Bad enough that in general academia increasingly has become immersed in politics replacing scholarship and learning. Worse, in Louisiana politics still drives too much even basic decisions in the realm of academia, a condition that should be eliminated recently illuminated by another example of unethical behavior.
The politicized nature of Louisiana higher education is well known, with Louisiana State University hardly alone in attempts to suppress free speech of students, of faculty members, and giving athletics the run of the place. But politicians and their appointees also intervene in the more mundane aspects of administration in order to convert power into favoritism, with former LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans Chancellor Larry Hollier having been revealed as a crass practitioner of this.
An internal investigation last year revealed Hollier intervened to help arrange scholarships for each of his grandsons and thousands of dollars in awards for his grandson’s girlfriend. Hollier denied giving them any assistance and remains a faculty member with a salary in the half million-dollar range after having served in the top spot from 2005-21. He left that abruptly amid charges he pushed for improper pay bumps for his inner circle, underpaid women, and violated the university’s policies while hiring and firing people, as another report indicated.
Concerning the latest revelation, internal messages show Hollier relentlessly pursued special favors, using both his relationship with the LSU Board of Supervisors, which employed him, and his status and connections as institution chief. On the one end, he steered supervisors and past LSU university presidents to award the scholarships, as these officials each can award without questions 15 scholarships a year to LSU. Those involved in handing these out to Hollier’s descendants, both political appointees that commonly have little familiarity with the academic side of higher education and the presidents at the very opposite end of that continuum, apparently didn’t do any due diligence on his requests.
On the other end, Hollier also influenced a subordinate way down the chain of command to admit the girlfriend to a graduate program, ahead of far higher-ranking applicants. The person in charge of the program at the time said she felt intimidated by her superior’s request, even not knowing the woman’s relationship with Hollier.
As an example of the inherent unsuitability of the idea of board members and institution heads giving out scholarships carte blanche, in one instance Hollier told former supervisor Stephen Perry, now retiring as New Orleans’ quasi-public tourism agency’s leader, specifically the request was for a grandson, laying bare the nepotism involved. Regardless, Perry complied, later claiming he had no real recollection of it.
Simply, this system is too ripe for favoritism that excludes those not lucky enough by birth or association to have an inside track. And it’s not just the LSU System that has it; both the University of Louisiana and Southern Systems supervisors and leaders have the same ability to dispense these gifts with the only qualification being university admittance.
That’s not an appropriate use of taxpayer dollars. The Louisiana Legislature needs to abolish this perquisite because it will be abused and it isn’t fair to deserving students without a politically-connected champion. Instead, the money currently paying for these should go into general scholarships or need-based grants.
True, the Legislature has whiffed repeatedly on reforming the related program where Tulane University agreed to let legislators give out yearly a scholarship to it and the New Orleans mayor 20, having rebuffed bills that would take selection out of their immediate hands. Yet if they won’t reform themselves, at least they could foist it on others that would impact directly tax dollars. And they need to do this at the next available opportunity.