Listen to our full interview with Dr. Amir Mohammadi below:
A former Slippery Rock University cabinet member is speaking out after having his position eliminated earlier this year.
Our newsroom spoke with former Senior Vice President of Administration, Global Engagement, and Economic Development Dr. Amir Mohammadi, who made multiple accusations against the university and President Dr. Bill Behre.
ENGINEERING ALLEGATIONS
Among the accusations include Behre signing off on an engineering program, despite Mohammadi’s objection that it would lose money. Mohammadi says the two engineering programs, mechanical and civil engineering, initially started as a concept under former interim President Dr. Philip Way. He asked Mohammadi to explore the financial impact on it. He says research found that it would cost the university anywhere from $50 to $100 million to start the program, offer the latest technology, and sustain the programs.
Mohammadi alleges that an initial report went to the council of trustees with false numbers.
“I noticed that they provided data that said within four years, the program would bring in $3 million for the two new engineering programs,” Mohammadi said. “I said there is no way this is true, and I will never sign it.”
When new President Dr. Bill Behre took over, Mohammadi says Behre wanted to move the engineering programs.
“When I questioned him, I asked ‘Do you realize by signing this the university is going to be in a lot of financial difficulty,'” Mohammadi said. “This is going to involve retrenchment in a lot of positions, and union employees are going to have to be let go in order to sustain this.”
Mohammadi said Behre moved the programs forward without reading a detailed financial impact.
“[Behre] told me ‘I have to go to ASCUE [Association Supporting Computers Users in Higher Education]. I don’t have the time to read it. I will sign it now and after I come back I will read it.’ Mohammadi said of a meeting he had with Behre. “I knew right then and there we were in trouble.”
Mohammadi contends the program has lost at least $1 million so far.
SCHOLARSHIP ALLEGATIONS
Mohammadi also says the university is offering scholarships to students that are unsustainable and depleting the college’s scholarship fund.
“The students are being bought by high scholarships to put into low enrollment classes,” Mohammadi said.
He says at the beginning of Behre’s tenure, the scholarship fund was an estimated $6.8 million. Now, Mohammadi says that number next year will drop to $3.2 million.
“The university had a level of a scholarship that was close to $7 million. Are you really going to cut 33 percent where the students won’t have any new scholarships, or current students will have scholarships cut? This is asinine,” Mohammadi said.
ALLEGATIONS OF POLITICAL BIAS
One of Mohammadi’s roles at the university included economic development. He said that included seeking private donations along with state grants and other public funding sources.
He says that one of his initiatives was to create a think tank at the university that would identify projects and funding mechanisms.
Mohammadi said the group included business owners and politicians. However, a couple of meeting with the group, Mohammadi alleges that Behre made a specific recommendation of the group.
“Dr. Behre after a couple of meetings told me ‘I want to make sure we don’t have anymore Republicans in the room with me,'” Mohammadi said. “I was flabbergasted.”
Mohammadi says others could attest to that statement. However, our newsroom has not been able to confirm that report.
Mohammadi said he reported all of his allegations to Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education. PASSHE says they have conducted an investigation and found no wrongdoing, however, that report was not made public.
“Look at the [Comprehensive Planning Process]. These started two years ago, and most of the universities that projected their CPPs on their enrollment numbers and financials are not meeting those goals they set two years ago. Everyone is kicking the can down the road,” Mohammadi said.
BEHRE’S RESPONSE
Through an email, Slippery Rock University President Dr. Bill Behre said that he couldn’t comment specifically on claims since Dr. Mohammadi “has filed administrative legal claims against the University, and we do not comment on ongoing litigation.”
He also added the following:
“SRU’s financial footing continues to be sound now and into the future. University reserves have risen in the past four years. This summer, the governor and legislature added substantially to the base funding for higher education in the Commonwealth. Additionally, as a result of this appropriation increase and the PASSHE Board of Governors new allocation formula, SRU has received about $9.7 million more in its base allocation this year than it did last year.
Enrollments for the fall have rebounded substantially from the pandemic lows but have yet to reach pre-pandemic levels. This year’s first- year class looks as if it will be just shy of 1,500 students. Pre-pandemic, we could have easily predicted about 1,550. However, we are happy to report that our retention rates have risen to 83.2 percent, up from 81.9 percent. Much of this gain has been realized by an improvement in the retention of students from historically underrepresented groups, up to 75.9 percent from 71.1 percent in the previous year.
We are committed to the success of our engineering program and continually evaluate options to provide our students with the best possible education and experience with the budget we have available as we do with all of our academic programs.”
This is not the first clash Mohammadi has had with the university however. In 2018, he filed a federal lawsuit that he was racially discriminated against as part of their presidential search. He says that he and the university settled the matter. However, he alleges the university violated that agreement saying that the university was supposed to create a $100,000 scholarship in his name, but that never happened.
