June 24, 2008

Chancellor Hire at U. of Wisconsin at Parkside Resigns Amid Criminal Probe

Facing new revelations that he is at the center of a criminal investigation, Robert Felner, the recently appointed chancellor of the University of Wisconsin at Parkside, withdrew from his new job today.

Mr. Felner, dean of the University of Louisville’s College of Education and Human Development, was scheduled to become Parkside’s chancellor in August. But federal authorities confirmed last Friday that they were investigating an unspecified potential violation at the college he leads in Kentucky. Mr. Felner called Kevin P. Reilly, the Wisconsin system’s president, over the weekend to inform him of the investigation. Mr. Reilly accepted Mr. Felner’s resignation today.

The criminal investigation involves an allegation that Mr. Felner’s college mishandled federal grants of $500,000, Scott C. Cox, a lawyer for Mr. Felner, told The Courier-Journal, a newspaper in Louisville.

“We believe from our very preliminary investigation that he has not mishandled any funds,” Mr. Cox said of Mr. Felner. He added that his client had resigned from the chancellorship because he was “concerned that this is going to create a problem, even if it’s just a perception problem, at the University of Wisconsin.” —Paul Fain

Comments

1. More screwball posts from the ever reliable duo of clowns above.

   Giardino, your biases are obvious to any reader. Since Robert Felner himself resigned from his to be position, how could he turn around and sue anyone? I await your explanation (which will surely be another funny rant). It also looks like he will need a different kind of lawyer (criminal) for the investigation he and Louisville are under rather than suiing Parkside for a civil matter.

   By the way, UW Parkside is one of 24 institutions of the University of Wisconsin and no one who knows anything would refer to the UW as you do with regard to this story. Since the investigation just began recently, is it a surprise that the search committee and outside screening firm missed it, especially since Mr. Felner only told Parkside over this past weekend about the investigation?

   — fflambeau    Jun 25, 01:20 AM    #

2. Comments 1 & 2 make no sense. The article says Fellner resigned. It doesn’t say (or imply) that UW or Reilly asked for it or otherwise took any steps to deny Fellner the job.

   — CU Alum    Jun 25, 02:30 AM    #

3. The UW system has a habit of caving in on personnel issues, rather than supporting its faculty and administrators and a couple of anti-UW legislators are the cause of this.

   — Steven Clark, PhD    Jun 25, 09:16 AM    #

4. I think it is too early to make a judgment either way with respect to this case. But it is not too early to state that the UW System is pathetic when it comes to public relations strategy – a combination of Midwest nice leading to paralyzing anxiety whenever some conflict emerges. If something emerges deal with it and deal with it straight, loud and clear, and in a principled way. Argg – like a deer in the headlights…

   — alfd    Jun 25, 09:39 AM    #

5. I appreciate Steven Clark’s remarks (#7) about the UW’s lack of support for faculty. While a couple of anti-UW legislators are probably a part of the problem, they are only a tiny part. Trust me, I know this system and one of its campuses very well. I have tried to figure out how one part of system could get to the point where bylaws are ignored, voting done illegially, documents redacted, and bullying is a way of life (in one of the colleges on that campus). My best guess is that there is nobody doing real investigations of some of the personnel actions taken on some campuses. Woodward and Bernstein-type writers would have a great old investigative time in the UW-System.

   — Ann    Jun 25, 10:20 AM    #

6. Not the first time Felner has had issues – check with URI

   — ralph parker    Jun 25, 10:35 AM    #

7. There is some degree of vindication (and schadenfreude) in this for the candidates who never got so much as a “thank you for applying” during or after the chancellor search. Why did the search committee have no clue about the “sucessful” candidate’s legal problems? Hint: search firms are such a joke!

   — Disgruntled candidate    Jun 25, 10:37 AM    #

8. Okay, I did spell everything correctly(including “successful”) in my application. Golly postings can make a person lazy!

   — Disgruntled candidate who can't spell    Jun 25, 10:39 AM    #

9. Observor: Thank you for the kind (and sage) words!

   — Disgruntled (and posting-challenged) candidate    Jun 25, 10:54 AM    #

10. I worked for Robert Felner at URI and I have to say from what I witnessed there, the man is utterly devoid of both personal and professional integrity. He ran a grant mill out of that institution; he was literally addicted to grant money. Not only that, he produced sloppy data, he knew it, and he didn’t care. Oh, and did I mention he was notoriously abusive to his overworked staff? A federal investigation couldn’t happen to a more deserving guy.

    — Mikey B    Jun 25, 10:57 AM    #

11. Comment #6. Let’s not focus in on “white-boys.” This is the only race/gender that can be openly attacked. Frankly, I’m tired of this!

    — D    Jun 25, 10:59 AM    #

12. 20. The administrative problems at the U.W. System go beyond Madison and Parkside. UW Platteville was just as sleezy in its administrative reputation within certain Colleges.

