Rising furor over the controversial demotion of a University of Wyoming engineering dean has brought the state’s only public four-year university to a tipping point.
Academic leaders, donors and others decried the demotion as emblematic of a culture of top-down and inscrutable decision making by the UW Board of Trustees and President Ed Seidel.
Twelve college deans signed a letter expressing “deep concern for the trajectory” of the university — citing the dean’s demotion and mounting pressures on academic freedom.
And on Monday, the faculty senate overwhelmingly delivered a vote of no confidence in Seidel, the first such vote in recent memory.
The outrage appeared strong enough to threaten Seidel’s leadership. Professors and deans expressed hope for lasting change to leadership that, according to the faculty senate, has driven the departure of talented academics and made replacing them difficult — ultimately threatening the learning experience for students.
The gravity of the moment was not lost on Seidel, he told the trustees Tuesday morning, reading from a written statement before they entered a closed-door meeting without him.
“How we handle this pivotal moment is important for the future of the institution,” Seidel said, “which is clearly facing a crisis.”
After an hour and a half behind closed doors, the board reemerged and issued its response. They will form a committee to study the issue.
The committee will include two trustees, and most likely one faculty member, one staff member, one student government member, Seidel and the provost, board chairman Kermit Brown said. “That committee will be charged with working on communications and working on ideas to more fully engage shared governance in the university,” he said.
Neither a timeline nor the new committee’s authority were discussed. The trustees are also crafting a “formal statement,” Brown said, “with regard to the current state of affairs and the work of the [new] committee.” That press release will be vetted by the university’s legal department before its release, trustees said.
The trustees had not published the statement by 6 p.m. Tuesday.
The trustees did not raise the prospect of imposing consequences on Seidel for losing the faculty’s trust. His current contract extends through the summer of 2026. Nor did the trustees address the underlying issues that sparked furor following Dean Cameron Wright’s demotion — most notably the allegations lobbed across campus that it was a retaliation for Wright’s opposition to funds being shifted from his budget to that of Seidel’s romantic partner, who heads UW’s new School of Computing.
Faculty senate members considered their vote a risky endeavor. Though many of them are tenured professors, they conducted yesterday’s meeting mostly in a closed session so that senators could feel safe speaking against university leadership. Once the meeting opened to the public, votes on the no-confidence resolution were issued by hand-written paper ballots to avoid any hand raising or spoken votes.
“You are justified in fearing retribution from this administration,” Bob Sprague, a former chair of the faculty senate, wrote in a letter to the body ahead of its Monday vote. But he also urged senators to “speak truth to power and send a clear message to the entire University community that this administration’s conduct is not acceptable.”
The faculty senate ultimately voted 43 to 11 to back a resolution that declared Seidel’s leadership “unacceptable,” though it did not call for him to be removed. Instead, in a final paragraph — referenced by Brown when he announced the new committee — it called for the administration and campus to work together to “reestablish an atmosphere of mutual respect, to rebuild trust and a willingness to work together.”
On Tuesday, faculty members returned to a campus Seidel will remain in charge of for the foreseeable future. During a campus town hall the president hosted yesterday, Seidel rejected any suggestions he would retaliate.
“I am absolutely against any form of retaliatory action,” he said at that event, according to a report in Oil City News. “I’ve been very, very clear about that. And I do not want to ever have any kind of a retaliation against someone for speaking their mind.”
After days of impassioned statements and letters from his critics, Tuesday appeared relatively quiet following the morning board meeting. Ray Fertig, the faculty senate president, did not respond to WyoFile voicemails requesting comment.
Two outspoken former faculty members, and Democratic Laramie lawmaker Karlee Provenza — who has criticized Seidel’s advocacy for the School of Computing and his conciliatory approach to the Legislature’s efforts to meddle with campus — told WyoFile the trustees’ response fell flat.
“They don’t have a really genuine, authentic response to anything is what it feels like,” Provenza said. She hoped faculty and deans would continue to push for change if they wanted something beyond the new committee, she said.
