The University of Saskatchewan board of governors announced Wednesday that Ilene Busch-Vishniac had been stripped of her title of president and vice-chancellor effective immediately.
The board said in a news release the ongoing “reputational crisis” led it to determine that rebuilding the university's fractured reputation would be easier with new leadership.
Susan Milburn, board chairwoman, said a number of factors went into the decision but that fallout over the recent firing of a tenured professor didn't help.
"The reputation of the university was tarnished during that period of time," Milburn said.
Busch-Vishniac’s termination was without cause and she is still eligible to work as a faculty member in the university’s college of engineering.
Her contract states the board of governors can terminate her presidency at any time without cause, and she’s entitled to return to her faculty position and take one of two severance options. The first financial choice would be 18 months of her base salary minus that of her faculty position. The other option would be to simply take the base salary remaining on her contract that was never fulfilled.
Former Saskatchewan Lieutenant-Governor Gordon Barnhart has been named acting president of the university, effective Thursday. He said he won't be wasting any time getting down to work.
"The first order of business will be to be meeting with all senior administration and obviously with the board and get briefed on where things are at," Barnhart said.
Max Fineday, president of the University of Saskatchewan Students' Union, said in a statement to CTV Saskatoon that the board’s decision to fire Busch-Vishniac is indicative of what the USSU has been saying for a year.
“Senior leadership at the university wasn’t meaningfully engaging students, or the rest of the campus community in TransformUS,” Fineday said, adding he’ll be meeting with acting president Barnhart as soon as possible to discuss what the “concerns and expectations are of students going forward.”
The controversy began last week when Robert Buckingham was fired from his position as head of the School of Public Health and stripped of his tenure. The professor had publicly criticized the TransfromUS budget-cutting program.
Busch-Vishniac admitted shortly after Buckingham's firing that the university "made a blunder."
Buckingham was offered back -- and accepted -- his tenure position, but Busch-Vishniac said he would not be reinstated as executive director of the School of Public Health. She said leadership at the university is expected to align behind the decisions of the administration.
Hundreds of angry students, staff and alumni staged a noisy protest Tuesday demanding Busch-Vishniac resign and complaining there wasn't enough consultaiton on the TransformIUS budget cuts.
In its release Wednesday, the board of governors addressed the root of the controversy.
“The board would also like to state in the strongest possible terms, that the University of Saskatchewan is committed to the principles of academic freedom and freedom of expression. It would also like to stress that it believes that tenure is a sacrosanct principle within this university,” the release said.
No details have been released about the search for permanent replacements for Busch-Vishniac or her former colleague, Brett Fairbairn, who resigned from his post as university provost on Monday.
Busch-Vishniac's firing led to a flurry of activity on social media. See below for a collection of tweets and reactions from the University of Saskatchewan and Saskatoon community.
