financialsituation15

(February 6, 2010) Shattered The recent elimination of economics majors/faculty in USM's b-school have left USM economics faculty shattered. Table 1 below shows just how many economics faculty were at USM at about the middle of 2009 ("Then"). This list is compared to what will be of USM economics faculty in about the middle of this year ("Soon").

(March 19, 2010) USM Makes Regional News: Could Lose 100 Faculty An 18-Mar-10 article by the Mobile Press-Register reporter Renee Busby entitled “Poor economy bites into university faculty salaries” describes the sad state of higher education finance these days. Busby compares the situation at several AL-based institutions and USM. The report also includes details about USM’s prior lease (of a building) with Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College, USM’s installation of the new APG, and the possibility that 100 USM faculty will be terminated in the coming months. USM faculty senate president, Jeffrey Evans, also provides a quote explaining the two sides of the faculty furlough option.

(March 25, 2010) breaking news . . . IHL Moves to Eliminate CoB’s MIS Program HATTIESBURG – With what some are characterizing as yet another surprising (and bold) turn, Mississippi’s IHL (the governing body of public universities) moved to cancel the CoB’s MIS program at its March-2010 board meeting. After what is referred to as a “first reading,” the job of cutting the program out of the CoB will be completed by the IHL at its regular April meeting in just a few weeks.

(March 25, 2010) Old School A Look at how the CoB’s Economists were Sent Packing The move in recent months by USM to eliminate its business economics programs and faculty has been covered by both regional and national media. The saga began with efforts by administrators, including USM provost Robert Lyman and CoB dean Lance Nail, to deal with one of the worst budgetary crises in university history. Graduating only a handful (or fewer) of students every year put ECO in the spotlight. That unit’s deplorable scholarly production level likely sealed the deal.

(April 22, 2010) GH Chatter Recent chatter has it that some of the five mostly senior economists who were forced to retire (through a fall 2009 negotiation) so that four mostly junior economists could continue their USM careers will not be retiring after 2009-10.

(April 26, 2010) Saved by Departures Two Retiring ECO Faculty may Remain at USM After 2009-10 It seems now that the surprise resignations of CoB economists Deniz Gevrek and Sami Dakhlia have worked to save two of the five mostly senior CoB economists who were set to retire after 2009-10 so that Gevrek, Dakhlia, Daniel Monchuk and Akbar Marvasti can continue their USM careers. This information comes to the USM family via Ed Kemp’s 26-April-2010 article in The Hattiesburg American entitled “USM must add 2 economics professors.”