Tennessee State Students Campaign to Keep President

Photo credit: The Meter Students were greeted by this flier and other handouts at a forum on keeping President James Hefner.

The Student Government Association at Tennessee State University is trying to help President James Hefner keep his job.

It is distributing "save Hefner" buttons, providing informative handouts and soliciting signatures for a petition in Hefner’s support. It has also hosted a forum.

Hefner, 63, announced in May that he would retire in May 2005 after two critical state audits, the second of which said he improperly accepted Super Bowl tickets from a Tennessee State vendor and then lied to auditors about it. However, the top prosecutor in Davidson County, Tenn., later concluded that Hefner had broken no laws.

Since the retirement announcement, the Tennessee State SGA began an effort to save Hefner, who has been at the university since 1991.

“We think that it is very important for the chancellor and the Tennessee Board of Regents to understand how highly we think of our president,” SGA President Chauncey Davis said. “He has done so much for our university and we do not want him to go.”

The SGA used $800 of its $19,000 programming budget to purchase 2,000 "save Hefner" buttons, which they began dispersing to students and alumni during homecoming week.

“The purpose for the 'save Hefner' buttons is to educate and heighten the awareness within our student body,” Davis said.

A “save Hefner” forum, held in the student center Nov. 10, presented a panel that included local Tennessee State alumni. Carolyn Baldwin-Tucker, Raymond Richardson, Kwame Lillard and Sherman Tribble gave students details about the university audits and Hefner’s retirement, expressed their feelings about the university and encouraged others to take a stand in Hefner’s support.

“We have the power and it is time to use it,” SGA vice president Rodriguez Johnson said. “I stand here unafraid because I know what Hefner means to the university.”

Some members of the Tennessee State community and student body consider Hefner’s retirement similar to those of former presidents William Jasper Hale, Walter S. Davis and Frederick S. Humphries.

Alumnus Ray Richardson, a plaintiff in the case leading to the Geier consent decree requiring desegregation of Tennessee's public universities, said the Board of Regents was practicing the same maltreatment and disrespect it did in dealing with past presidents.

“I am glad that this student body has finally taken the initiative to stand up for this university,” Janet Merriweather, national Tennessee State alumni association vice president, said. “I can really appreciate that, hopefully, it will make a change this time.”

Many students who attended the forum said they appreciated the information.

“If he’s being forced to retire, then that’s wrong,” said Jerri Evans, a sophomore from Washington, D.C., who is majoring in aeronautical industrialized technology .

“Stand up for your rights,” said Vanessa Samu, a sophomore from Ann Arbor, Mich., majoring in business administration. “Now that we have them, we need to use them.”

One member of the administration is working closing with the SGA.

“We have to understand that we are experiencing institutional racism, and the root of it all is to change the face of Tennessee State,” said Dr. Inman Otey, director of the career center. “I have supported and strongly encouraged the students to vocalize their feelings and concerns."

A second presidential search committee meeting was held Nov. 11.

Kamaria Mack is a student at Tennessee State University who is campus editor of The Meter. She can be reached at [email protected].

Posted Nov. 22, 2004