By the time Oregon University System Chancellor George Pernsteiner@@http://www.ous.edu/news_and_information/bios/pernsteiner.php@@ started reading off the recommendation, it was relatively clear he and the other members of the Oregon State Board of Higher of Education were not going to reverse course from their directive. Pernsteiner read — just as he had two hours before, after two hours of public comment — a proposal to execute the portion of University President Richard Lariviere’s contract that allowed termination with one month’s notice and with no cause.
This was at 5:05 p.m.
This was a prime example of disrespect from a night filled with ignorance; where members of the OUS Board simply refused to acknowledge the perspectives of its primary constituents. For about an hour afterward, the Board continued to read off prepared statements they had presumably made during or before their executive session at 2 p.m.
The resounding sensation among the hundreds watching from the Smith building at Portland State University and via video feeds was this: The first public meeting concerning the employment status of our University’s president was barely more than a show trial, an organized affair to give us the impression of a voice.@@or a voice for the Board@@
But as Robert Kyr, University Senate president, told the Board at the start of the public comment session, “You don’t know us.” He detailed how the Board made no attempts at connecting with the Senate — a body containing members from every single constituency affected by the firing of a University president.
There were no University representatives of any sort involved in collaboration on this decision. The Board blatantly disregarded those opinions in the original forming of this decision and did it once again when those stakeholders made the two-hour trek to Portland to present those opinions.
“There are no winners here today,” Board member Jim Francesconi pleaded with the audience.@@http://www.ous.edu/news_and_information/bios/franc.php@@
It didn’t need to be this way, and it shouldn’t be this way. A board supposedly representing the State of Oregon should not be unanimously in support of a decision that 19 state senators and representatives are opposed to. This makes a mockery of the institution to which we belong — a board unanimously making a decision in the face of quite hearty dissent, dissent rising out of students blindsided by a board that continued to reference possible negative outcomes to other OUS institutions but refused time and time again to specify those concerns.
This isn’t the way government is supposed to work, especially with such touchy subjects as the University President. As several students mentioned throughout the public comment, Lariviere has been singularly focused on making students feel welcome — something the Board hasn’t tried to do. We know this because they never contacted Kyr.
Then again, it is kind of hard to try to be collaborative when you’re firing the guy you’re supposed to be collaborating with. But that’s just the issue. From the beginning of this issue (which we don’t know the date of because, again, not contacted), the lack of community input and student involvement has been unmistakably prominent, which runs entirely contrary to the mission of any public institution of higher learning.
Pernsteiner and the rest of the Board seemed to not understand any of this in all of their hours of covering up for past mistakes.