“One choice is ‘aw shucks, I didn’t get what I wanted, I don’t have any power in this situation,’” Provenza said. “But I think the other option is we have to build our power. There are more levers of power for faculty, for deans, and I encourage them to exercise those rights.”
Sprague and former president of the faculty senate, now-retired veterinary professor Donal O’Toole both noted that the committee, as Brown described it, appeared stacked toward the administration and the trustees, with just two faculty representatives and one student on a seven-person body.
“They will put forward probably some very watered down recommendations that ultimately will be ignored,” Sprague said. Ultimately, he feared the episode will lead to “no substantial improvement to the situation on campus,” and the trustees, he said, will “rationalize [faculty] unhappiness in various ways.”
O’Toole agreed that the trustees had opted for a tepid, middle-of-the-road path. “Seidel is a known quantity,” he said, “and [in the wake of criticism] he’s certainly saying all the right things.”
Beginning last week, when the faculty senate leadership expressed dismay in his leadership ahead of the full body’s vote, Seidel has been conciliatory and said he has learned from the uproar. In several statements and in yesterday’s town hall, he promised to renew his commitment to the university’s model of “shared governance,” which, notably, calls for faculty input on the removal of academic officers.
Faculty members say that part of the university’s governing code was firmly ignored when the board demoted Wright. The board demoted Wright even though every department head in his college — with the exception of school of computing head Gabrielle Allen, Seidel’s partner — called on them not to.
Coming back from a no-confidence resolution to a place where the campus is working well together will be very hard to do, O’Toole said.
“On the one hand, I think the faculty senate executive committee thought this had to be done,” he said. “On the other hand, they realized that in the short and medium term it’s going to make dealing with Seidel’s administration pretty frosty … The feeling is ‘we’ve sent the message, let’s hope for the best.’”
I have been a trustee of a college, and can affirm that two of the most common mistakes of college governance are on display here.
First, the role of trustees is to ensure public accountability to the owners of the institution — the public. I was an elected trustee and so the public could have unelected me if I had failed in my duty; but these appointed trustees are no less responsible for public accountability than I was. Trustees should treat a president as their employee. The relationship that often develops, though, is the inverse of this. The president figures out how to become the boss of the trustees. This is understandable because college presidents usually have large egos that bristle at being a mere employee. The trustees must resist the inversion of roles, however, and do so without micromanaging the school. It is a fine line to walk. Yet, once trustees allow the inversion to rule, they become de facto employees and do no one any good.
Second, there appear to be trustees with pet projects connected to the university. This too should be avoided as it will conflict with the independence needed to provide hard-nosed accountability.
Finally, I became a trustee when my campus was facing a leadership crisis almost exactly like this one, and resulting principally from items one and two above. I would be happy to provide some advice to the parties involved. here, but I doubt anyone would welcome my input or even listen to advice.
UW; best of luck to you.
Kevin Kilty
Laramie
This entire debacle has just highlighted the anti academic changes that have been enacted at UW. Interference by the Board of Trustees can be likened to helicopter parents who try to oversee every aspect of their student’s life, never letting them mature.
Seidel is toast. No president can survive a vote of no confidence from the faculty like this, regardless of what the board of trustees might think. Their silly committee idea is a joke, stacked as it is with Seidel defenders and sycophants. Nobody is going to take their deliberations or conclusions seriously. The more important question is who can possibly succeed Seidel. The presidential musical chairs that the board of trustees has engineered over the past 15 years has made this post perhaps the least desirable position of academic leadership in the country. What kind of glutton for punishment would throw him (or her) self into this toxic meat grinder?
I believe UW President Ed Seidel represents Wyoming Values that the majority of the state of Wyoming residents believe in. As the president of the University of Wyoming it his duty to improve the University. Some may disagree, but it his responsibility to move the university in what he believes is best for the university. I am sure he looks at all options and consults others before he make a decision.
