What’s the Story Behind Tom Apple’s Ouster as UH Chancellor?
UH officials should be forthcoming about why the chancellor has been canned just a few weeks after new president takes over.
Whatever the case, as usual, the lawyers are now gearing up for a fight over how much he gets of the remaining funding for his incredibly lavish salary (close to half a million a year) – which is the equivalent of about seven or eight new assistant professors, if a complete hiring freeze were not in force at UHM because the state, in its wisdom, does not believe that a well-funded university is all that important.
Dr. Tom Apple, the University of Hawaii at Manoa chancellor.
University of Hawaii at Manoa
This is striking news, at least to those of us who work at the face of the coal. The folks up at the head mining office may have already been aware that something was afoot but it does not seem to have been bruited about very widely amongst the rank and file.
As someone who, like most of Civil Beat’s readers, spends most of his time down in the pit digging away on the day-to-day job (in my case, it’s teaching, research, and service), I often find what goes on up at the head office a puzzle.
People are hired upstairs who, to the average faculty member, used to peer reviews and rigorous vetting for any kind of increased responsibility or compensation, often seem less than brilliant, to put it mildly. However, we just get on with the work in hand and deal as best we can with whomever the gods have chosen to set over us.
UH President David Lassner was ensconced only a few short weeks ago and it would seem that he may already have been in possession of information that would lead him to decide to “can” the chancellor. As the “interim” or “acting” or “brevet” high chief (or whatever the term of art is for someone whose powers have not been made more-or-less permanent), Dr. Lassner most likely had to wait until after his official coronation to make a move on Tom Apple.
Of course, the above scenario could be entirely wrong. Dr. Apple may have been caught in flagrante delicto just last night, but that seems unlikely – the UH might have had some odd characters amongst our administrators over the years (I can think of several), but unforeseen crimes of passion have been rather rare.
So it would appear that something has been rotting in Denmark for a while and what that is has yet to come out. The question is “will it all come out” or will only part of the story come to light or will the powers-that-be dissimulate entirely and words like “for personal reasons” or for “reasons of health” or some similar but all-too-familiar boilerplate be offered?
