Editorial: Lou Anna Simon must resign as Michigan State president

Lou Anna Simon is no longer the right person to lead Michigan State University.

While Simon’s 12-year tenure has been marked by numerous accomplishments, there is one stark and significant failure that now overpowers all else: MSU’s inability to keep women safe from sexual assault and harassment on campus.

That failure belongs to Simon and her team. The time has come to hold her accountable.

Fired MSU physician Larry Nassar – accused of assaulting more than 125 girls or women who have made complaints to police – has dominated recent headlines with his guilty pleas, but this is a problem deeper and more persistent than one man who is unquestionably a monster.

Viewpoints:
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The year since Nassar was fired by MSU has been filled with other headlines of concern. Four football players were charged with sexual assault. Journalists revealed that a former football player was expelled from a graduate studies program in 2016 and banned from campus after being accused of assaulting a student. That woman sued MSU this month.

Still more headlines chronicled other women and men who have sued over flaws in MSU’s Title IX process for investigating complaints of sexual assault, harassment and relationship violence. Those cases include instances where punishment meted out by a disciplinary board has been overturned by one of Simon’s vice presidents and others where the accused complain of lack of due process.

And this all follows a 2015 finding by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights that MSU’s handling of Title IX complaints created a “sexually hostile environment.” Specifically, that report – written after review of MSU’s handling of 150 complaints received from 2009 to 2014 – stated:

“The university’s failure to address complaints of sexual harassment, including sexual violence, in a prompt and equitable manner caused and may have contributed to a continuation of this sexually hostile environment.”

When that report was released in September 2015, Simon told journalists: “We’re on board with the national conversation that one sexual assault is too many.”

Fast forward to April 2017, when Simon told her Board of Trustees: “I have been told it is virtually impossible to stop a determined sexual predator and pedophile, that they will go to incomprehensible lengths to keep what they do in the shadows.”

That comment – whether viewed as tone deaf or as a deliberate effort to distance the university from accountability – was incredibly inappropriate and set off a firestorm of reaction. Sexual assault victims launched an internet petition chastising Simon. The Washington Post’s editorial board paused from national politics long enough to make note of Simon’s comment and opine: “But Dr. Nassar was not in the shadows. He and his behavior were on full display, for years, waiting for administrators to take action. They chose not to listen, and they chose not to see.”

LSJ’s editorial board earlier this year called upon MSU to spend less effort managing the appearance of these events and more on taking transparent steps to change campus culture.

LSJ Editorials:

• MSU must work harder to change culture (June 2017)
• Title IX process should be top priority for MSU officials (April 2017)
• One sexual assault is one too many at MSU (December 2016)

To date, MSU’s most visible response to all of this has been to lawyer up. There are no less than five law firms engaged in providing various assistance to the university’s in-house counsel. As of last week, LSJ’s monitoring of legal billings showed well over $5 million has been spent.

And while MSU officials and loyal Spartans resist comparisons to Penn State’s Jerry Sandusky scandal, one point worth potential comparison is the costs.

Sandusky, to refresh memories, was a retired assistant football coach who had access to campus facilities and was observed sexually abusing a young boy in an athletic department shower. The incident was reported to university officials, including then-president Graham Spanier, who agreed to bar Sandusky from campus facilities without contacting law enforcement or child welfare authorities.

After Sandusky’s eventual conviction, Penn State paid $93 million to more than 30 victims of the serial pedophile. Its total costs – including legal bills and fines – reached a quarter billion dollars.

Earlier this month, university spokesman Jason Cody disclosed that the FBI and MSU Police did a joint investigation into “whether any university employee other than Nassar engaged in criminal conduct.” The results went to the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Michigan and Cody said the university has “no reason to believe any criminal conduct was found.”

That may be intended to provide a sense of relief but, to date, Simon and the trustees have been publicly silent on details of what Simon knew and when. Regrettably, this is a case where not knowing until too late is as much a problem as knowing and doing nothing.

Related:AG Schuette wants to know what MSU officials knew about Nassar, seeks details of internal review

More than 140 women and girls have filed federal lawsuits against Nassar, with the university as a defendant in many of those cases. It seems reasonable to wonder whether Nassar’s actions may cost MSU an amount comparable to Penn State, if not more.

Some 70% of MSU’s $1.3 billion general fund revenue comes from tuition dollars, with about 20% from state tax dollars and the rest from “other sources.” How will students, donors and taxpayers react if a quarter billion or more provided for education is instead funneled into compensating sexual assault victims and paying related expenses? How will the 552,000 Spartan alumni react?

