Update – WVU President Mike Garrison Emails Employees

In the last post, I talked about ways to respond to a pr crisis. In fairness that he is responding to the crisis with a statement – and using email to do it! although nothing further on his blog so far – I wanted to post an email WVU President Mike Garrison just forwarded to WVU employees (MOUNTAINEER E-NEWS). Full text follows:

Statement from WVU President Mike Garrison

My responsibility as President extends to the entire University, and I accept full and total responsibility for failures that led to the award of unearned credits and grades to a former student. I am personally very sorry that this situation has occurred.

Over the past several days, I have had the opportunity to thoroughly review the report of the panel that investigated this matter. I have also read the notes of the statements given by individuals to the panel; I have spoken with each of the individuals in the President*s Office who are noted in the report; and have spoken with the Chairman of the panel. As I stated last week, I take both the panel findings and recommendations, as well as my charge from the Board of Governors, very
seriously. I agree with the panel*s findings and accept the report in its entirety.

I have also accepted the resignations of Provost Gerald Lang and Dean Stephen Sears. Both of these individuals are honorable men, and both have taken responsibility for their decisions in this matter. I want to state unequivocally that I did not ask any person, either directly or indirectly, to award any credit, grades, or degree in this case or any other case. I will never do so and would not accept interference from others in the evaluation of the students that I teach.

I do not believe that it is acceptable to assign credit or grades to a student without consultation with the faculty member assigned to a class. Like the members of the panel, I believe that the decision that was made in this in this matter was wrong. Like every member of the University community, I reject the idea that we should award any degree or credit not earned by the student.

Let me say again: My responsibility as President extends to the entire University. I accept full and total responsibility for this matter. I am personally very sorry that this situation has occurred during my tenure as President, and I apologize to the entire University community.