First, there was the abrupt suspension and termination of Drs. Bennett and Hall. This was reportedly due to Dr. Bennett padding his class rosters in order to get the classes to “make,” or go on as scheduled. The classes “made,” but the Optics course I took had to go the “independent study” route, which is a real pain for a regular course. Taking a six-credit, two-hours-a-day, four-days-a-week course on that basis leads to some serious stress.

When talking to Dr. Bennett, he told me that the faculty union is (or maybe was, since his terminaton?) up in arms about the fact that he was put on leave and then terminated over this, as lots of instructors “pad” their class rosters using “audit” students. (An “audit” student signs up for the class, can attend some or all of the classes, as convenient. The only difference between an “audit” student and a regular student is that when you take the class on an “audit” basis, you don’t get a grade for it.)

The real reason this action was taken, according to Dr. Bennett, was that Dr. Hall and he had taken note of a large pile of cash donated to the School of Applied Technologies — specifically the Photonics Department — by various companies, and that some of the cash had gone missing from the SAT coffers. Two specific donations were mentioned, one from Intel for $60K, and another from Schott Solar to the tune of $500K. The unstated idea was that if he and Dr. Hall had kept quiet about the cash being taken from the Photonics budget, the both of them would still be employed by CNM at present.

Last week, I received the following from Dr. Bennett –

I am quickly getting the impression that no one gives a shit whether CNM keeps the Applied Technologies programs going or not.

Current mood: annoyed

From: Bob Hall
Sent: Thu 11/20/2008 7:40 AM
To: Various Staff
Subject: Termination From CNM

Good morning all. It is time you got to know what is going on for real.

For 7+ years we have worked as a team and provided classes for our students and support to our community in the form of workforce development in technical specialties. For the past 5 weeks both Gordon Bennett and I have been restricted from discussing the reason for our administrative leave. No more.

As you recall, last April and May were tough times on all because of the problem with enrollment and the possibility of faculty not having loads due to course cancellations. As you know I have always fought to keep classes on the schedule as long as possible to give students time to enroll. Both Gordon & I did sign up to audit certain classes so that they would stay on the schedule long enough for students to register, and register they did and there were enough in the classes even without the audit for the classes to run.

Well, with the policy of 12 in a class and anything below 10 being canceled we were just trying to meet the needs of students and make sure faculty had full loads that wanted them. Now with the fall semester the cancellation moved from the Wednesday before to two weeks before. Dean Burkes position is that students are just going to have to learn to sign up early or the classes wont be there. That means they wont be there for faculty either. Dean Burke just does not get it that our students are not going to sign up two weeks early in most cases because they are waiting on some for of funding and CANT AFFORD it. She says it is only $40.00. Anyone can afford that. That is easy to say when you make $100K+ a year. So, Gordon & I were accused of providing false reports to the school by auditing classes and padding classes because we fight for our students and faculty.

We were both provided our letters of termination yesterday @ 3:00 and 3:30 PM.

I want you all to know that I have enjoyed working with you and it has been a pleasure to call you the Electronics and Manufacturing team. Your jobs are going to get even tougher with the way the programs are being administered so keep focused on providing our students with the best possible education that can be found anywhere. Sorry that my efforts were seen to be against policy but Burke has been working to terminate me since she came on board. I don’t agree with her style of management so my situation was predictable.

Just remember, if you don get 12 students the class wont run.

Best wishes for the upcoming holidays and you now have my e-mail so stay in touch if you want.

Thanks again for a great 7+ years – as faculty and staff you are the best.

Best Regards,

Bob Hall
Past Director
Electronics & Manufacturing.