New Alabama State University President Gwendolyn Boyd has had her troubles with the university’s board of trustees but she appears to have the university’s faculty in her corner.
A former trustee of Alabama State University, Donald Watkins stated that he believes President Boyd has an “unholy alliance” with “Tea Party Republican Governor Robert Bentley” and “treats ASU trustees as political outcasts.”
But when President Boyd recently gave her first formal address to the university’s faculty at the annual Fall Faculty Institute, she received a very warm welcome. In her address, President Boyd referred to the controversy surrounding the board of trustees by saying that “the good news is that all of those experiences have allowed us to begin the process of the transformation of Alabama State University. In spite of everything we have been through, we see one point of consistency, and that is the quality of the Academy here at Alabama State University.”
President Boyd was greeted by loud applause and a standing ovation after telling the faculty: “You are helping our students stay focused on their dreams and aspirations as others would take them off course and have them distracted by other messages. You are the ones who help our students understand the tremendous potential that lies in each of them, and you pull out of them what they don’t even realize is resonant in their minds and spirits. We will not allow anybody to tear us apart, or come between us or try to keep us distracted from our mission and that is educating these fine young people who have made a choice to come here.”
On the right track — keep forging ahead. Stay focused on the real goal – academic excellence and ignore the naysayers — be glad they are out of the way and can no longer wreak havoc on ASU.