Re: UAH Hockey is on the precipice. Please tell our President to step off.
...our university president was run out on a rail in March. [I've never been sure why, but I think it was his free-spending ways.]
I can speak to this just a little bit, at least the whole run out on a rail thing. Outside of his support for the hockey team, Dr. Williams was deeply unpopular with alumni, staff, faculty, and students as well as the Board of Regents. He had his own ideas, and they didn't seem to mesh with anyone else's. Many of us felt his biggest failure was that he couldn't listen when he had his mind made up on an issue. He made many decisions which were felt to be in less than the best interest of the school. These include:
Attempting to merge Arts and Sciences and planning shifts in Chemical Engineering
Indebting the school for millions to build an on campus dorm during a recession and during massive tuition hikes. (I averaged an increase of over 10% annually during my time at UAH.)
Instituting several high fee policies including the two year live on campus rules, and the meal plan requirements for all students. Exemptions came later but are still significantly more stingy than most other similar institutions, and the arguments were predicated on false pretense. I.e. the myth that students who live on campus get better GPA's. There's a lovely doctoral dissertation from Maryland that debunks that quite nicely.
Changing the school to UAHuntsville, at significant cost
That's just a few of the many things we were having issues with and we were shaking the tree pretty hard, though I can't say how much of that shaking ended up helping topple the tree. Dr. Williams was losing community support and that didn't pair well with his fights with the controlling Board of Regents who have their own ideas of what UAH should be. I admit my involvement here, I had a hand it just about every protest that hit in the last three years regarding Dr. Williams ouster. Outside of his support for the hockey program I did not find him to be the right leadership for the school. No more than I like Mack running it now. Yes, more than a few of us were actively trying to get rid him, there's no question about it. Many of us felt Dr. Williams had turned his back on, and flat out attacked, many of the non-traditional students who are a mainstay of the UAH campus though out the years and we were being bled dry in a recession. The town hall style meetings were heated to say the least, and it was a combination of all the stakeholders who showed up, not just students or faculty. While it grieves me that his removal may also inadvertently kill the hockey team (by giving Mack the opportunity to kill it), but I firmly believe that Dr. Williams was the wrong choice for UAH... and so far I'm not terribly impressed by our new Athletic Director.
UAH unfortunately is in for a rough ride, and has been in one, for several years. If the school, like the hockey team, survives; it will be better and stronger for the experience. But it does not make the experience any less unpleasant.
By the by, he already had the Ohio State job lined up before he officially called it quits at UAH. I got that bit from a few friends who are OSU alums and had they'd already been posting about it.
