Faculty-led University Senate delivers vote of no confidence on Purdue provost
Vote follows a semester of questions about Provost Patrick Wolfe’s handling of hiring, lack of communication and heavy-handed decisions. President Chiang calls vote ‘misinformed,’ backs Wolfe.
Purdue Provost Patrick Wolfe – targeted earlier this year by a group of faculty members for a laundry list of accusations about “unilateral decision-making” and heavy-handed treatment in hiring, admissions and campus policies – was given a vote of no confidence in his leadership by the faculty-led University Senate.
After more than two hours of debate Monday afternoon – and a procedure marked by faculty members wary about individual votes being made public, for fear of retribution – 74% of University Senate members voted for the no-confidence measure for Wolfe, Purdue’s top academic officer.
Wolfe, who was in on the Senate meeting held over Zoom, didn’t comment after the vote. And he didn’t make a case, one way or another, in his defense during the meeting.
But Monday afternoon, Purdue President Mung Chiang and Gary Lehman, chair of the Purdue Trustees, stood with Wolfe.
“While a resolution lacking in authority, misinformed in content, and, as stated by Senate leaders today, flawed in procedural validity warrants no response, the university reaffirms the support that Provost Wolfe will continue as provost,” Chiang and Lehman said in a statement released by the university.
The vote came after several University Senate members warned that the process was moving too quickly and others looked to delay action. Mark Zimpfer, this year’s University Senate chair, told members he had “grave concerns that we’ve actually done our due diligence.” Others warned that the body was risking credibility by moving quickly on a measure that had to clear a two-thirds majority just to have the vote.
But Howard Zelaznik, one of two University Senate members listed as sponsors of the measure, said the time had come to address what many on Purdue’s faculty understood was a problem.
