As a lonely adjunct, a Filipino American teaching at a state school, I am but a wee voice in higher ed. But what if I were Jack Thomas at Western Illinois University, the school’s very first Black president?
If you don’t know Jack, maybe you should. He’s living proof there are still many obstacles for people of color in higher ed. After 8 years as president, Thomas, 58, will no longer be president of Western Illinois University as of June 30. The school’s board of trustees made the announcement Friday, and then added that Thomas will be getting a nice parting gift. He’ll be put on administrative leave through June of 2021 and continue to draw his salary of $270,528.
And when that’s done, he’ll become a tenured distinguished service professor.
“At this pivotal time in our history, I believe the university would best be served by new leadership,” Thomas said in a statement where he expressed that it was a privilege to serve as president, provost and a member of the Illinois Board of Higher Education. “Despite the difficulties our state has faced with regards to the budget and loss of population, our university remains resilient. We are a world class university, and during my final days a president, I will work to ensure everything is in place for the new leadership to being the next chapter in Western’s history.”
Nice words, carefully crafted, but likely what was demanded of him before being handed a parachute, not exactly golden, but one that might actually open.
The prepared statement deftly and politically whitewashes what Thomas has had to endure during the last eight years. Low enrollments, reduced state funding, layoffs of dozens of faculty and staff and enrollment drops of nearly 40 percent last fall, didn’t make Thomas’ job easy. Certainly, more than 130 layoffs didn’t help his popularity.
But on top of all that, Thomas had to endure a heated local campaign by members of the university town of Macomb — 90 percent White with a population of 18,000. There were calls for the school to fire Thomas.
