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[dale1]

Very surprised no early morning discussion of the U. Vermont article at http://chronicle.com/article/Scandal-Undermined-Values-at/128597/

Seems like there may be quite a bit more to the story than the Chronicle has indicated, if the article responses are any indication. 

I simply don't know what the trajectory of UVM has been under Fogel, but it's kind of a sad story all around.

[spork]

It's like the movie Wonder Boys, but not as funny.

[fourhats]

I think there's another thread on this, started by Fiona.

[zuzu_]

You know, I spent a few weeks in Burlington this summer, and this story was all over the local media. For the life of me, I cannot figure out what the big deal is. Adults had an affair. It's not the president's fault his wife had an affair.

[dale1]

@zuzu_:

Well I think it has to do with the strange circumstances, as some of the blogs have pointed to.  That the married man she had an affair with now claims to be gay, and now the wife was apparently mentally ill.

[yemaya]

You know, I spent a few weeks in Burlington this summer, and this story was all over the local media. For the life of me, I cannot figure out what the big deal is. Adults had an affair. It's not the president's fault his wife had an affair.

It's a weird story, and that's probably part of the appeal.  The only thing I can think of for forcing Fogel out is if it really can be proven that he engaged in undue influence - hiring and promoting employees based on nepotism.  Since the story says that guy she was fooling around with does not appear to have benefitted professional, it seems like it's a separate matter entirely.

I do think it's ridiculous that his wife is being accused of mental illness because she had an affair.  I mean, in that case, how many mentally ill male politicians do we have?  But I suppose, whatever he needs to tell himself to feel less of a "cuckold."  If he were the one fooling around, there would no doubt have been some wagging tongues, but unless there was a student involved or it can be proven that there was additional salacious stuff going on, it's unlikely he would have been out of a job.

[tuxedo_cat]

Ok, this. . .

The review also reiterates the findings of an earlier investigation, which concluded that Mr. Schultz's dissertation was approved by a university committee without any undue influence from Ms. Kahn-Fogel or others. The dissertation, which focused on the role of presidents' spouses in fund raising, did not draw on interviews with Ms. Kahn-Fogel, the report says.

. . . is hilarious.

But the fact that someone who (seriously?) got a PhD by studying that, and then was making this . . .

A severance package, according to details released by the university, provides Mr. Schultz with a number of benefits, which include his full salary of $155,408 through December 31, 2012, and tuition remission for his three young children

. . . kind of makes me want to walk in front of a bus.

[larryc]

This story is really creepy--I could not finish it:
http://www.7dvt.com/2011-uvm-president-fogel-wife

The president's wife was obsessed with Schultz, who in turn enjoyed the patronage and perhaps the attention even as he was wrestling with his own sexual identity. What a sad mess.

[spork]

Who will play the president's wife in the movie?

[aandsdean]

Who will play the president's wife in the movie?

Laura Linney.

[tuxedo_cat]

Who will play the president's wife in the movie?

Laura Linney.

Could we just establish this as a standard response to any "Who will play X in the movie of Y" question?

[fiona]

I think there's another thread on this, started by Fiona.

Nope, not me. I started the thread about the president of Dickinson University in North Dakota.

I don't do Vermont.

The Fiona

[kaysixteen]

VT is extremely small, and the governor has chops, and public opinion matters.  It is also famously leftish, and union-friendly... it is hard to see how this ubergenerous golden parachute, complete with the outrageous new overpaid English dept. position, is going to sell well there, in light of the economy and what is being asked of real employees, etc.

[daniel_von_flanagan]

As I just posted over there, the Board of a state university forcing a president out over his wife's moral indiscretions is unacceptable and archaic.  This is not to justify either his salary (before or after the ouster) or any actions of his wife or her paramour. - DvF

[msparticularity]

As I just posted over there, the Board of a state university forcing a president out over his wife's moral indiscretions is unacceptable and archaic.  This is not to justify either his salary (before or after the ouster) or any actions of his wife or her paramour. - DvF

I think there may be some bad reporting and/or garbled writing in this story. Reading carefully, I believe that the real issue was the undue influence on hiring and promotions in the development office exercised by both the president and his wife. People were hired, retained and promoted based upon the Fogels's "comfort" with them rather than upon qualifications--even though that didn't turn out to be the case with the paramour, it would be ample cause for termination in my state university system.

Of course, that doesn't make nearly as entertaining reading as the other stuff.