through their public relations departments. Good news, if accurate and complete, is welcome by all. Maintaining a favorable public image, however, does not include volunteering unfavorable information...".

(January 11, 2011) "PART 2: Tolerant people seek and accept the challenge of alternative views and ideas, that is, diversity of thought, reason, and evidence. A consequence is decisions are better informed than they might otherwise be which, in effect, is an opportunity to enhance knowledge, performance, and results. In contrast, intolerant people may consider diversity as heretical and punish it, as Interim Dean Alvin Williams and President Martha Saunders at the University of Southern Mississippi did because of this research...".

(January 12, 2011) "PART 3 It seems intuitive that there is a relation between tolerance of ideas and tolerance of gender and race. And the relation might be explored by asking, do tolerance of ideas, reason, and attention to evidence signal tolerance in general? And, does diversity of gender and race imply tolerance of diversity of ideas? From a practical view, however, the answer is less important than whether an institution and its members abide by their public representations of tolerance of race, gender, and expression of ideas and thought...".

(January 13, 2011) "PART 4 The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business claims to advance diversity at its member institutions such as the University of Southern Mississippi and its College of Business and School of Accountancy. Universities, like USM, and an accreditor, like AACSB, together reinforce each other’s promises and could, if they chose to do so, support each other’s efforts to conform their behavior to their promises. But do they?...".

(January 14, 2011) "PART 5 The Current Environment -- If a university, with its promises of diversity of ideas, academic freedom, and creation of knowledge effect an environment in which faculty cannot bring “bad news” to the attention to administrators and colleagues without being punished, what hope is there that other types of organizations that offer far weaker support will not punish its employees or professionals for speaking out about perceived problems?...".

(January 17, 2011) PART 6 What USM and AACSB Say University of Southern Mississippi’s Faculty Handbook promises diversity of thought, academic freedom of inquiry and speech, protection from retaliation, and the decentralization of shared governance: “2.12 ACADEMIC FREEDOM AND SHARED GOVERNANCE Academic freedom and shared governance are long-established and living principles at the University of Southern Mississippi. The University cherishes the free exchange of ideas, diversity of thought, joint decision making, and individuals’ assumption of responsibility. Academic freedom is fundamental to the central values and purposes of a university,...”.

(January 18, 2011) "PART 7 What USM and AACSB Actually Do University of Southern Mississippi and Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business representations advocating diversity are promises. Their actual practice, however, must be observed and the observations documented. A brief summary of USM and AACSB actual practices is provided as an overview before the detailed documentary evidence is presented in PART 8:...".

(January 19, 2011) "PART 8 Details and Documentation The Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business requires “complainants” to “(1) identify the specific accreditation standard(s) relevant to the complaint, (2) provide documentation that supports the complaint, and (3) identify the relationship of the complainant to the member school.” (AACSB July 24, 2004.)...".

(January 20, 2011) "PART 9 Consider Interim Dean Alvin Williams’ claim that Research Professor DePree “contacted the AACSB office and made allegations about our programs and processes that were not based on facts.” The following documentation and evidence were provided first to the involved faculty and administrators, then, after they refused to discuss the documents, the documents were sent to AACSB in accordance with the rules and procedures. They are summarized next: (Documents are identified by the following numbered items.)...".

(January 24, 2011) "Part 10 Next, consider additional facts and documentation offered to AACSB in a follow-up communication in support of the claim that there was no process for investigating allegations of faculty plagiarism at University: Email from University Ombudsman, stating that 'He [Vice President Cecil Burge] agrees [with the Ombudsman John Harsh ] that we [University of Southern Mississippi] don’t have such a person [to investigate plagiarism] on this campus.'...".

(January 25, 2011) "Part 11 Next, consider additional facts and documentation offered to AACSB in a follow-up communication in support of the claim that there was no process for investigating allegations of faculty plagiarism at University:...".

(January 27, 2011) "Part 12 Consider Syracuse University School of Management’s attribution included at the end of its Academic Integrity Policy (Go to the end of PART 11.): … The citations were the only significant item USM’s College of Business did not copy from Syracuse University School of Management’s Academic Integrity Policy. Note that Syracuse’s School of Management citations of sources of its Academic Integrity Policy constitutes an affirmative opinion about the propriety of copying others’ Academic Integrity Policy words and ideas...".

(January 31, 2011) "Part 13 The facts and documents provided in this report were and continue to be independently verifiable. For example, internet addresses were often cited and documents were provided first to University of Southern Mississippi’s involved faculty and administrators then, when USM refused to discuss the documents, to AACSB for its consideration. Based on the evidence presented in previous PARTS of this research, one conclusion is clearly demonstrated: Interim Dean Alvin Williams’s assertion that Research Professor Marc DePree “contacted the AACSB office and made allegations about our (University of Southern Mississippi’s) programs and processes that were not based on facts” is false.

(February 1, 2011) "PART 14 What AACSB Does in Practice Research Professor Marc DePree and several colleagues had informally encouraged involved faculty and administrators to discuss the documents they copied “without proper citation” and later submitted to AACSB during reaccreditation. When ignored, Professor DePree and colleagues complied with University of Southern Mississippi’s Faculty Handbook. It states the following requirements:...".

(February 2, 2011) "PART 15 University of Southern Mississippi President Martha Saunders suspended Research Professor Marc DePree on the basis of false claims in letters from Interim Dean Alvin Williams and involved faculty (see, previous parts of this series). Of course, President Saunders chose not to act on the fact that the miscreants had illegitimate motives. Instead, in spite of the evidence provided to her, and shown in previous parts of this series above, she chose to join the miscreants. Saunders, Williams and involved faculty demonstrated intolerance of different ideas as well as misconduct. (Alvin Williams became Dean after both Dean Harold Doty and Associate Dean Farang Niroomand “stepped down” at the same time in mid-semester. Rumors abounded but no confirmation of the reasons for the unusual mid-semester resignations of both the Dean and Associate Dean were forthcoming. However, Patty Munn, an instructor in the School of Accountancy, testified under oath that:..".

(February 3, 2011) "PART 16 Conclusion Race and Gender Implications University of Southern Mississippi’s President, Martha Saunders, is a white female; Interim Dean Alvin Williams is African American male; and Executive Vice President AACSB Jerry Trapnell is a white male; involved faculty included white and black males and females from all disciplines in the College of Business. Diversity of race, gender, and background, therefore, does not imply tolerance of different ideas. In fact, as demonstrated in this paper, when Saunders, Williams, Trapnell, Jordan, et al. had “skin in the game”, they did not tolerate diversity of ideas. Furthermore, University of Southern Mississippi and AACSB proclamations of diversity of ideas are diametrically opposed to their practice. Although omerta, deception, and punishment for speech may be commonplace among gangsters and criminals, should we expect better from the University of Southern Mississippi and the AACSB?...".