Here is the testimony of College of Arts and Sciences Dean Dawn Weber. Weber arrived at Ashland University in the Fall of 2008, the same year I was hired as an assistant professor of English and Journalism. She was the only dean I had in eight years at AU.
Reading through this deposition makes me think that Weber either has an incredibly horrible memory or she is not being entirely truthful. I mean, she testified that she didn’t know who the president of the university was in May 2014.
I’ll tell you who it was: It was Fred Finks, and the provost was Frank Pettigrew. And early in May 2014, Faculty Senate passed a vote of No Confidence in Finks and Pettigrew after we became aware of a proposal Finks turned in to the Board of Trustees that recommended, among other things, eliminating tenured faculty.
Fifteen months later, 14 tenured faculty were eliminated.