COLUMBIA — Melissa Click has been fired after the UM System Board of Curators voted 4-2 to terminate her employment.
Curators David Steelman, Maurice Graham, Phillip Snowden and Donald Cupps voted during an executive session Wednesday night to fire Click. Chairwoman Pamela Henrickson and John Phillips voted against firing Click, and Henrickson released this statement Thursday afternoon:
"The board believes that Dr. Click’s conduct was not compatible with university policies and did not meet expectations for a university faculty member," Henrickson noted in the statement. She said Click's behavior demanded "serious action."
Henrickson said Click "has the right to ask the board for reconsideration."
"It would be her process, and she could submit anything she would like to convince the board to change its mind," Henrickson said.
Cause to investigate
Since November, Click, an MU assistant professor of communication, has become a crucible for debates about academic due process, First Amendment rights and protests against racism at MU.
She drew the ire of more than 100 state lawmakers and others who thought her actions disgraced MU. As a result of a Nov. 9 confrontation with MU student and independent journalist Mark Schierbecker near the Concerned Student 1950 camp on the Mel Carnahan Quadrangle, Click was charged with third-degree assault.
The Board of Curators suspended her from teaching on Jan. 27 pending an investigation conducted by the St. Louis law firm Bryan Cave. Investigators reviewed paperwork and video, and more than 20 people, including Click, were interviewed as part of their investigation.
The report made it clear that the law firm's job was to collect facts and testimony; it was not asked to offer opinions or make recommendations.
Click was given the report Feb. 12 and said in her response one week later that her actions needed to be understood within the campus climate at the time.
She wrote that the report "omits a number of crucial descriptions and events that give context to my actions" at the parade and on the quadrangle. She said she believed the board needed "a fuller picture of the environment in which I found myself."
Pressures of process
The decision to fire Click comes after the curators faced pressure from inside and outside the state to make a decision.
In early January, 117 Republican legislators wrote letters to the curators asking for Click's termination, and the House Budget Committee pushed a proposal to slash the UM System budget.
Meanwhile, incensed MU faculty insisted that the board must follow due process. They cited the process outlined in UM Collected Rules and Regulations as the appropriate venue for adjudicating charges of faculty misconduct.
In a conference call following the firing's announcement, Henrickson said Click's termination was meant to prevent her conduct from going unaddressed.
She said the demands by the legislators had not factored into the decision, and the curators did not consider filing a faculty irresponsibility charge under the Collected Rules and Regulations.
"We were hoping that a member of the faculty would file such a charge," Henrickson said.
A state legislator filed a complaint last week, but because he was not affiliated with the university, he didn't have standing to do so.
Among the other curators, neither Steelman nor Cupps could be reached for comment. Graham and Snowden declined to comment beyond referring to Henrickson's statement.
MU Interim Chancellor Hank Foley, who called Click's actions at the Oct. 10 Homecoming parade "appalling" after the Missourian published an article Feb. 13 including body camera footage of the event, issued a statement Thursday supporting the curators' decision.
"The process the Board of Curators used to reach a determination about Dr. Click’s employment at the university is not typical — but these have been extraordinary times in our university’s history, and I am in complete agreement with the board that the termination of Dr. Click is in the best interest of our university," Foley said.
In the conference call, UM System Interim President Mike Middleton said he agreed with the decision. Middleton characterized Bryan Cave's investigation as "exhaustive," and he said Click's "behavior was inappropriate and unacceptable."
Swift reactions
MU Faculty Council Chair and Law School professor Ben Trachtenberg said he thought the decision to fire Click was "terrible."
"The board had every opportunity to use our existing processes and chose not to," Trachtenberg said. "Regardless of what one thinks about Melissa Click or her behavior, she was entitled to a fair process, not one created on the fly, containing at least one judge (Steelman) who had written in the Washington Post how the case should come out."
Angela Speck, a Faculty Council member and professor of astrophysics, said, "I think it's ridiculous that she should be fired without due process."
At the MU Faculty Council meeting Thursday after Click was fired, Foley stood by the Board of Curators' decision. He said did not feel that his authority had been undermined by the decision.
After the meeting, the Faculty Council released a statement noting that Click was never afforded a fair hearing and that the curators could have filed a faculty irresponsibility complaint against Click instead of hiring a law firm to investigate.
"By flouting the Collected Rules and Regulations of the University, the Board of Curators has caused needless injury to the University of Missouri," the council wrote in its statement.
Mitchell McKinney, who chairs the Department of Communication, declined to comment Thursday afternoon.
Lacy Rushin, of the Austin, Texas, firm Status Labs that has been helping Click rehabilitate her image, said Thursday afternoon that Click would have no comment at this time.
"We are not Melissa's legal counsel, but we will continue to help as needed," Rushin said in an email.