UW has prospered under President Seidel’s leadership. I believe it disingenuous to bring into the conversation Presidents Seidel’s personal life. To me this is a personal attack on President Seidel. It angers me that some would stoop so low. Let the man do his job.
he wanted his girlfriend to receive money from another department. he brought his own personal life into the conversation. quit trying to spin
I take it you have reviewed all the actions of the Trustees and the direction they have given the President and know conclusively that the decision to shift the funding to a different program was based solely on a personal relationship. Certainly, the accusations would be based on hearsay or internet chatter.
Well said if you’re a BoT member. The rest of us don’t see it this way.
There’s an old country saying, “don’t poop where you eat.” Keep church and state separate, so to speak. The issue isn’t bad manners bringing up Seidel’s personal life, it’s Siedel bringing his personal life into work.
Gabrielle Allen, a professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, is Seidel’s romantic partner and the director of the School of Computing at the University of Wyoming. She has been the director of the School of Computing since 2022 and is Seidel’s romantic partner. The relationship became a point of controversy after the dismissal of Cameron Wright, the dean of the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, who objected to the transfer of $500,000 in state funding to the School of Computing led by Allen. Exactly nobody cared Seidel and Allen were mixing it up, until they gave the impression of the personal relationship influencing university funding and firing the Dean of a college. Seidel pooped where UW eats. Bad Seidel. Bad.
Unfortunately Wyoming values may not be what students in higher education need. Academic values, worldly values, open minds, and academic freedom is what a University education is all about. Wyoming values (what ever that means) might be viewed as indoctrination into an ideal that is counterproductive in the real world of 8 Billion people that occupy our planet. That world is where these people must work and compete.
Posting a quote from the Chronical of Higher Education that came out this morning: “After moving to a closed executive session, the board announced that it was forming a committee that will likely be composed of two trustees, a faculty member, a Staff Senate member, a dean, the provost, and the president to bolster principles of shared governance on the campus.”
One of the main goals of the No Confidence Resolution passed by Faculty Senate was to open lines of communication between administration, faculty, and the Board. So the announcement of a committee to investigate principles of shared governance at UW is a welcome and promising start.
However, the composition of the committee is curiously top-heavy for a discussion on shared governance, especially since Upper Admin and the BoT seem to be less familiar with the philosophy and processes related to shared governance as described in Uni-Reg 1-4 :
Board Members: 2
Upper Administration (President, Provost, Dean): 3
Faculty: 1
Staff: 1
Here are some questions:
Why the 5:1 ratio of Board members and Upper Admin to faculty? This is quite the power imbalance and considering that faculty brought the vote of no confidence based on a deficit of shared governance at the University, more input from faculty would align with the stated goals of addressing faculty concerns.
Who will select the faculty member? Will Faculty Senate be asked to select the faculty member(s) for this committee? Or will the administration pick?
WY’s only 4-year institution is collapsing into a flaccid arm of rightwing stupidity. Columbia went way too far Left, while UW goes way too far alt-right. The WY HS cum laude kids are applying elsewhere. The same people crowing about how WY’s young talent flees the state as soon as they can afford the bus ticket are also actively destroying our communities. The next generation cannot afford to live here, and doesn’t want to if they could. Stumbling around with an orange smudge on your lips is not good for recruiting, Seidel. Seidel needs to pack Gordon, Harriet, Loomis, Barrasso and the rest of the syncopates into a Tesla, and get the heck out of WY. You’re less value to this state than brucellosis.
Couldn’t agree more.
Oh yea, creating another “committee” will fix things…right. This current B of T obvious does not have a firm grip on the U. Meanwhile, Seidel continues to traipse around with his “romantic partner”. Thought you were going to fix things, Trustee Brad Bonner………….
I’m sorry, you all on the BoT have had numerous times over the last 10 years to try and regain everyone’s trust and respect as well as to be transparent. You failed miserably. Please don’t waste everyone’s time with some BS committee that will fail to achieve anything. No one will respect or trust whomever is on this committee, just stick to what you do best by keeping us all in the dark and making decisions unilaterally. Sadly, it’s what we have all gotten used to and expect.
What a uniquely condescending and dismissive response by a board most guided by saving face and protecting ego.