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Monday, May 20, 2013

Professor Emeritus Responds


To:  Dr. Lloyd Jacobs, President
From:  Abid A. Al-Marayati, Professor Emeritus
Subject: Tenure Termination
Date:  May 19, 2013
I am writing to you with reference to your letter of May 16, 2013.  Within your letter, you are using the pretext of alleging bad health for terminating me.  I have been teaching for some 44 years at The University of Toledo and have not suffered a medical problem, except for the seasonal malady of the flu.  You cannot state that I am a bad teacher or that I am professionally inactive.
Your and Mr. Kevin West’s claim that there is something wrong with my health, is not true, as I have provided you with a statement from my medical doctor stating that I am competent to teach.  In fact, I question your health and that of Mr. Kevin West.  You and your staff (Dr. Mark Denham, Mr. Kevin West, Mrs. Janelle Schaller, and Dr. Jamie Barlow) are now resorting to health condition.
As a discredited official by the faculty, you are making new rules of procedures.  The faculty has already considered you alien to faculty relations.  In your short period with the administration, you have caused too many problems.
Mr. Kevin West has been making decisions without the support of the faculty.  Mrs. Janelle Schaller made false statements to the Ohio Civil Rights Commission, a state agency.  Dr. Mark Denham falsely stated that I have been absent for a long period of time, whereas I was absent for one class session.  Dr. Jamie Barlowe assumed the position of Dean without consultation with the faculty.
Please Dr. Jacobs go back to your medical profession.  You are not able whatsoever to deal with faculty affairs.
I am noted of being a faithful member of the faculty.  To my credit are many publications and being active professionally.
You provide your associates with large sums of money.  Mr. West receives $179,000; Mrs. Schaller $130,000; Dr. Denham $140,000; and Dr. Barlowe $220,000; all from hard-earned taxpayer dollars.  You have enriched your subordinates at the expense of students who mop floors and flip hamburgers to further their education.
You cannot terminate me as I have been appointed by the Board of Trustees.  Yet, you dismiss the Board of Trustees which has appointed you to your position. 
I believe that you are against tenure which is a basis for the foundation of the University which you seem to ignore.  You have no respect for the policies and procedures of the University and are lacking in conscience.  You terminated me without consultation.  You raise questions while I was not under contract, which reflects your hostility to tenure.
I invite you and your collaborators for a public meeting for the community to examine the style of your administration.
You resorted immediately to termination without giving me my rights or the opportunity to explain.  You have no respect for academic freedom or tenure.  Your actions are dangerous as you are putting an end to the profession of 44 years of a faculty.
Mr. Kevin West arbitrarily withheld the salary of a faculty member.  He even failed to provide me with a grievance committee though he informed me that he was working on restoring the membership.
You and your administration are unscrupulous and have brought a lot of grief onto the faculty and students.  An examination of your administration is very much needed.

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

All around the country, other faculty at other universities, like me, are watching this play out with great sadness, as Jacobs destroys what was a good thing. It is very sad that your Board of Trustees doesn't have any will to act with any decency.

Anonymous said...

Abid A. Al-Marayati sent the termination letter signed by Jacobs and his "response" in a mass email addressed, I believe, to all faculty and admin. It caught me by surprise and there must be a back story to this I'm unfamiliar with. Anyone know it?

Anonymous said...

I had the honor to have Dr. Al-Marayati for three undergraduate classes in the mid-1980s. I'll admit he was somewhat eccentric, but I learned more from those classes than I did from just about any three or even six classes I ever took. His classes were demanding and at times unorthodox, but no one would ever question his knowledge and his passion for teaching. He was one of my all-time favorite professors.

Anonymous said...

There is a long and complex backstory to this issue going back years, none of which is reflected in the letter. As one could expect there are many issues not of public record or disclosed by either party so all is not as it would appear by this letter. I would be very careful in jumping to conclusions as to the actions of the Administration in this specific case based solely on his letters.

Anonymous said...

so much for transparency...

Anonymous said...

" It is very sad that your Board of Trustees doesn't have any will to act with any decency."

Well, why do you think they are also the Board of Turds? Time to boycott all the businesses retaining these parasites!

