Winston-Salem State University, part of the UNC system, has been a troubled campus owing to allegations from faculty members that the administration was changing grades they had assigned to students. Last year we published an article that exposed this mess, along with the fact that the administration evidently takes it out on anyone who dares to complain. In today’s Pope Center piece, our new writer, Harry Painter, covers a recent hearing at WSSU involving another faculty member who is under attack (suspension, and possible termination) for the horrendous academic misconduct of having referred to her dissertation as a book. It seems apparent that the provost is using that as a pretext for getting rid of a faculty member she doesn’t want around.
A remarkable claim was made during the hearing. The professor stated that most of the way through a semester, many of the students in her class on constitutional law were failing, so the administration put them into another poli sci course for which they were all given A grades.
Another aspect of the case is that the provost also justified her suspension of Professor Davis because of her alleged poor teaching. Was there any prior record of that? Did the administration ever discuss her supposedly poor teaching with her? Apparently not.
It certainly looks as though WSSU has a rogue, thin-skinned administration. Will the General Administration do anything?
