Texas Southern University President to be dismissed

The Board of Regents at Texas Southern University has voted to propose the dismissal of President Austin Lane from his position.

This decision was made on Wednesday February 4th which was preceded by the announcement that was issued on January 10, to place Lane on paid administrative leave. A crowd of about seventy supporters which included current TSU students and alumni gathered to wait out the decision of the board. When the final decision to propose Lane’s dismissal was made the crowd became visibly hurt, confused, and upset at the decision of the Board of Regents.

There has been plenty of media coverage as to how this issue came about. However much is still unclear about how this situation came to light and the authentic motives of the Board of Regents. Amongst the confusion Lane has affirmed that he will fight the decision of the board with an appeal. But what exactly is Austin Lane being accused of?

According to the letter issued by the Board of Regents, Lane’s dismissal is related in part to “failure to report to the board information relating to the improper payments to the admissions of the Thurgood Marshall School of Law and the improper awarding of scholarships to students, which led in part to the initiations of a comprehensive investigation.”

`The Board has also accused Lane of other salacious acts such as, attempts to conceal excessive entertainment expenses, and attempting to coerce a former law school official to misrepresent a report to the national law school accreditation review board along with his assistant. All of these acts, if he cannot achieve an appeal, will allow for the board to fire Lane with a cause. This means that he will not be paid the remainder of his salary outlined in his contract.

The Board of Regents has also affirmed that they have enacted bylaws that allow them to hire and fire any employee of Texas Southern University giving them total power over the school. Lane has said that this is a violation of a policy enforced by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, which serves as the regional accreditation organization for Texas Southern University. This set of bylaws put the university out of compliance in October, just one month before the university’s scheduled accreditation visit according to Lane via the Houston Chronicle.

Lane told a reporter at the Houston Chronicle that the Board of Regents is enacting a “calculated witch hunt” and the charges brought against him by the Board are just “accusations designed to tarnish my reputation and career.” Furthermore Austin Lane has accused the board of misappropriating the investigation and inappropriately taking over personal decisions and also generally overreaching their authority- acts which he says violates the university’s policy and could endanger the school’s accreditation.

Lane also has maintained that he had no knowledge of any improprieties in the admissions process of the Thurgood Marshall Law School and therefore could not have notified the board of any salacious activities.

The wait continues as the community of Texas Southern University and Houston, Texas anticipate whether or not the leader of ‘Tiger Nation’ will finally fall, and what other entities will crumble with him.