An outspoken tenured professor of English at Cleveland State University whose discrimination lawsuit against the Ohio school is scheduled for a November trial has been served a termination letter only weeks before classes start, according to documents obtained exclusively by Diverse: Issues in Higher Education.
Associate Professor Nuala M. Archer, an internationally distinguished poet who joined CSU’s English Department in 1990 after teaching at Yale University, was notified in a July 22, 2011, letter signed by Provost Geoffery S. Mearns that her dismissal was “because of a pattern of conduct that violated” the collective bargaining agreement between the university and the CSU chapter of the American Association of University Professors, “as well as the basic tenets of professionalism and collegiality.”
But Archer, in court documents, maintains that the attempted firing—which she is contesting through the union’s grievance process and before Ohio’s State Board of Personnel Review—is yet another wrinkle in a long and concerted effort to destroy and eliminate a vocal critic of alleged discrimination in CSU’s Department of English.
In her appeal to the board, filed on August 1, Archer alleges retaliatory discipline and asserts whistleblower protection.
In the lawsuit, which she filed last year with Attorney Eric Hall, Archer, who is 56 and White, accuses CSU of age, gender and handicap discrimination, as well as retaliation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The complaint charged that CSU “has given disparate treatment to substantially younger employees and male employees” and that Archer “has repeatedly been wrongfully denied promotion.”
CSU has denied the allegations in court filings. CSU General Counsel Sonali Wilson and Mearns declined comment.
Amos Jones, a Washington, D.C.-based constitutional scholar whom Archer retained in late July as appellate counsel in anticipation of complex litigation, says that the conduct of CSU toward Archer is alarming, especially the timing of the letter of dismissal.
