Priscilla Slade
Priscilla Dean Slade was president of Texas Southern University (TSU) from October 27, 1999, until June 2006.
Education
She holds a doctor of philosophy degree in accountancy from The University of Texas at Austin, a master's degree from Jackson State University, and a bachelor's degree from Mississippi State University.
Career at TSU
Slade joined the TSU faculty in October 1991 as the chair of the accounting department. In 1992, she was named dean of the school of business and in 1999, president of the university. In 2006 she was fired as President, following an audit that found she had used more than $650,000 in university funds to cover personal expenses including personal landscaping, kitchenware, and a massive bar tab. Indicted on four felony counts, her 2007 trial ended in a hung jury. Scheduled to be retried in 2008, she accepted a plea deal on March 26, 2008, pleading "No Contest" to the charges and accepting 10 years of deferred adjudication, repayment of $127,672.18 to the school, and 400 hours of community service.
Quintin F. Wiggins, the Chief Financial Officer of the university during Dr. Slade's tenure as president, was found guilty of similar charges and sentenced to ten years in prison; he is appealing his conviction. Bruce Wilson, former Vice President for Purchasing, is awaiting trial. In March 2008 prosecutors raised the possibility of allowing both men to testify against Dr. Slade in her retrial, in return for immunity.
In December 2007 the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools placed Texas Southern University on probation.
She is now a faculty member in the College of Business at Jackson State University, in Jackson, Mississippi. -=-=-=-=--=-=-= The Below entry is from Barbara Oakley's book 'Evil Genes' About Machiavellian Personality traits and how the manifest in power structures, causing the fostering of corruption and abuse of power.
In August 2006, flamboyant Texas Southern University president Priscilla Slade, along with three board members, was indicted for "misapplication of fiduciary responsibility" in relation to millions of dollars of misspent, misused, and disappearing funds. Many of Slade's apparent accomplishments were ultimately shown to disguise a sordid reality. For example, TSU's doubling of enrollment brought a dangerous element to campus even as the tuition helped fund her flamboyant lifestyle - Slade was eventually caught illegally spending 260,000 dollars to landscape and furnish her home, 10,000 dollars for limousines, and 9000 dollars for a bed. Meanwhile, only 6 percent of TSU students graduated in four years - one of the lowest rates in the nation.
Freshman class president Justin Jordan and his friends Oliver Brown and William Hudson-the "TSU 3" - were motivated to investigate the school after the death of a student bystander who died when a firefight erupted in a campus parking lot . Their investigation uncovered rampant corruption on the TSU campus. Christiana Asquith, a reporter of Diverse Issues in Higher education, related how the TSU 3 discovered a paper trail of evidence revealing that associates of campus administrators were being paid thousands each month even when they didn't work for the university. State representatives were paid by TSU to be "guest lecturers." Two Highly publicized parking garages were built for tens of millions of dollars over budget. Administrators at many levels appeared to be stealing state funds.
Through their diligent efforts, the TSU 3 built a slam-dunk case against TSU's administration that immediately provoked indignation from the board and state authorities and resulted in the immediate firing of the indictment of the guilty parties. JK, as the instant messengers say. Just kidding. Instead, despite the increasingly squalid nature of the material the TSU 3 was uncovering, the administration responded by offering semesters abroad and other bribe-like inducements to the trio of would-be whistleblowers. When the TSU 3 brought their evidence of corruption to the university's board, board members responded with a vote of confidence for TSU's corrupt president- neatly shifting blame for the problems on lack of funding from the Republicans. When the students met with Texas state governor Rick Perry to provide evidence for criminality, the governor simply referred the matter back to the TSU board- who ignored it. The young men were harassed by campus police officers and ultimately arrested on trumped-up charges. Then, as Asquith relates: " In late Spring 2005, administrators brought the students before the Student-Faculty Disciplinary Committee on charges that included "inflicting mental harm," "insubordination, vulgar language" and "disturbing a meeting." They sy they were denied legal representation and told to write a letter to Gov. Perry saying that "everything was OK now" at TSU. One of the TSU3, William Hudson, was suspended for a year and required to take anger management classes in order to return. He was also fired from his campus job in the office enrollment management. Each of the TSU3 was forced out of his role in student government.... By the fall of 2005, the three were feeling demoralized and ready to give up. "Every time we took information to someone, we ran into a brick wall," said Jordan.
Finally, luck turned their way- a sympathetic DA took on the case and the goings-on at TSU came under legal scrutiny. The indictments came down, and Slade lost her job, after a fashion. She was a tenured professor, so she was simply moved to a teaching position. "With corruption, everyone pays, " Jordan says. "Now the faculty has to teach more classes, the students have had a tuition increase, the taxpayers- they're sick of paying more money, and people in the administration are going to jail. We are all paying somehow. " Adds Jordan: "Dr. Slade and the administration did a wonderful job of charming the board. They were mesmerized by her. People were mesmerized by her." One can easily imagine that, if the charismatic Slade had had friends in the DA's office, Jordan and his friends would have been further harassed until they had no psychic resources remaining. The lives of the TSU3 would have been derailed, and corruption at TSU could have gone unchecked for decades to come. You can buy Barbara's book: [1]
References
- "About President Slade". Office of the President, Texas Southern University. Archived from the original on 2006-02-06. Retrieved 2006-03-26.