Yes, UK’s now richly retired last president gassed on endlessly about how UK was on the verge of becoming a top-twenty university. How could it not soar into that empyrean? It spent most of its money on corrupt coaches and apathetic administrators. It embarrassed itself on a regular basis. It spat on the state’s most important living writer, Wendell Berry. Ain’t that how it’s done?
Actually, no. As this commenter – on an article about the newest faculty member on the university’s board of trustees – points out, Todd’s master plan trashed the school’s ranking and offered students an ever more amply paid, notoriously corrupt, sports program, coupled with angry, undercompensated faculty. Not really a recipe for a high US News and World Report outcome, though perhaps UK’s administration believes that the magazine uses sports wins in determining rankings.
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The new trustee, Irina Voro, points out that the school treats faculty like “bumpkins.” Plus she “cited a Russian proverb: ‘A fish starts to be rotten at the top.'” Plus, she said that “a friend who is a former UK auditor couldn’t decipher the UK budget that is furnished to each UK trustee.”
Well, only a bumpkin wouldn’t realize that when you’ve got a sports program like UK’s, a lot of sleights of hand are called for.