Ferandes Threatens University and BoT
“In a frank e-mail to trustees, a copy of which was provided to The Washington Post yesterday by someone other than Fernandes, she explained why she is determined to stay. She asked trustees not to resign or call for her to step aside.
If she were to leave or be fired, she wrote, “the University and in particular the Board of Trustees will undergo intense scrutiny from Congress. I venture to guess Congress will ask why you did not perform your fiduciary duties to the University. And you will have to explain.” Gallaudet Trustees Split on Fernandes – washingtonpost.com
Commentary: This private e-mail was leaked to Washington Post. So it appears Fernandes is blackmailing the university and Bot. Hmmm, now this reinforces my suspicions the last few weeks that another reason may be lying behind her refusal to resignation.
What would this failure of fiduciary duties be?
Would that be the refusal of BoT to honor the contract , possibly granting her a severance payment less than one million dollars? But why will that call “for intense scrutiny from Congress”?
Or is it something more serious? Because she said the university, too. Since Jordan is her staunchest supporter, it may be someone else. Paul Kelly?
Would this involve the possible financial mismanagement and the missing 4 million dollars as alleged by the former university administrator, Bernie Holt?
To be honest, I am not certain what she has that would put both the university and BoT under intense scrutiny from Congress, but this sounds very serious.
Whatever, tt doesn’t reflect well on a presidential appointee to be threatening the BoT who is above her. If she has BoT wrapped around her finger, BoT may find it difficult to oversee the performance of Fernandes as the president in the incoming years.
elizabeth
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Elizabeth, I believe you’ve hit the nail on the head. I had similar feelings and thoughts when I read the article. This smacks of blackmail and thinly veiled threats. She is right, though, in that Congress is going to wonder why King and the BoT failed in its fiduicary responsibility. This is, hopefully good, because this means we can re-do the Board and get the right people in there. (read: ethical, open, accepting of various people yet cherishing ASL and Deaf culture, etc, etc.)
I’ve thought for some time now that the protesters should be single-mindedly calling for a financial audit at Gallaudet. This fits in with a few other bits of information (floating out there god knows where on DeafRead’s feed) plus the nature of her reaction (assuming she is not an outright stupid person; I think she’s smart enough).
Try and trigger an audit whether or not she stays, honestly.
It is a big mess. Who knows what is going on there?
This is very serious! I had not anticpated that such issue as this would pop up.
Washington Post finally showed this on the front page after two weeks of taking a side with the IKJ administration.
This is really serious!
As an interested outside observer, I never felt like the Washington Post was “taking a side” with the IKJ administration as poster Greg thought. I felt that the WP gave a good picture of what was happening with a sympathetic nod to the protesters. But I am way outside the beltway down here in Alabama of all places. I wrote about the issue because I’m interested in higher education issues of governance and one of my local readers with Gallaudet connections piqued my interest further.
It seems Fernandes is resorting to the kind of manipulation that found her so many detractors as an administrator. There is only one solution here. She will resign or withdraw. Your protests will have done the trick.
The Washington Post DEFINITELY took sides with the IKJ Administration on its editorial page, running at least two anti-protester editorials. (The editorial writers were probably against integration and women’s suffrage too.)
Funny how they don’t let their total ignorance of deaf-related issues stop them from taking sides.
But the news articles have been pretty balanced, thanks to Susan Kinzie and other reporters who have worked on this story.
Totaly agreed with Tom W. about the Washington Post editorial writers.
The Gallaudet University website is obviously under a full control by the IKG administration at this time. There are several source links to the Washington Post such as two one-sided WP editorial pages. Go see this admin-controlled website for yourself.