By: Mollie Bryant – The Jackson Clarion-Ledger
“Let us be done with fault finding and leave off self-seeking. May we put away all pretense and meet each other face to face, without self-pity and without prejudice. May we never be hasty in judgment and always generous.”
Led by Jackson State University President Carolyn Meyers, employees recited The Collect in unison at the 2013 fall seminar for faculty and staff. The Collect followed an address in which Meyers boasted JSU’s record-breaking enrollment, new Madison campus and plans for its downtown branch.
That year, 82 of JSU’s permanent faculty and staff were terminated — more than any other public university in Mississippi with available data.
In a three-month investigation, The Clarion-Ledger spoke with 25 current and former JSU employees, the majority of whom said they worked in a hostile work environment, where faculty and staff worry the wrong move could lead to retaliation, being “iced out” or worse — a pink slip. Many said they had experienced stress so severe they became physically ill, causing them to go on medical leave. On top of that, they described a campuswide fear to voice concerns or publicly identify problems with the university.
Read the full story – JSU Terminations, Lawsuits Raise Questions
This is interesting, it appears that being fired at JSU is pop culture.
Why does it come to this? Black people don’t speak up when things are right or wrong, especially at HBCUs. They just stay silent, quiet and watching what happens next. It always takes a white man to get the ball rolling. The people directly affected still don’t know which side of the fence to get on. I don’t know if this President is a good fit for JSU or not . I understand she has done a lot of good things there, but, her time maybe be up. What I do know, she is on record saying she didn’t know the head football coach was fired until she read it in the papers. Also, she did not know him. At any PWI institution, a President making these types of statements would have been evaluated immediately and released. Vivian Fuller is working at JSU, doing what? I am surprise she is still working in Higher Education based on her track record, check it out, a trail of lawsuits and firings. JSU has a long history of hiring bad characters, I here there are others, just maybe the employees are getting what they deserve, fired.