When Missouri Southern State University journalism instructor T. R. Hanrahan was named Missouri College Media Association Adviser of the Year in 2010, he was praised by Dr. Bob Berglund of Missouri Western University for his courage.In his speech, Dr. Berglund quoted Hanrahan as saying the faculty adviser position “is one of the few jobs in which the better you do your job, the more likely you are to lose it.”
Thanks to the hard work of his young reporters and the lack of support from Joplin’s daily newspaper, T. R. Hanrahan will soon join the ranks of the unemployed.
Hanrahan, who does not have tenure, was told a few days ago his services would not be required for the fall semester. Many were surprised he lasted this long. His young staff broke one story after another revealing controversy and incompetence during the three years the university has been led by President Bruce Speck.
Hanrahan never backed down from his belief that a reporter’s job is to seek the truth. Not once did he tell the young people under his charge to back off a story because it dealt with a sensitive subject. He never took the easy route. Had he done so, he might still have a job.
A few weeks ago, the Chart won MCMA’s Sweepstakes Award as the best newspaper in its division, while its editor, Brennan Stebbins, was named Journalist of the Year, for exposing the university’s hiring, without a background check, of an accounting teacher who had pleaded guilty to embezzling at least $130,000 when he worked at the William McKinley Museum in Canton, Ohio.
That was just the latest in a string of scoops that embarrassed university officials, including the following:
-A complete investigation into the hiring of Speck, who was the only person interviewed for the position.
-The back-door dealings between Speck and a Kansas City medical school president to bring a satellite school to Joplin. (The plan fell through and the medical school president has been indicted for theft.)
-One of Speck’s underlings removing all copies of the newspaper from a recruitment fair because it had stories that were critical of the university.
-Complete coverage of a faculty vote of no confidence in Speck’s administration
-Coverage of the president’s refusal to speak with members of the media, including the Chart, and a strong editorial noting how juvenile it was for the president to stay silent on important issues.
That is only a partial list. Were it not for the hard working young reporters at the Chart, the taxpayers would have remained blissfully unaware of what was going on in this area’s most prominent institution of higher learning.
For a long time, the Joplin Globe did not print anything about the controversy at MSSU. Finally, one intrepid reporter, Greg Grisolano, began mining the nuggets that had been unearthed by the Chart and delivered a series of hard-hitting stories that earned him investigative reporting awards.
Unfortunately, by the time he received those awards, Grisolano had been pulled off the beat and the critical focus on the university was abandoned by the area’s paper of record.
The reasons why were revealed in an e-mail sent from Joplin Globe Publisher Michael Beatty, formerly the publisher of the Baltimore Examiner, to Speck.
In that April 6, 2010, e-mail, Beatty said he had put a stop to Freedom of Information requests filed by Grisolano, offered to bring the newspaper’s editor to meet with Speck to give him "examples of positive stories" the Globe wanted to run about MSSU, and offered Speck advice on how to manage the news to avoid further controversy.
The university and some of its top financial supporters are major Joplin Globe advertisers.
The Globe publisher’s shirking of his responsibilities as a newspaper publisher would have remained a secret, as I am sure Beatty intended, had it not been for a Freedom of Information request filed by The Chart.
The job done by the Chart staff, under T. R. Hanrahan’s direction, has been a sterling example, not just of what student journalism should be, but what journalism should be.
With the Chart effectively neutered by university officials and the Joplin Globe publisher asking which part of the president’s anatomy he can kiss next, it may be a long while before anyone can shine a light on the darkness at Missouri Southern State University.
(Photo: Hanrahan with the award-winning 2010 Chart staff after winning big at the annual MCMA awards.)
20 comments:
A good journalist brings transparency where it is needed, and it is always needed in areas of politics and bureaucracy like MSSU.
I'm sad that Southern made the decision to get rid of an award winning advisor that provided transparency to the University.
If the Joplin Globe management had any regard for seeking the truth, the Globe would hire this person and turn him loose to seek the truth. But, Speck and the Publisher are memebers of the good ole boys and girls club, so it will not happen.
Hey Hanrahan, remember a few weeks back when I offered some constructive criticism of Stebbins in comparison to Rogers? Perhaps we know now where those egos come from. If you would have kept yours in check, perhaps you would still have a job. Good luck ... just remember, ask yourself each night before you fall asleep, I worked so hard for the university, we did all the right things for all right reasons, and where did it get me? Just remember that, where did it get you? You taught those kids well, guided them properly, educated them above the standards and what do you have to show for it? Walking papers. Think about it, think hard about it.