In evaluating Simon’s future, the trustees will consider the breadth and importance of her achievements:

• The Facility for Rare Isotope Beams, a $730 million U.S. Department of Energy project under construction on campus, is a cutting-edge international research facility that should bring a new sector of scientific industry to the region.
• The expansion of medical education in Grand Rapids, public health initiatives in Flint and work with “research corridor” partners Wayne State and the University of Michigan have pushed MSU’s economic impact across the state.
• Enrollment is above 50,000. Research funding in 2015-16 exceeded half a billion dollars. MSU’s Empower Extraordinary fundraising campaign reached its $1.5 billion milestone early.

Nearly three years ago, as Simon marked her 10th year as president, an LSJ article chronicled the progress under her tenure. Some compared Simon to John Hannah, the much revered and longest-serving MSU president who directed the transformation from an agricultural college into a respected research university.

Leadership requires bold vision for the future and relentless drive to succeed. No one can fault Simon for her vision or her drive, which have helped the university push into new frontiers of economic development and global engagement.

Yet leadership cannot be entirely forward focused. It also requires an astute sense of the present – situational awareness, if you will – and the ability to react appropriately to threats that endanger the organization and the people who support and depend upon it.

By failing to fully understand the threats posed by the escalating Nassar crisis and the long-term shortcomings of MSU’s Title IX efforts, Simon has demonstrated an acute lack of leadership in the present.

That failure already has cost MSU too much in dollars and reputation.

There have been some efforts to react in the wake of Nassar’s exposure, but those actions did not go far enough.

Nassar was fired in September 2016 only after victims began contacting journalists, who exposed the scope of his misdeeds. To date, two lower-level MSU employees have left their jobs over conduct related to Nassar. Gymnastics coach Kathy Klages chose to retire a day after being suspended for her handling of a team meeting to discuss Nassar. Physician Brooke Lemmen, a colleague of Nassar's, was allowed to resign after being told the College of Osteopathic Medicine was considering her termination for removing patient records from a university office at Nassar’s request. What about their supervisors?

Nassar had a contract that let him work for outside organizations without university supervision. After Nassar was cleared by a Title IX investigation in 2014, he was ordered to follow specific procedures to avoid future problems, but there was no follow up to check his compliance. This raises questions about the leadership of the College of Osteopathic Medicine.

Court filings show that youth and student-athletes interacting with Nassar brought concerns to Klages and other university athletic trainers multiple times, going back as far as 1997. The response was to reassure these girls and young women that they were getting care from a premier physician. That nobody felt compelled to seek investigation on their behalf raises concern about the leadership of athletic programs.

At a certain point, the accumulated weight of these problems rests directly on the shoulders of the person at the top: Simon.

Nassar has pleaded guilty to 10 counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct. He said in Ingham County court earlier this month that one reason he agreed to do so was to allow healing to begin for victims and the community.

That healing won’t be complete with Simon as MSU’s president. It’s time for her to resign.

Failing that, MSU’s Board of Trustees should fire her.

With the magnitude of problems facing MSU, the board must exercise care in its interim leadership solution. None of Simon’s leadership team should be placed in charge during the presidential search, which could stretch over months.

There are alternatives.

One is to take a page from MSU’s history, going back to 1969 when economics professor Walter Adams served nine months as president after John Hannah left MSU, then returned to his professorship. His short tenure came at a critical time of social unrest across the nation and on the campus – a time of rapid cultural change. Adams fulfilled his presidential duties with gravitas and grace.

Absent a 21st century Adams, MSU’s trustees could turn to a distinguished alumnus with experience in high-level executive leadership, or perhaps bring in a recently retired president from another major research university. Such a temporary steward should steady the team while trustees conduct their search.

Lou Anna Simon has served MSU to the best of her considerable ability, but that does not include the skill needed to shepherd Spartan Nation through its sadness and anger, fix what’s broken and restore faith. Those challenges belong to an interim leader and a new president.

For MSU to move forward, the Simon chapter must end.

– an LSJ editorial

Have an opinion to share? Email your 175-word letter to the editor to opinions@lsj.com. To contact the LSJ Editorial Board, email Engagement Editor Matt Hund (mhund@lsj.com) or Executive Editor Stephanie Angel (sangel@lsj.com).