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(November 16, 2007) Backstage Pass A Look at How "EFIB Dominance" is Impacting Academic Quality in the CoB For a number of years, the CoB's core curriculum has included ECO 336, or international economics. Some of the CoB's economists have argued that globalization trends demand that the CoB's students be exposed to a course in international economics, and for years now, they have been. At the same time there have also been small factions among the CoB faculty that have argued for an option in the core curriculum that allows students to use the international course in each major (e.g., international management, etc.) to fulfill this "international" portion of the CoB's core. Whenever these factions raised a voice, the economists would attempt to hush that voice as quickly as possible. To do otherwise would reduce the number of student credit hours taught by the CoB's economists -- a situation that would ultimately threaten the size and composition of that group.

(November 16, 2007) Breaking News IHL Board Approves Healthcare Marketing Degree HATTIESBURG – In his 15-Nov-07 article entitled “USM to offer new degree program,” The Hattiesburg American’s Phil Hearn informs the South Mississippi community that the Mississippi IHL Board has approved the CoB’s new Healthcare Marketing degree program. Interim CoB Dean Alvin Williams told Hearn that the CoB is “excited about this [new degree program],” and that the CoB’s Marketing faculty have put together “a state-of-the-art program” whose nearest competitors are as far away as Saint Joseph’s University (Philadelphia, PA) and Rutgers University in New Jersey.

(November 27, 2007) Williams Foils Clark’s Plan to Avoid a Dec-07 CoB Faculty Meeting Less than three months after passage of a preemptive motion by associate professor of finance, John Clark, to confer upon CoB graduates their Dec-07 degrees and avoid having a Dec-07 CoB faculty meeting, Interim CoB Dean Alvin Williams has decided to call a faculty-wide meeting for 6-Dec-07. According to Williams’ e-mail announcement, which is inserted below, the meeting is being called in order to “get a brief update/status report from each of the CoB committees.”

(December 4, 2007) Special Report Dean ME An Examination of CoB Deans’ Merit Raises over the Past 15 Years The revelation that Interim CoB Dean Alvin Williams is working on a contract that is paying him $175,000/year came as a shock to many readers of USMNEWS.NET. After more than a decade of turning down offers to lead USM’s College of Business, it seems to many now that Williams’ past decisions were all about money. Given readers’ response to reports about Williams’ current salary, USMNEWS.NET reporters have searched our archives and found data (for the past 15 years) on the merit raises that the CoB’s Deans, past and present, have “awarded themselves.” Some of the results are a bit a surprising.

(December 24, 2007) CoB News, December 2007 Williams to USA Sources have informed USMNEWS.NET that Interim CoB Dean Alvin Williams (shown below) has accepted a position at the University of South Alabama.