While faculty gets the ax, MSSU administration hires half-millon dollar consulting firm

Times are tough at Missouri Southern State University and when times are tough, President Bruce Speck and his band of merry men naturally take the conservative approach to budgeting. That approach, naturally, includes elimination of programs, sending faculty packing, and making sure the lights are turned out when people go home for the evening. Along with those approaches, Speck has elected to take another one- spending half a million dollars over a four-year period for a consulting firm to find out what can be done to attract students to coming to the school. The university is reportedly entering into a deal with the nationally-respected Noel-Levitz Higher Education Consulting, at about $130,000 annually, to interview people and find out just what the university can do to convince students that Missouri Southern State University is the destination for them. Perhaps the university should reconsider this expenditure. The half-million dollars could be more wisely spent in other areas and I have a few free suggestions on what Missouri Southern can do to enhance its offerings. -Stop the dismantling of the university's International Program, one of the few that has genuinely set it apart from other Missouri institutions of higher learning. -End the process of pushing out experienced faculty and turning the job over to day laborers. A strong faculty is always a selling point at any school, whether it be K-12, college, or university. -Forget about this nonsense of "collegiality" and actually show some. If Speck had ever treated the faculty and other employees with respect, he would be enveloped in collegiality. -Stop the spaying and neutering of the university's Communications Department. This is one area which has consistently shown that it not only can place students in the workforce after they graduate, but those students have been able to rise to the top of their profession. In his quest to manage every bit of information that comes out of the university, Bruce Speck has come close to destroying The Chart, an institution which has continually brought top-notch student journalism to the forefront in Joplin. -Allocate more money into the university's free-ride scholarships for top students, the Academic Honors Program. That was an innovation that brought in many excellent students who might never have considered Missouri Southern otherwise. You wouldn't think you would half to spend a half million dollars to come up with common sense ways to bring students back to Missouri Southern. Just start running it like a university.