Schierbecker said he "felt like the investigation was thorough enough and brought enough information to the table that the Board of Curators probably made a confident decision."
"Click obviously has some issues to work through," Schierbecker said. "What happens between me and her wasn't all that happened that day. What you saw on the video was pretty much what other people saw in their interactions with her that day, and I would speculate that that had something to do with what happened."
The Bryan Cave report includes comments from a Feb. 2 interview with Click about her call for "some muscle." She told an investigator she thought "it was common practice in the camp that when something got heated, large men would come in to defuse the situation." She characterized this as "protocol" for dealing with confrontations.
First Amendment issues
Tim Tai, a Missourian photographer who was photographing the Nov. 9 protests for ESPN while Click was present, said Thursday he was "hopeful we're finally done talking about Click and can start focusing outrage on why black students are harassed and why they feel isolated on campus and underrepresented in faculty demographics."
One common claim against Click was that she had infringed upon Tai and Schierbecker's freedoms of speech, press and assembly. First Amendment issues galvanized those who saw Click's actions as an assault on one of the country's fundamental rights.
Brian Brooks, the former associate dean in the Missouri School of Journalism, filed a Title IX report against Click after the Nov. 9 incident.
In a letter to the editor published in the Missourian on Feb. 19, Brooks said her actions were "outrageous" and "hurt the cause of the very students she sought to support."
Brooks said Thursday he thought it was about time that Click was fired.
"Her actions in both circumstances were deplorable," Brooks said.
On Feb. 18, members of the MU chapter of Young Americans for Liberty collected signatures calling for Click's firing. The group organized to promote free speech, the right to assembly and other First Amendment rights.
Thomas Bradbury, the president of the MU chapter, said that while the decision to fire Click wouldn't "completely remedy the current negative perception associated with the University of Missouri," it was "a step on the correct path."
The curators, Bradbury said, "are showing that students' (First Amendment) rights are more important than a professor attempting to make a political statement."
Missourian reporter Ida Sophie Winter contributed to this article.
Supervising editor is Elizabeth Brixey.
Show Me the Errors (
(6) comments
And now they need to punish the football team as well. Yes they have the freedom of free speech, but that freedom has a price to pay. And they need to pay that price, & it needs to be a very steep one too.
What alternative was there?
http://www.columbiatribune.com/opinion/actions-on-quadrangle-were-spontaneous-instinctive-and-regrettable/article_c94138b1-9182-5de7-93e9-8243b1bdcfb0.html
Click writes in her article that she "take[s] full responsibility for my words and actions." This is contemptible rubbish, given two statements which she makes in her article.
First, Click writes that she "encountered one person, Mark Schierbecker, who had broken through this peaceful, temporary circle." "Broken through"? "Broken through"? Schierbecker was on public property exercising his First Amendment rights; rights about which alleged "Communications Professor" Click knows absolutely nothing. Schierbecker "broke through" nothing; he was on public property. It was Click who "broke through" Schierbecker's right to be on public property. Schierbecker "broke through" nothing; he was exercising his First Amendment rights. It was Click who "broke through" Schierbecker's First Amendment rights. Click's statement proves that she takes NO "responsibility for my words and actions."
The second statement of Click which shows that she takes NO "responsibility for my words and actions" is her statement: "I truly believe that my 12 years of service and commitment to MU ought not to be judged by ONE hectic moment in which I acted in exasperation." [emphasis added]. Notice Click's reference to the number "ONE."
Click's article does not mention her Homecoming Parade videos and her reprehensible conduct at the Homecoming Parade in which she screamed, possibly with children nearby, that a police officer's hands were "fuXking." One would think that an alleged "Communications Professor" would want to discuss the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, which would include her other "hectic moment" which occurred during the Homecoming Parade. In the end, alleged "Communications Professor" Click lied to her reader when she claimed that there was only "ONE hectic moment in which I acted in exasperation." There is the other incident in which she screamed, possibly with children nearby, that the police officer's hands were "fucXing." One plus one does not equal one. This lie by Click confirms that she has no sense of dignity, she has no sense of shame.
I wrote above that Click "alleges" to be a Communications Professor because she has a very serious problem communicating. She swears at a police officer when children may be nearby. She claims to have misspoken when she used the noun "muscle" while knowing that she was being videotaped. She writes an article in which she claims that there was only "one hectic moment" when in fact there are at least two. Talk about a "Communications Professor" with an utter inability to communicate. Given Click's inability to communicate - and now her inability even to count to two - describing Click as an "alleged" Communications Professor is more than accurate.
Furthermore, what is the statistical probability that the only two occasions when Click behaved this way just happened to be when she was being videotaped? What is the statistical probability that there have been other occasions when Click behaved this way? What is the statistical probability that there shall be other future occasions when Click shall behave this way? Does the University of Missouri really want to gamble with its reputation by believing that Click shall not behave this way in the future?
