NMSU conducts audit following faculty vote of no confidence in administration: Here's what we learned
LAS CRUCES – By late October 2021, faculty and students of New Mexico State University had had enough with university administration.
Both the student and faculty senates claimed they had no confidence in President John Floros and Provost Carol Parker and called on the NMSU regents to ask Chancellor Dan Arvizu to fire both of them.
Those students and professors who were loudest alleged the top brass were bullies to, or at least dishonest with, those beneath them on the organizational chart, leading to low morale and retention within the university community.
The regents ordered their auditing committee to investigate five specific claims from faculty: misappropriation of university funds, unethical hiring and promotion practices, deliberate circumvention of due process, rejection of principles and practices of shared governance, and broader impacts of a systemic failure of leadership.
Within the three months it took the committee to probe the allegations, Parker was put on administrative leave and Floros announced he would be taking a year's sabbatical with no intention of returning to his role.
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Shortly after regents and the chancellor had the audit in hand, Parker was let go permanently.
The audit, which was released to the public Feb. 4, confirmed an adversarial relationship and a lack of trust between faculty and administration — which was news to no one.
"It was not a surprise to me, that we did not have a good relationship with the faculty," Chancellor Dan Arvizu said Tuesday in an interview with the Las Cruces Sun-News. "They told us that repeatedly. In fact, it was pretty clear that the one word that kept coming up was lack of trust."
Substantiated and unsubstantiated claims
The committee found the claims of misappropriation of university funds and rejection of principles and practices of shared governance were wholly unsubstantiated.
But the audit did find that administration engaged in unethical hiring practices at least once and also partially substantiated the claim of deliberate circumvention of due process.
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The unethical hiring section of the audit results looked at Parker's role in hiring and promotions that fell ultimately under her approval. The audit found that several minor Human Resource Services processes were skipped over.
"Non-conformance to HRS processes by the Provost Office is shown to be more of a control breakdown rather than human error," stated the audit.
Much of the circumvention of due process also fell under non-compliance with HRS. Lack of communication between university offices — the Office of Institutional Equity, Human Resources, Employee & Labor Relations — lead to grievances being lost in the shuffle.
More shared governance and communication
Arvizu said that he is glad the audit came when it did.
"It gives us an opportunity to kind of hit the reset button," Arvizu said. "Very refreshing. I think we're better served. Because I think first of all, we've got different personalities, and now with the Faculty Senate will be essentially providing new members and new leadership.
"There's a lot of opportunity, I think, to actually grow in this process."
There will be more involvement of Faculty Senate members in university decisions, something faculty has been asking for. This is intended to provide more shared governance opportunities.
Jamie Bronstein, Faculty Senate vice chair, confirmed that Arvizu has been meeting more frequently with the Faculty Senate.
She spoke with the Sun-News, saying this may be a step in the right direction, but there is still a lot that needs to change.
Audit Services noted that adversarial conditions exist at NMSU and that these conditions are "incumbent on all to resolve."
Bronstein rejected that the Faculty Senate is at fault for the adversarial relationship, saying that the group has continuously reached out and attempted to create bridges between faculty and administration.
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In the past, several members of the Faculty Senate has repeatedly stated that there has been a lack of communication and respect for faculty input.
But Bronstein agreed that creating a strong relationship does come down to both parties working together.
"I would venture to say that almost everybody who is now Faculty Senate has been at NMSU longer than the top administration. The administration was hired in what 2018? There are people in Faculty Senate who have been at NMSU since the early 90s," Bronstein said. "You've got to ask what's different now? Why did this not happen before? Well, clearly something changed, and it wasn't the faculty."
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A full picture?
After NMSU released the findings on Friday evening, some staff took to social media to voice concerns that this audit was not covering the full picture.
Bronstein said that while many of the claims were found to be unsubstantiated, there is suggestions to improve in almost all areas.
"There's a difference between there being something that is illegal and something that is unethical, or something that is just a bad decision," Bronstein said. "We could say, 'Oh, it's not illegal to expand the administration and to hire administrators at market price, while faculty salaries are at the 10th percentile of people at an R2 research to institution."
Bronstein and other faculty senators had agreed that there are too many upper administrators being paid too-high salaries. Bronstein posits the audit did not fully consider this beyond a legal lens.
"We really need people in the classroom," she said. "The faculty and staff are the ones who make the university run. Why are the administrators paid at market when faculty are not?"
The "Additional Systemic Impacts" found could lead to "financial loss and reputational harm" to NMSU.
The audit doesn't specify the additional systematic impacts beyond this, but the original Faculty Senate resolution listed several:
Not supporting, implementing, or embracing the land-grant, HSI-mission
Consistent and constant breakdown of communication and information sharing
Financial/fiscal mismanagement
Mis/distrust of central administration due to lack of integrity and ethics
Continued pattern of a lack of transparency and disreputable behaviors
Inability to safeguard safety, security, and wellbeing of campus stakeholders
Potential loss of enrollment based on negative reputational optics
No processes that allow for access to trained, skilled, unbiased Human Resource personnel for faculty
Low morale inhibiting retention of faculty, staff, and students
Unfair, discriminatory hiring practices resulting in an unsupportive work environment
Perpetuation of a climate of retaliation, fear, and hostility
The Associated Students of NMSU Senate also affirmed these conditions in their own resolution.
NMSU graduate student workers have made similar claims.
Despite ASNMSU's Senate passing a separate resolution of no-confidence, this audit is directed at the Faculty Senate's resolution. Arvizu said he doesn't know of any further audits being conducted for ASNMSU — that would be a Board of Regents decision.
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However, Arvizu has been meeting with ASNMSU. He said he briefed some of the student leaders on the audit results the night they were released.
"I think they were very appreciative of having heard that," Arvizu said. "I will continue to address those (concerns). Clearly, some of the issues students have, which relate to the protests, which relate to graduate students, those kinds of things, we're focused on it, we're like a laser on making sure that we understand those issues."
He plans to keep an open dialogue with students and staff.
Read the entire audit here:
Miranda Cyr, a Report for America corps member, can be reached at mcyr@lcsun-news.com or @mirandabcyr on Twitter. Show your support for the Report for America program at https://bit.ly/LCSNRFA.
This article originally appeared on Las Cruces Sun-News: NMSU's adversarial faculty-admin relationship audit: What we learned