I have done my share: pulled all my money out of Huntington, steered clear of Columbus First Bank, and Waterford banks, discontinued The Blade, stayed away from Koester Corporation. I am surprised the IRS witch hunt did not pick up on the money trail between the UT administrative princelets and their sugar daddies in the BOT Banker Brigade...

Weatherman said...

At yesterday's media extravaganza in the Student Union Dr. Jacobs reiterated his personal management philosophy "If it ain't broke, then break it." Freud should look into this. Sure, it is considered a "best practice" in war and business these days to vaunt "creative destruction".

But as somebody pointed out yesterday (and as every high school senior touring Centennial Mall can readily notice), the clock on the University Hall tower is broken. I wonder who broke it?

Backstory: "By the time I get through with this XXx&^$* main campus tenured faculty they won't even know what time of day it is!" ~ Jacobs' pledge to the BOT, 2006.

Anonymous said...

At this point, Jacobs has broken everything on this campus, except for one thing: faculty dedication to our students, our profession and our institution.

Anonymous said...

"...Jacobs reiterated his personal management philosophy "If it ain't broke, then break it." ...Sure, it is considered "best practice" in war and business these days to vaunt "creative destruction"."

You know, Commander Jacobs was a soldier when he was younger, but he seems to be forgetting who ihe is waging a war against: his own community. What a phony marine!

Use the UCMJ to remove him from office -- his leadership no longer serves the best interest of this community, including our ROTC cadets who may have to risk their lives for this crapitalist system that tolerates Jacobs, cronies, board of turds, etc with a serious supremacy complex.

That Supremacy Clause may even put the communists to shame. Why should our soldiers put up with a totalitarian system that they swore to fight to death? The ROTC program should close at UT in protest against Jacobs' regime, or they will teach young cadets that US democracy is no longer worth fighting for.

They might as well join private security and mercenary forces, the Foreign Legion, or some other thug outfit you see in movies.

That will certainly glorify Jacobs!

Anonymous said...

"so much for transparency..."

How much transparency are you expecting when a legal case is involved, would you expect the Administration to comment on this at all publicly??

Anonymous said...

WEvery would be child engineer knows that breaking things is easy. Fixing or making things better is another matter. So far, Mr. Jacobs has proven he can break things; but he has not yet proven that he can fix or maker better things that he has broken. As a result the University of Toledo suffers in all important higher education.

Anonymous said...

"How much transparency are you expecting when a legal case is involved, would you expect the Administration to comment on this at all publicly?"

Transparency should be integral to the administration's MO; it's too late to expect transparency once the legal system moves in. The only transparency you can see is when all that becomes a public record after the proceedings end. There might be some delay or period of restriction. You may even need a FOIA request.

This is the method Jacobs, Cronies, and Board of Thugs use to drag their feet, gain time, cover their tracks, and launder their money...who knows?

Anonymous said...

"So far, Mr. Jacobs has proven he can break things; but he has not yet proven that he can fix or maker better things that he has broken."

He can't see the difference between himself as Commander Jacobs and Surgeon Jacobs: he would declare a war on the patient in the OR. Except, I'd rather be his enemy than his patient.

Anonymous said...

Can we all move on now?

K. Meltow said...

Yes, by all means. Let's move on! There are other dragons to slay.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUezctTV4ps

Anonymous said...

Yes, we should move on now since all this talk of Jacobs, Cronies, and Board of Thugs will make them cringe and may even turn them into very nice loving, caring intellectuals. Perhaps We should have ICare T-shirts saying "Have you hugged your Crony?", "XOXO 4 BOT", "Jake Loves U."

I second the move...

Anyone objecting?

Anonymous said...

With your sarcasm and wit, you make it difficult to imagine or embrace a future

health fitness said...

I had the honor to have Dr. Al-Marayati for three undergraduate classes in the mid-1980s. I'll admit he was somewhat eccentric, but I learned more from those classes than I did from just about any three or even six classes I ever took. His classes were demanding and at times unorthodox, but no one would ever question his knowledge and his passion for teaching. He was one of my all-time favorite professors

health fitness

Anonymous said...

Dr. Al-Marayati has passed away:

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/toledoblade/obituary.aspx?n=abid-a-al-marayati&pid=166213309#fbLoggedOut