Jonathan Canning has issued the measured and dignified statement below, expressing his great pleasure "working with VU students, faculty, and staff," as well as the "high privilege...to have been associated with the museum," etc. At the same time, he reminds Valparaiso University that removal of "a museum professional" and closing the galleries to "public access" are further suspect steps with ethical and legal implications, violations of core conditions in the Sloan Trust.
It would have been easy for Canning to go along to get along, knowing his job was in jeopardy; instead, he has maintained his integrity and upheld the ethics of his profession throughout this whole process. Despite the ways he was ill-treated by the administration from the very beginning when he was hired under misleading circumstances, leaving a very fine position to come to VU, and then purposely deceived at stages during the process of the art sale, he has behaved honorably.
Yesterday morning, my position as Director/curator of the Brauer Museum of Art was eliminated. The museum is shut for the summer. The campus community has been told "updated staffing will be determined for the fall to allow faculty/students and classes access to the collection for academic purposes." I remind the University that public access and the employment of a museum professional are core conditions under which it received the foundational Sloan gift of art and funds seventy-one years ago.
Working with VU students, faculty, and staff was all I hoped it would be; working with the collection so much more than I could have imagined after my first campus visit. The Brauer's collection is a testament to the vision and dedication of my predecessors, especially the eponymous, one-time director Richard Brauer. I consider it a high privilege, indeed, to have been associated with the museum, its collection of art, students, and dedicated supporters, and to have many of them now, including Richard, as friends.
Valpo ranked 10th in Indiana. Butler didn't make the cut! For the record, there are 60 colleges in Indiana, not including branch locations.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/best-college-indiana-see-where-145325741.html
Pal, You clearly need to take a vacation or otherwise get an attitude adjustment. Right now, if Valpo beat Notre Dame in football you claim that the refs were terrible and that they had a few key players out with injuries. So, as they said in Spamalot--
Purdue better than Notre Dame and Rose Holman? Sure dude.
Purdue better than Notre Dame and Rose Holman? Sure dude.
Despite Purdue's lackluster student services, housing, and a bunch of other things. That 91% retention rate carries their statistics.
@rezynezy Apparently, the CRC group is hidden, so only members can find the group.
Here is a link to the Chicago Tribune / Post Tribune article about cuts and restructuring.
As a follow up to a prior post, Concordia Ann Arbor has announced that next year (2024-25) will be the last year of residential in-person classes in its traditional format. They have a health sciences building about three miles north of their main campus, and they will continue those programs in person (Nursing, Rehabilitation Science, Physical Therapy, PA etc.). They will have online options for Education. All of their other academic programs will be closed.
The full detail is available here (see the Academic Update from 6/20 in particular.)
Thanks 95, sad to see the state CUAA is in, but it is a very real future for a lot of small Christian schools that don't have endowment. VU does have a sizable one, but that money wont last forever
I feel bad for Jonathan Canning and what must to him feel like bait-and-switch, but he's just one of a club at this point and nobody particularly special in this regard. Dozens/hundreds of bright people have come to Valpo in this last decade thinking it was a good career move only to have it screw up their career in a major way. At least for people like Canning there was never any notion of potential permanency in employment on the staff side, whereas that is part of the explicit recruitment pitch the faculty tenure-track/tenured side.... A lot of these bright people were just unlucky to have spent their potentially competitive years on the job market at Valpo, and they were either laid off or are now too old on the market to move.
So, I'm sorry that Jonathan Canning got suckered into this disaster of a career move for him and his family- but if Canning's hiring committee presented it to him as a stable situation where he could stretch his museum curator ideals, then it's kind of on them too for misrepresenting Valpo and pulling him into all this. He was probably told all kinds of rosy things about Valpo/Brauer by folks in the museum world or by his naively optimistic search committee. Maybe none of them saw this coming down the pipeline.
Thank you for your frank comments. As you note, a number of VU faculty, including those with tenure or tenure track, had their livelihoods abruptly withdrawn. Some that I know well (and for whom I served on their tenure committees), for years great teachers and contributors to the university community, have now sadly left academics altogether as a result.
As for the hiring committee: they were consciously kept in the dark by the administration about plans already in process to sell the major artworks that had established the great respect and stature of the museum, paintings that were also protected by the Sloan Trust. The committee members weren't naive and are angry; they were deceived. Most importantly, President Padilla hid the art sale process from Canning even in the hiring as he was presenting to him the full collection in all its glory as a selling point feature of the museum, and he further deceived Canning after he assumed his role as museum director.
As you suggest, the erosion done to the university's reputation among its faculty and the academic community at large is substantial and perhaps difficult for outsiders to fully realize. But this latest action has spread the damage even more, and more articles in the Chicago Tribune or elsewhere only exacerbate the problem. Museum directors and others in the art field across the country have publicly supported Canning, and one respected director has now encouraged him to go "scorched earth" against the university, advice Canning has not yet followed. Donors, some who have contributed very large sums in the past, are already pulling away from the university. Certainly, gifts to the museum in artworks and support funds are done now. Even a representative of the Sloan family has spoken out: "I now wish my archives were not at the university and at an institution that respects art," Jeanette Pasin Sloan.
Yeah, I agree the buck ultimately stops with the Pres/VPs/Provost when it comes to hiring and it's up to them to be transparent with all the hiring committees below. They see the whole financial picture, whereas the rest of us don't. But I still think the mid-level staff & faculty serving on the committees need to use their brains and not get played by the administration....
If you're asked to serve on a search committee, you do have the power to say, 'no, I don't believe this is right.'
I agree with your comments about departments that were subject to cuts. I experienced similar situations in mine. However, the art museum funds were deemed separate and untouchable due to established ethical restraints and the legal conditions of the Sloan Trust, which had been supported by the university and never been challenged. Additionally, since the museum was reopening after the covid period, the university was required to hire a museum director. The search committee could not say "no." As Canning points out in his recent statement: "I remind the university that public access and the employment of a museum professional are core conditions under which it received the foundational Sloan gift of art and funds." The committee did not have an option of not hiring a director.
As a more outside observer than many on the board, I can't imagine this situation helps with enrollment.
