Editorial: What’s in a name?

We have a hunch that the University of Toledo likes long titles.

As silly as it sounds, there may be some truth to our conjecture. After all, no one can deny the fact that some of UT’s administrators have rather long titles. For example, Rudy Taylor’s former position was the program manager for the Office of Student Involvement — geez, what a mouthful!

While it can feel like trying to master a tongue-twister just to address someone correctly, some position titles got a little bit longer due to the addition of one word — interim. This is because UT is seeing a lot of position changes between administrators leaving and other administrators temporarily taking their places.

How many is a lot, exactly? Here’s our administrative count so far:

• Seven are interim.
  • Interim Provost John Barrett
  • Interim Chair of the Women’s and Gender Studies Department Asma Abdel Halim
  • Interim Senior Vice President for Finance and Administration Thomas D. Biggs
  • Interim Dean of the Honors College Kelly Moore
  • Interim Dean of the College of Nursing Kelly Phillips
  • Interim Dean of the College of Education Virginia Keil
  • Interim Director of University Libraries Barbara Floyd (see promoted)
• Four filled recently-vacated positions.
  • President Sharon Gaber
  • Event Coordinator for the Office of Student Involvement Callie Cannon
  • Program Manager for the Office of Student Involvement Evita Thompson
  • Chief Information Officer Bill McCreary
• Four went to the University of Akron.
  • Former Provost Scott Scarborough
  • Former Honors Dean Lakeesha Ransom
  • Former Vice President for External Affairs Larry Burns
  • Former Vice President for Information Technology Godfrey Ovwigho
• Three went elsewhere.
  • Former Medical Center Chancellor Jeffery Gold
  • Former UT President Lloyd Jacobs
  • Former program manager for the Office of Student Involvement Rudy Taylor
• Two positions were combined into one.
  • External Affairs and Institutional Advancement Vice Presidencies combined to become the Vice President of Advancement, held by Sam McCrimmon. (see hired)
• Two people were hired.
  • Vice President of Advancement Sam McCrimmon
  • Chief of Staff in the Office of the President Matt Schroeder
• Two people were promoted.
  • Associate Vice President for Student Affairs and Director of ResLife Virginia Speight
  • Interim Director of University Libraries Barbara Floyd
• One position remains unfilled.
  • Former LGBTQA Director Fatima Pervaiz
• One person retired.
  • Former Vice president for Advancement Vern Snyder
• One person was fired.
  • Former Dean of YouCollege Program D’Naie Jacobs

That’s quite a bit of moving around!

Not all change is bad. Firing administrators who are not doing their jobs is what universities are supposed to do, and promoting people into new positions is natural during periods of growth. With a new president and a lot of change-up in the administration, UT is going through just that — a period of growth as an institution.

However, there is a fine line between natural turnover and hemorrhaging employees, and UT is toeing that line. Why is it that so many administrators have left? Is there a problem within our administrative system, or do they just see UT as a stepping stone on the way to bigger and better things?

We would like to see some stability in UT’s leadership in the coming years. Hopefully, the time taken to fill permanent positions will be worth the wait. We are hopeful that it will be worth it; the university has scheduled open forums for different administrative positions, which we think is wonderful and we would like to see this method continued in the future. It’s great that there are open forums to gain the input of the whole community, as it allows those affected to have a voice in the matter. Additionally, President Sharon Gaber has been consistent in updating everyone of the staffing changes she has made.

We like the openness and transparency, and see it as a sign of improvement.

We just hope UT takes the administrative game of musical chairs as a fresh start and an opportunity to step forward instead of falling back.