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Peter Green

Kristin Summerwill

[Note: This material is copyright by the Press-Citizen, and is reproduced here as a matter of "fair use" for non-commercial, educational purposes only. Any other use may require the prior approval of the Iowa City Press-Citizen.]

As a long-term student of ancient power-structures, a former faculty member of a large public university and a 10-year resident of Iowa City, I have been observing the activities of Iowa state Board of Regents with intense interest and a certain sense of déjà vu. The current brouhaha is, I suspect, no more than the latest and most acute symptom of a malaise that goes back for some years, and to which the departures of the University of Iowa’s last three presidents bear alarming witness.

This makes Regents President Michael Gartner’s recent pronouncements on the constitution of the next search committee of especial interest. It will consist, we are told, of deans (one to preside), regents and donors. There is no indication of any proposed participation by faculty, staff or students: certainly none of those actively involved in the various votes of no confidence, since the new committee will contain no members of the old one. The make-up and proportions of this new committee thus become of urgent interest.

All deans, or a selection only, and if so, which ones? How many regents? And, most important, how many donors?

That donors should have a voice on how their money is spent is fair enough. That they should have a controlling voice in the overall policy and funding of this great public university is something else altogether, and I cannot believe, his record notwithstanding, that Gartner is proposing, in effect (as Jugurtha said of Rome), to sell UI’s future to the highest bidder.

Peter Green
Iowa City

Have Regents Michael Gartner and Teresa Wahlert — and Gov. Tom Vilsack for that matter — forgotten that the UI “community” extends well beyond Iowa City? Or that the effects of their whole hiring folly are nationwide?

I’m a 1969 graduate who is not on any UI payroll, but I am a UI contributor. Imagine all those other loyal alumni who year after year happily support their UI colleges — Law, Business, Liberal Arts, Medicine, etc. — the faculty chairs within those colleges, UI athletics or any number of excellent programs under the UI umbrella. It’s a good bet that these generous alumni don’t like the fact that the Board of Regents is toying with their baby and thereby sullying its fine reputation any more than I do.

Perhaps the UI Alumni Association and the UI Foundation should consider facilitating the call for a vote of no-confidence among their own “respectable majority” — the thousands of UI Alumni Association members and UI donors. That vote won’t be fluffed off.

Kristin Summerwill
Iowa City