Reasons vary for termination of Wichita State University vice president

A student leader at Wichita State University says that President John Bardo gave him a detailed explanation for letting a top official go – though Bardo has repeatedly told The Eagle that he can’t legally discussing his reasonings.

The official, Wade Robinson, was told in January that his appointment as Wichita State University’s vice president for student affairs would not be renewed. Robinson said that Bardo’s discussion of personnel issues was inappropriate and a violation of confidentiality.

A WSU document obtained by The Eagle also shows that candidates to fill Robinson’s position on an interim basis were told in writing earlier this year that the current office under Robinson is “hierarchical and punishment oriented.”

In a written statement Friday, Bardo said that “the legal confidentiality of personnel matters means that I can’t talk about it.”

“Everyone who has ever run a business knows that feeling of wanting to tell his or her side of the story, but not being permitted to do so,” Bardo wrote Friday, in a prepared statement sent to the newspaper.

Robinson says Bardo never told him why he was let go, but that WSU Provost Tony Vizzini offered him an entirely different set of reasons, including that “you seemed to be distracted after your mother died.”

‘Looking over their shoulders’

The student leader, Matthew Conklin, who ended his term as WSU’s student body president last month, sent a letter this week to the Kansas Board of Regents asking them to investigate Bardo’s handling of several university decisions, including student safety on campus and Robinson’s appointment not being renewed.

And Conklin, a senior majoring in history and economics who met regularly with Bardo during his time as student president, laid out in that letter a conversation he said he had, quoting Bardo at length talking about why Robinson was let go.

“Bardo gave me three reasons,” Conklin wrote the regents. Conklin quoted Bardo as saying that the student conduct process is too punitive in nature rather than educational as it should be; that student affairs had improperly allocated finances in supporting the institution’s goals; and that student affairs is “too bureaucratic in nature.”

Conklin defended Robinson as a good leader in his letter to the regents.

And he said this about Bardo: The student affairs office “is suffering because of the culture of hostility and retaliation promoted by Bardo and his circle of advisors.” Student affairs staff at WSU, Conklin said, “can’t speak up or express their concerns because they have seen what’s happened to Dr. Robinson.”

“Bardo was not surprised when I conveyed my concerns to him,” Conklin wrote the regents. “When I expressed how I’ve seen a culture develop where people are looking over their shoulders, fearful for their job, he said some should be.”

‘Culture of the executive leadership’

The Eagle requested documents from WSU last week regarding the university’s national search for an interim vice president for student affairs. The Registry for College and University Presidents, which recruits interim job candidates for universities, sent a note to job candidates about the student affairs job.

In another memo obtained by The Eagle to potential candidates, the Registry asked candidates to keep all this confidential, and then laid out details regarding the job.

“The incumbent does not ‘fit’ with the culture of the executive leadership team.”

“The current operation is too hierarchical and punishment-centered.”

That national search ended April 22 when Bardo surprised some on campus by naming Athletic Director Eric Sexton, not as an interim, but as the permanent student affairs vice president.

During that national search, according to documents received by the Eagle through an open records request, one of the job candidates, Kathleen Rice, wrote to WSU officials expressing interest in the job of interim student affairs vice president.

“I am interested in the Wichita State University position mainly because it provides the opportunity to work collaboratively with the associate vice presidents and the directors to identify, and eliminate the causes of what the Registry Announcement referred to as the ‘hierarchical and punishment-centered operation.’”

‘We need to inform WSU’

Robinson says he actually saw those documents in which his operation was called “hierarchical and punishment-centered.”

On April 22, the same day Sexton was named to replace him, he wrote an e-mail to Registry official Nikki Cormier.

“I am interested to know the number of people that this Registry Announcement was distributed to?” Robinson wrote. “I would also like to know if the content of this Registry announcement was provided by Wichita State University or if your company developed the wording listed in the bullet points that was sent to your members.”

According to the e-mail exchange obtained through an open records request, Cormier forwarded Robinson’s e-mail to Bryan Carlson, who is named on the Registry’s web site as a Registry co-founder.

Carlson wrote back to Cormier: “We should not send anything – and should not acknowledge – thanks for checking. We need to inform WSU.”

Cormier, according to the e-mail exchange, then wrote Bardo, explaining Robinson’s inquiry.

“Bryan told me to forward the message to you for awareness and let you know that I have not responded or acknowledged the email. Wade’s message can be found at the bottom of this email thread,” Cormier’s e-mail said.

This story was originally published May 9, 2015 at 7:11 AM with the headline "Reasons vary for termination of Wichita State University vice president."