HR 500/505 of the U.M. System's Collected Rules and Regulations states that "the personal conduct at all times of any employee shall be of such a nature as not to bring discredit upon the institution. Conduct contrary to this policy will result in the termination of such employee's connection with the University." Click's breach
of this requirement which caused her to be fired. The Oxford Dictionary defines "discredit" as: "to harm the good reputation of"; "loss or lack of reputation or respect." How did Click's repeated conduct "bring discredit" to U.M.? Let one count the ways: [1] she screamed, possibly with children nearby, that a police officer's arms were "fucXing"; [2] she criminally threatened Schierbecker by her now famous "muscle" remark; [3] she physically assaulted Schierbecker; [4] she was arrested for physically assaulting Schierbecker; and [5] she plea bargained to perform community service instead of going to trial and possibly being found guilty of assault.
There is no question that Click's conduct did "bring discredit" to U.M. For this reason, the University was justified to fire her. Click can continue her alleged Communications Studies professional academic research on Lady Gaga by becoming the President of the Lady Gaga Fan Club. Since she was paid by tax payers to watch television and videos in her current job, let Click now do this on her family's dime. Not only will she now never get a job in Academia, Click will not even get a job working for TV Guide.
Another reason to question Click's ability to tell the truth is her statement in a 2/13/16 Missourian newspaper article written by William Schmitt that she does not "rule out filing a lawsuit against the UM System Board of Curators, MU or Schierbecker." If Click does bring such lawsuits, which she now probably will do after being fired, then they shall confirm that she was not telling the truth when she stated that she "take[s] full responsibility for my words and actions." If she does bring such lawsuits, then it is to be hoped that Click "muscles" her family into Bankruptcy because of the very expensive litigation costs of such lawsuits.
Finally, Click hired the PR firm of "Status Labs" to try to do damage control. Ironically, "Status Labs" has a great deal of experience regarding damage control. Consider the following two articles about the reputation of this PR firm:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/03/20/status-labs-austin_n_6910642.html
http://m.statesman.com/news/news/jordan-french-dismissed-as-ceo-after-pinata-stores/nkgC8/
Yes, Click most certainly picked the best PR firm!! If her PR firm caused her to publish her Columbia Tribune missive above, then it caused Click publicly to lie that she had only "ONE hectic moment" when there was more than one. If her PR firm caused her to be interviewed by William Schmitt for the Missourian article, then it caused Click publicly to state that she does not "rule out filing a lawsuit against the UM System Board of Curators, MU or Schierbecker"; a statement which may cause the reader to question whether Click also was truthful when she alleged that she "take[s] full responsibility for my words and actions."
With PR expertise like this, with Click making statements like these during this PR firm's control of her, and with Click being fired during this PR firm's tenure, one can only conclude that they deserved each other.
May Click now sue everyone she wants; and then "muscle" her husband, the Chairperson of the Religion Department of UM, into paying for her lawsuits with his salary; after which the two of them can file Bankruptcy.
I agree with the comments of Forrest, Owen and Harris.
However, this (Ms. Click) is only addressing a long and torturous sideshow, that definitely needed to be addressed. IF that's all that is going to be addressed, then we have NOT addressed several of the System's core problems, which at some time must be addressed. "The fat lady," as the saying goes, "has yet to sing."
PS: The news has already hit the national online news sites.
About flipping time! She should have been suspended the day this happened. Had this been a conservative faculty member (not that there are any at MU) they would have been gone back in November!
I'm sure of course, she will sue the university, for "discrimination" or some other wacky thing, write a book, go on tour or some other stuff. As long as she's off the taxpayer funded payroll, I don't care what she does.
Melissa Click and these kids. The protesters. They're little more than attention seekers. More than anything, they just want to act on their overriding and irrational urge to be seen and heard.
Social media is their expertise and misinformation and distortion are the dominant themes of that world. 'What's Trending' becomes the issue of the day and the larger media becomes complicit by turning 'What's Trending' into what we used to call 'News'.
Most of them don't even vote -- as Bernie Sanders is going to find out over the next couple of weeks.
Praise the Lord the Civil Rights movement wasn't made up of people like them.
I agree with the decision to terminate this "teacher". She claims we need to see yet more information to understand the broader picture --- I dont, actually. When supposedly fighting against violence she requests 'muscle' to forcibly remove a reporter (or any other objective observer) from a public area because SHE has determined she has the right of ownership over what is public property is cause enough. What terrifies me actually is that she feels a "public" apology will somehow forgive those actions. Simple question did she accept the public apology given by the police, school administrators etc and therefore she stopped her actions (protests)? No, rightly so she did not because an apology public or private does not ensure a behavior or action will change. I honestly and quite respectfully think she should have saved the money she may have used to hire other to 'rehabilitation', I think an honest rehabilitation of her reputation will come from her actions in the future.
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