Elwyn Lee began his duties in the new cabinet-level position of Vice President for Community Relations and Institutional Access last week.
The position, created by President Renu Khator, will focus on improving community relationships and access to colleges for talented underrepresented, low-income and first-generation students.
In addition, Lee will oversee the Women’s Resource Center, the LGBT Resource Center and the Center for Students with Disabilities.
One of the goals of the new addition to Khator’s cabinet is to make sure UH is able to keep up with other universities in the state.
University of Texas-Austin and Texas A&M University have both added similar administrative offices in the past few years.
“One of the things that major universities have, that’s fairly common that we have not had, is an office that focuses on expanding equal opportunity in a variety of fronts,” Lee said.
“As we strive to be Tier One in a number of areas, you certainly want to have those things that are useful and valuable that serves a purpose.”
With UH facing budget cuts, the cost of adding a new cabinet position will be an issue.
“UH has been fortunate to enjoy an impressive level of diversity over the years, but we do not take that for granted,” Karen Clarke, Associate Vice President for University Relations, said.
“Assigning a specific dollar value to such broad and ongoing benefits is impractical, at best.”
Clarke said the position is designed to benefit the university by “maintaining and enhancing the advantages our students receive from interacting with diverse cultures and exposure to different real-world perspectives.”
Lee was chosen to lead the new department because of his background in teaching employment law, ethics law, disability law and sexual harassment. He has also written on employment discrimination and voting rights.
Lee served as the vice president for Student Affairs, where he helped get the Center for Students with Disabilities building constructed and added a daycare center in the Campus Recreation and Wellness Center.
Lee’s goals for the department will be to engage campus groups and analyze diversity by assessing the student body, faculty and the different schools on campus.
“Our goals will be to establish the office, analyze the situation (diversity), see where we are and try to come to the determination of are we doing well or not,” Lee said. “And see if there are there things we can do that we think do in a particular area.”
Lee graduated from the Yale School of Law in 1975 and began his career at UH in 1978 as a law professor before becoming the interim director of the African American Studies program in 1989.
Since 1998, Lee served in his official capacity with Student Affairs, as well as serving as vice chancellor of Student Affairs for the UH System.
Serving as the interim VPSA will be Michael Lawrence until a permanent replacement for Lee can be found. A committee will be appointed to conduct a search that is estimated to take six months to complete.
Lawrence last served as the vice president of Student Development at Nazareth College in Rochester, N.Y., and served in a variety of administrative positions at Southern Methodist University.
Lawrence will look to improve student residential halls and quality of life around campus.
“We want to build strong communities,” Lawrence said. “My number one priority is the students.”
The whole thing stinks of cronyism and nepotism.
For the last 13 years, Elwyn Lee has been a complete failure as vp for student affairs. Instead of simply replacing him, President Khator creates a new cabinet level position for him. Is this because his wife is Sheila Jackson Lee? The comments by Karen Clark ("assigning a specific dollar value to such broad and ongoing benefits is impractical at best") at a time we are contemplating serious budget cuts are disingenuous! Do these remarks reflect incompetence or are they a cover up for cronyism?
This is not the first time President Khator creates high-level positions instead of simply removing administrators: After removing the president of UH-Victoria, she has created a new high-level (read high $$$!!) position for him. Did that fix anything? No! As we watch the crisis unfold at UH-Victoria (they are planning to leave the UH system to join the A&M System), President Khator's incompetence becomes clear. Her strategy to fix problems by quid pro quo and cronyism does not work!
But this is how President Khator operates. After all, the board of regents changed UH nepotism rules to get her husband hired and her husband was appointed as associate dean for graduate studies despite the fact that he is unqualified for the job (no graduate student supervision, no research). As a beneficiary of nepotism herself, she does not hesitate to practice nepotism and cronyism.
Currently, President Khator is taking credit for things that are based on data before she came to UH (e.g., Carnegie rankings) while her incompetence and mismanagement are taking UH towards bankruptcy.
With all this cronyism and nepotism, how will she face students, faculty, and staff during budget cuts?
Texas Tech is cutting administrative positions as part of their budget cuts while President Khator is creating new expensive administrative positions. Stop cronyism and nepotism! UH needs honest, transparent, and competent administrators.