Dr. Dawn Bishop McLin returns to JSU Faculty Senate

After being on administrative for a year, former Faculty Senate President Dr. Dawn Bishop McLin has returned to the Jackson State University Faculty Senate Executive Committee. Based upon the Faculty Senate’s constitution, the immediate past president of the Faculty Senate, which she is, serves on the Executive Committee. To a layperson that may not mean much. What it means, however, is that Dr. McLin gets to sit with the rest of the officers of the Faculty Senate to establish its agenda, plan its strategies, meet with administrators, and, in every other way, function as a leader of the Faculty Senate.

That kind of arrangement was built into the JSU’s Faculty Senate in order to benefit from the knowledge and experience an individual had gained as president. Because of the ordeal endured by Dr. McLin under the Marcus Thompson administration, in addition to the significant initiatives which she had led as president, including the efforts to expand shared governance, to protect free speech and academic freedom, to verbalize support for upholding certain accreditation standards, and to provide open assessments of academic administrators’ performances, she has demonstrated the knowledge, experience, wisdom, and courage from which the JSU Faculty Senate can benefit.

Dr. McLin was able to return to the Faculty Senate in time for JSU’s opening convocation, wherein she was welcomed by the faculty and staff. This was possible because of what had happened in settlement talks and in court during this past summer.

During a court session presided over by Federal District Judge Henry Wingate, lawyers representing Dr. McLin (Chad Welch), the College Board (Pope Mallett), and former JSU president Marcus Thompson (Carlos Tanner) announced they had reached a tentative settlement in the case of Dawn Bishop McLin vs. Jackson State University. The nature of the settlement was tentative because there were issues still needing resolution or further clarification.

The matters on which there was clarity included: (1) during its June meeting the College Board had voted in executive session to re-instate Dr. McLin to her position at JSU rather than terminate her; (2) the monetary request of $48,000 plus attorney fees was reasonable; and (3) the case would be dismissed upon the resolution of the undisclosed issue. All three parties accepted those as the facts, which Judge Wingate duly noted. 

The case had been brought by Dr. McLin as a result of Dr. Thompson placing her on administrative leave last Spring. Although she was paid her regular salary, Dr. McLin lost $38,000 in grant money and $10,000 since she was not able to teach summer school. In addition to that, she was being threatened with the loss of employment for this academic year, to say nothing of the humiliation and mental anguish caused, as well as the violation of her freedom of speech and tenure rights.

After several hours of discussion in the court and behind the scene negotiations, lawyers for both Dr. McLin and the College Board seemed to indicate their differences were relatively minor and a final agreement could be reached in a matter of days. 

For her part, Dr. McLin demonstrated her concern was more on the side of returning to work at her beloved alma mater than punishing the system by seeking what appears to be the minimum damages – only the clearly loss wages from her grant and summer school employment rather than compensation for mental anguish, humiliation, and other matters that could have been justified.

With that legal matter behind her, Dr. McLin reports she is happily back at work as a researcher and teacher in the Department of Psychology. The Faculty Senate is looking forward to her leadership involvement. Even faculty senate colleagues on other campuses have invited her to share with them the wisdom she acquired as an apparently successful faculty senate president. 

Through it all, Dr. McLin has been supported by her husband, Prentiss McLin, who was by her side during the court hearing. The same can be said regarding support from her parents B.V. and Carrine Bishop, both of whom graduated from Jackson State University.