    — Former UW Faculty    Jun 25, 02:34 PM    #

13. While I have problems too with the nature of the UW System, it really irks me when people play ideological games…a case in point being Steve L. (21)…if it was so bad why did he bother applying?! On a mission to clean house? I detect someone who is bitter and twisted about rejection (never trust the views of someone who has been rejected – this is a general rule), or else perchance we have someone seeking to stir up the mud, and more mud than exists, for political reasons…

    — alfd    Jun 25, 05:06 PM    #

14. Too much free time in the summer? Don’t you have anything better to do? Go back to work!

    — Get that paper done!    Jun 25, 11:07 PM    #

15. It’s hard to understand the animosity expressed in some of the comments above towards the UW system unless there are “sour grapes” involved (see comment #22 when the writer fesses up to the fact that he didn’t get a job he applied for). Whatever nasty that happened here, if anything since an investigation is underway, happened at the School of Education at the University of Louisville. Not at Parkside, not at the UW system, and not at UW, Madison.

    Here is a comment from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel web site today (www.jsonline.com) that indicates the UW System search for the Parkside Chancellor had shown NO RED FLAGS (doubtless because a criminal investigation is usually kept quiet and the Dean at Louisville neglected to tell the search committee about it until this past Sunday):

    “The UW System would not release the background checks or other information gathered in the course of the public search for Felner, saying those are confidential. But UW spokesman David Giroux said the first the system officials heard of the investigation was Sunday and that there were no red flags raised during the search process.

    “We have gone through and checked again the records that were produced as part of the background check and there is no mention of anything that would lead to this conclusion,” he said. “Clearly if there were (red flags), the results of the search would have been very different.”

    Those who were denied tenure, didn’t get a job, or simply are clowns (like #1, 13, 19, 21) will of course, be free to continue to bash the system that was the victim in this case.

    — fflambeau    Jun 26, 12:22 AM    #

16. Sorry, Mr. Sour Grapes is post #21, not #22 (whose post makes much sense).

    — fflambeau    Jun 26, 12:25 AM    #

17. Too bad the UW did not question more faculty and staff at UofL.
    They would have heard the real story on this guy. UofL wanted to get rid of him!

    — Benny    Jun 27, 11:05 AM    #

18. Re # 27: The UW-System and Parkside surely cannot be counted as faculty-or tenure-friendly places. Tenure is often dependent on the schemes of the Arts & Sciences Dean or the Chancellor’s personal hostility toward a particular department’s faculty and professional philosophy. The antipathy between the previous Chancellor and the Teacher Education Department for example, had been a well-known inflammation for several years. It was also no secret that there was a concerted effort to strangle the department’s ability to operate by denying new PAR’s, dismantling the curriculum lab, and removing faculty by tenure denial. The department today consists of 3 full-time (sort of) faculty who certify around 10 teachers per semester – that from past averages approaching 30. Given some of the rumored current practices, it’s a wonder DPI still grants licenses to program graduates.

    At any rate, whether the university was at fault for ‘sleazy’ hiring practices or for rushing to judgment, it doesn’t reflect positively on the System or bode well for the chancellorship of Parkside.

    — Observer    Jun 27, 01:58 PM    #

19. The timing of this inquiry at a time when Dr. Robert Felner was about to leave the University for a better job, is a bit of a concern about the human rights of this person being violated. Having resigned from his new position and being investigated at his current position he is caught between a rock and a hard place. Assuming he is innocent of the allegations (which are easy to make), his career is doomed precisely because of what he says “perception that he may have done something wrong” and the bad press. He seems like a dispensable person for the University and a good candidate for being made a scape goat for mishandling of grants by several others. It could also be a smoke screen for the University’s other problems and a diversion from being at the center of negative attention. On the other hand, at a time when there are budget restrictions and 9% increases in tuition fees, the University should review the extravagant salaries over $120,000 (greater than the salary of the governor of Kentucky) being given to some faculty from the state treasury who do not necessarily deserve it or maybe deserved it in one particular year when they performed exceptionally. In order to save the state from going into deeper debt and raising taxes, it would be advisable to cap all faculty salaries at 100,000 coming from the state and if the faculty has grants and allotted a portion of their time to research than the additional salary is merited but it then comes from the grant and not the state (with its budget shortfall). The bucks for brains program has not really brought any eminent brains of the caliber of Nobel laureates or even members of the US National Academy of Sciences. Only bucks have been expended. When the state budget is plush with funds, such programs would certainly be worthwhile even if the top guns in the country are not attracted as has been the case. The University tends to control the press in the city by promoting people when they wish to and knocking them down when they have been used and abused. Prof. Felner seems like one such example and not too long ago it was Dr. Shumaker.

    — Ethicist1    Jun 27, 06:00 PM    #

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