August 28, 2012

Penn State Faculty Leaders Attack NCAA's Use of Freeh Report

erikson-daily

Christopher Weddle for The Chronicle

Rodney A. Erickson, Penn State's president, says it is difficult to disseminate positive messages about the university "when you have a media barrage around the trial, the Freeh report, the NCAA sanctions."

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Christopher Weddle for The Chronicle

Rodney A. Erickson, Penn State's president, says it is difficult to disseminate positive messages about the university "when you have a media barrage around the trial, the Freeh report, the NCAA sanctions."

By Robin Wilson

University Park, Pa.

As Pennsylvania State University faculty members and students expressed widespread displeasure with the institution's acceptance of harsh penalties imposed by the NCAA in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky sex-abuse scandal, Rodney A. Erickson, the president, defended his decision to allow the punishments and said he'd agree to them again if he had the chance.

"I felt that under the circumstances, with what I was left with, that this was the decision I had to make," he told The