CSU board announcing yesterday it will not appoint Paul Vallas as school president, rejecting Governor Rauner’s pressure to do so.
I wrote yesterday about Paul Vallas and the move by Governor Rauner to appoint him as president of the financially challenged Chicago State University.
CSU serves mostly African American and working class students.
Its financial challenges mainly come from the failure of the Governor to get a budget passed.
Some are now suggesting that we will never see a state budget passed while Rauner is Governor.
Now it seems that strong opposition to the Vallas appointment as delayed or killed it.
Chicago State University trustees on Monday put off a decision on whether to appoint ex-Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas to a top administrative job, a controversial move pushed by Gov. Bruce Rauner.
The board instead voted to name new interim leadership on April 7, including a new interim president and a temporary chief administrative officer. Vallas is in the running for either job if he steps down as a trustee, a position he has held since Rauner appointed him in January.Vallas left the meeting without commenting on his plans.
There were some Vallas defenders.
“On a short term, emergency basis, somebody with the kind of financial skills may be of use to us,” said Deborah Lynch, an assistant professor at CSU who ran the Chicago Teachers Union after Vallas resigned. “Somebody with the reputation of turning things around may be of use to us….The narrative of collapse is killing us.”
Lynch’s reference to a reputation for turning things around is odd since Vallas has been fired from nearly every education-related job he has held including leadership positions in Chicago, Philadelphia, New Orleans and Bridgeport, Connecticut.Since the announcement of Vallas’ possible appointment as president of CSU there has been widespread opposition to handing Vallas another job to fail at, including coming from Chicago African American Aldermanic leader, Roderick Sawyer.
Download and listen to our podcast: Hitting Left with the Klonsky Brothers.
Fred Klonsky 
This is welcome news. It’s also important to note that it does not appear that Vallas came with any prior higher education experience–either teaching or in administration.
This will save the university from throwing good money after bad…really bad.
Kudos to the CSU Board. And crickets to Deborah Lynch.
It seems odd also, that the previous Democratic administration wanted Vallas as its Lt Gov, and that the current Republican Rauner administration also wants him – this time as a henchman. Maybe we’re looking at this wrong. Perhaps Rauner wanting Vallas as part of his team, is an effort on his part to show us that he (Rauner) is becoming more non-partisan, and is willing to compromise by working with people from across the aisle.
Bullshit!
Amen to that!
Artfully said. And true.
Jacek–Thanks so much–I haven’t had a good laugh all day!
Lynch is not the sharpest tool in the shed. She was a very poor CTU prez. and not remembered fondly. I was surprised that she landed at CSU. Maybe she got her letters mixed up.
&, oh, Jacek–have you seen the new Rauner commercial about patching things up? (He was wearin’ his flannel shirt & droppin’ the gs.)
It was shown TWICE w/in a half hour during the Ch. 7/ABC 10 PM news.
And to think how those $$$$$$ COULD have been spent…
Sorry–my mistake–I have now seen the commercial SO many times (in 5 PM news broadcasts, 6 PM news broadcasts, 10 PM news broadcasts, & so on, ad nauseum {emphasis on the latter}), that I realized that Rauner does not, in fact, drop his g’s. Still wearing good guy flannel shirt, though.