News is exploding out of Champaign-Urbana in the last day or so as a series of admissions-related emails were just released by the University of Illinois. The state's rough and tumble political community appears to have targeted the U of I as a source of marketable influence.
As I noted early this month, the University of Illinois School of Law was pressured to admit political VIP's. Dean Heidi Hurd pushed back on the demands, though she did not - and realistically, could not - fully eliminate the role of political influence in the admissions process. The story reported earlier this month involved political pressure to admit a minimally qualified - but not otherwise admittable applicant.
State Sen. Chris Lauzen believed a student deserved admission to the University of Illinois law school in 2005, and he let the university's lobbyists know. The school's dean thought otherwise. "She won't hurt us terribly, but she certainly won't help us," then-Dean Heidi Hurd wrote to Chancellor Richard Herman. "She will almost certainly be denied admission if the process unfolds as we predict. But she can probably do the work. If you tell me we need to do this one, we will. We'll remember it though!" "Please admit," the chancellor replied. "I understand no harm."
Now it appears that the school was pressured by Gov. Blagojevich to admit unqualified applicants - in exchange for jobs provided by a political pal of the Governor.
University of Illinois Chancellor Richard Herman forced the law school to admit an unqualified applicant backed by former Gov. Rod Blagojevich while arranging for the governor's go-between to seek jobs for five law school graduates, according to new documents released Thursday by the university.
The records suggest for the first time an explicit trading of favors, the most troubling evidence yet of how Illinois' entrenched system of patronage crept into the admissions process of the state's most prestigious public university.
The relative of deep-pocketed Blagojevich campaign donor Kerry Peck appears to have been pushed by trustee Lawrence Eppley, who routinely carried admissions requests from the governor.
My favorite part of the story, however, was the deliciously snarky response of Dean Hurd.
When law school dean Heidi Hurd balked on accepting the applicant in April 2006, Herman replied that the request came "Straight from the G. My apologies. Larry has promised to work on jobs (5). What counts?"
Hurd replied: "Only very high-paying jobs in law firms that are absolutely indifferent to whether the five have passed their law school classes or the Bar."
There isn't a law school in the nation that wouldn't like to snare those jobs!
There is only one way for a state school to respond to political pressure on admissions: never give in. If you do, the pressure will just increase. It's like other ethical problems, lost virtue can never be recaptured.
Posted by: Blackstone | June 26, 2009 at 11:14 AM
Wait a minute, Dan. Are you seriously saying you think it's okay to admit an unqualified student (one that Hurd herself said would most likely fail out and/or never pass the bar) in return for five jobs for graduates? If so, I could not disagree more. I agree with you that Heidi's response was somewhat snarky, but she was also deadly serious, and her request was immediately followed up by an e-mail to the Governor's office directly asking for five jobs in government for U. of Illinois law graduates who hadn't passed the bar. You think that's okay?
Posted by: Kevin Jones | June 26, 2009 at 07:40 PM
Kevin: Hardly!
Posted by: Dan Filler | June 27, 2009 at 08:50 AM
Dan--thanks for this. This and the other recent story from Illinois (the DePaul dean firing) reminds me why tenure is important. Without it, governors and probably state legislators, too would be demanding that faculty be fired--and probably getting their demands met, too. Please keep both of these examples in mind the next time someone says tenure's not necessary.
Posted by: Alfred | June 29, 2009 at 10:41 AM