SIU ousts Carbondale chancellor

By JIM SUHR

The Associated Press

CARBONDALE, Ill. -- Dogged by allegations of plagiarism and "intellectual dishonesty," Southern Illinois University's chancellor will be replaced with an interim chief of the 20,000-student Carbondale campus, the university system's president announced Wednesday.

University president Glenn Poshard tapped SIU provost John Dunn to temporarily succeed Walter Wendler, who was told last year that his contract, set to expire in June of next year, would not be renewed. Dunn's appointment takes effect Nov. 15.

As a tenured full professor in architecture, Wendler will be reassigned to the school's College of Applied Sciences and Arts.

Wednesday's announcement came eight days after a Poshard-appointed panel announced that Wendler admitted "lifting" excerpts from a strategic plan for a Texas school where he worked, then used them in the Carbondale school's long-range blueprint.

Poshard said at a news conference that the panel's report had no effect his decision, saying he told Wendler of his plans nearly a month ago.

Poshard wanted to build his own team since talking the helm at SIU earlier this year and also cited drops in the school's enrollment for the past two years as factors in his decision.

"We're the only public university in the state losing students," Poshard said. "We have to turn this around."

Poshard said that Dunn would make Wendler's $229,000 salary, adding that Wendler would continue to collect that sum through the end of next June when his contract expires.

Poshard said his newly launched search for a permanent successor to Wendler would include discussing that process with key campus groups, with tentative plans to have a new chancellor in place by July 1 of next year.

Dunn, a Southern Illinois native, has served as provost and vice chancellor -- the school's second-highest administrative post -- for the past four years. Before that, he was dean of the University of Utah's College of Health and spent two decades on the faculty of Oregon State University.

Dunn "is a proven administrator who not only understands the challenges that lie ahead for us but also is personally and professionally committed to working with me and the Board of Trustees to ensure that the transition period between chancellors is one of opportunity and progress for this university," Poshard said.

Messages left Wednesday with Wendler were not immediately returned.

Poshard said then that he accepted the findings from the group he tapped in September to scrutinize similarities in Texas A&M's "Vision 2020" and the Carbondale school's "Southern at 150" -- and Wendler's ties to both.

The three-person panel comprised of members from various university departments and schools also is urging the Illinois school to review its anti-plagiarism policies.

Poshard said he would create a committee to take up the review panel's concerns and "have a dialogue across the system as to what constitutes plagiarism and intellectual dishonesty."

The panel's five-page report made no disciplinary recommendation involving Wendler, stating that "nothing in this report should be interpreted as a judgment on Chancellor Wendler's character or his dedication to the university."

But the report says Wendler "sincerely believed he was acting ethically by lifting what he considered his intellectual property." The panel also noted that in producing a document in an academic setting, the school's top administrator should have made clear that parts of SIU's strategic plan were from Texas A&M's document.

Wendler has said he doesn't agree with everything in the report and has called the assessment "a bit unfair."

A&M's plan, unveiled in 1999, aspires to make the College Station-based school among the nation's 10 best public universities by 2020. SIU's plan, "Southern at 150," aims to make the school a top 75 public university by its 150th birthday in 2019.

Wendler was Vision 2020's coordinator at Texas A&M, where he served as vice chancellor for planning and system integration before becoming head of SIU's Carbondale campus in 2001.

According to last week's report, Wendler told the panel he merely was the "architect" of both plans, of which there are no sole authors. Wendler admitted that "in hindsight, he probably should have included attribution to himself and Vision 2020 for some items that appear in both plans."

Allegations involving plagiarism at SIU also surfaced in February, when Wendler acknowledged he unintentionally left out the source of an anecdote during his "State of the University" speech last year.