Funny thing. I don't remember much of Hanrahan. I don't think his ego mattered much.
And if he did all the right things for all the right reasons, then I think he is OK. It is the people that canned him for it that should answer.
Anonymous 7:20, you tell Hanrahan to think. You ought to try it some time. He had integrity and can sleep at night. The awards that he and the Chart staff received speak for themselves. The lesson of this is that if you work at MSSU, you had better toe the administration line or you risk retribution and retaliation of the most severe kind.
Close MSSU and let the students get a quality education, and a future, by attending Pittsburg State, Missouri State or University of Arkansas.
Southern should be ashamed. Simple as that.
Where is John Hacker when you need him... Rogers?
To anonymous 7:52 a.m.
Don't forget Crowder College. Look at what it has to offer.
MSSU will continue to decline as long as the chief buffoon & his board are around. The veil of secrecy is ridiculous-how many hoops can you jump through to get one real answer? The Globe has obviously been told not to print any "negative" comments about MSSU. The faculty survey this spring showed even worse (for Speck) results than before. The atmosphere is not improving. When the best you can say is "things can only get better from here", morale is practically nonexistent.
And there are still board members whose terms have expired.
let's contact the Higher Learning Committee and let them know of this egregius violation of the freedom of the press at a college they just certified
It's a sad day for journalism in the state of Missouri, and an especially sad day for Missouri Southern.
Count me as another who cannot figure out where the Globe is in all of this. They stopped being a "real" paper long ago.
I am hoping that Hanrahan's excellent reputation means that he gets a great job offer soon.
What an outrage! No sooner are HLC (the accreditation inspectors) out of here than the hammer falls. Don't kid yourself, faculty and staff, this is only the beginning. Now that His Uselessness and his BoG cronies are out from under the scrutiny of the accreditation folks, you can expect retaliation left and right.
That we should lose such an able and accomplished educator as Hanrahan is evidence of how little Bruce cares about education and how much he cares about his own ego! He's turned a fine institution into a swamp of petty vindictiveness and self-interest.
Will no one rid us of this twit?
I guess I should count myself lucky to have attended MSSU during its golden period in the late 90s, before everything that made it a great place to be was ripped away from it. TR got royally screwed on this. And if this doesn't garner wider attention and action, there is something wrong. Randy, please use your connections to try and get this story picked up by other papers, I'm sure some other MCMA schools would love to dish on how The Chart just got hosed for doing its job.
T.R. Hanrahan was and continues to be one of my favorite and best instructors I had during my three years at MSSU. SHAME on them for trying so desperately to use lies and cover-ups to make the university look good. They can try all they want, but most students from MSSU can tell you that it is not that great of a school.
The ONLY part of the school I loved were the handful of professors and instructors, like T.R., who made our education worth being there. It's not often you find a gold nugget like T.R. who not only loves to teach, but cares deeply about each and every one of his students.
"The ONLY part of the school I loved were the handful of professors and instructors, like T.R., who made our education worth being there." - Amen to that.
The joke that is our MIDS class is a facile attempt at international education. My professor needed our (google's) help to fill out the map of Germany. Completely unprepared and uninterested. That was my most expensive class that semester, too.
Now we can use our ID's to buy soda and print, but there is a minimum balance of $25. I had to fork over $25 to print 40c of homework. Now I have a card with money I can spend 10c at a time, or buy soda with. Out of curiosity, I'd like to see how well the vendors did since that change.
What % of my tuition goes to sports programs I could care less about? Would that capitol be there if that part of the school didn't generate revenue (simply like... taught)?
That said, there are a few instructors who do what they do with passion and talent. They want to educate. In my experience, they're the minority.
What MSSU needs is a good cleaning. By that I mean the admins. And the BoG and Speck. Either that, or it should be allowed to sink into one of the sinkholes around there, permanently.
Being an MSSU alum, I was planning on donating to Southern once I get out of grad school and find a job. But now... I'm not so sure.
Anonymous 7:52 AM: I graduated from MSSU with two degrees in Biology and Biochemistry, and am now attending the University of Missouri-Columbia School of Medicine, along with another MSSU alum in my class, to obtain my MD degree. My boyfriend, a MSSU International Studies alum, will be attending law school here at MU in the fall.
Don't tell me you can't get a "quality education" at Missouri Southern. There are people in my class who went to Yale and John's Hopkins for undergrad, and I am doing just as well as they are in medical school.
The people who get a sub-par education from MSSU are the ones who are not willing to work for one. I hope that a suitable, accountable, and honest president and administration could be found for this university, because I truly believe that Missouri Southern could flourish with the support of their leaders and the community.
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