What a liar.
Posted on 07/24/2007 4:51:37 PM PDT by 69ConvertibleFirebird
University of Colorado regents voted 8-1 to fire controversial professor Ward Churchill this afternoon.
Regent Cindy Carlisle, D-Boulder, cast the lone dissenting vote. There was no discussion.
After the quick vote, dissenters in the crowd at the Glenn Miller Ballroom shouled "bullshit" and "cowards."
Regent Steve Bosley, R-Louisville, introduced the motion for dismissal shortly after the regents convened, and it was seconded by Regent Kyle Hybl, R-Colorado Springs.
Churchill supporters converged in the back of the ballroom after the vote, playing drums and chanting.
The dismissal of the controversial professor is the first of its kind in CU’s 131-year history — the university never before had fired a tenured professor on the grounds of academic-misconduct.
The academic-misconduct case — which has wrapped the Boulder campus in controversy for the past 2 1/2 years — has touched off debate about academic freedom, scholarly fraud, tenure and the political climate after Sept. 11, 2001.
CU President Hank Brown and Regent Pat Hayes are expected to hold a press conference in the University Memorial Center shortly for reporters with media credentials.
Churchill, his attorney, David Lane, and supporters are planning to simultaneously hold a separate news conference, also in the UMC. Professional credentials are required at this event as well because organizers say they want to prevent physical threats against the controversial professor, and squelch the potential for any disruptions.
Churchill and his attorney say that the case is far from being over, and they plan to file a First Amendment lawsuit in Denver District Court as soon as Wednesday.
The firebrand professor first sparked controversy in 2005 with his essay on Sept. 11, 2001, that called some victims of the terrorist attacks "little Eichmanns," a reference to a notorious Nazi. Churchill says he has been the target of a right-wing attack on academic freedom.
They argue that the university is retaliating against Churchill for his controversial speech and has wanted to fire him since he first sparked controversy in 2005. Lane has described the CU process as a "kangaroo court" and Churchill has called the proceedings a "charade."
An investigative panel of scholars that was set up to investigate academic-fraud charges against the professor issued a report in 2006 detailing patterns of deliberate misconduct and "shoddy research." The report accused Churchill of plagiarizing passages from other scholars and twisting facts to bolster arguments.
Churchill filed counter-complaints last week defending his research and alleging the panel members, in the report, plagiarized material and fabricated evidence to build up the case against him.
The regents’ pivotal vote came after a day-long hearing where the board heard legal arguments from three sides: Churchill, who was fighting to keep his tenured job; a faculty panel that recommended Churchill be suspended without pay for one year and demoted; and the university that pushed for dismissal.
CU President Brown in May recommended that Churchill be dismissed. The recommendation backs an earlier one made by Phil DiStefano a year ago, when he was serving as the Boulder campus’s top administrator.
Finally, the board will hear from the legal counsel representing CU’s Privilege and Tenure Committee, the faculty panel that came out with a softer recommendation after reviewing the case. The committee recommended that Churchill be suspended without pay for one year and demoted.
Confidentiality rules require that the hearing be held behind closed doors because the case is a personnel matter.
Churchill’s case represents the first time a CU professor with the job protection known as tenure has been fired for academic-misconduct, although the university has dismissed two other faculty members.
CU in 2004 fired R. Igor Gamow for "moral turpitude" after seven women accused him of sexual assault and harassment.
The university dismissed Mahinder Uberoi in 2000 for reasons that haven’t been made public. He had filed eight lawsuits over six years against the university, claiming everything from racial discrimination to hazardous laboratory working conditions and violations of the state‘s Open Records Act.
dissenters Liberals in the crowd at the Glenn Miller Ballroom shouted "bullshit"...
Such well behaved people, progressives/liberals. Just the types who **should** be running our country (barf)
Ugh!
No kidding. In a normal world he’d have been let go for the initial remark.
Good luck in your next occupation, ya little eichman!
Now comes the lawsuits.
Good riddance though...
I smell alumni support (read $$$) drying up and the board had to respond...
or possibly this one
Hold on, was that a pig that just flew by my window?
How about that, a university with some guts.
Ward Churchill is NOT an Indian. Why the drums? Why the chanting? He doesn't deserve it. He is not a real tribal member.
Excellent!
Churchill is the poster boy for libs doing the samething in universities across America.
Those people are simply disgusting morons.
Churchill must not be denied his constitutional freedom to plagiarized speech!
"...censorship does not interfere with the constitutional right of every American to sit alone in the dark, in the nude, and cuss..."
Why do they even have to fire him for the Eichmanns comment, when he's just a plain old fraud?
What a liar.
Well just damn......he was my favorite cigar store injun.
Churchill supporters converged in the back of the ballroom after the vote, playing drums and chanting.
Playing drums and chanting! Oh my alma mater is still teaching the basics!!
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