The SU administration: Will the board of supervisors please stand up

Most of us in the Southern University community have never met or even heard of the people in the big building at the back of the campus. The J.S. Clark Administration Building is the business end of Southern. The building is home to the offices of some of the most important people on campus, the ones that help make all the big decisions. One of those very important people is our President-Chancellor, Dr. Ray L. Belton who is a former military man and most importantly a former Jag. Belton has headed many organizations and made many accomplishments as the Chancellor of Southern University in Shreveport. With the problems that Southern faces, we like to blame the person that’s at the top, but we can not put all the blame on Belton. Former Governor Bobby Jindal who only made one trip to the campus in 2008, is the person that is responsible for the problems that higher education is facing due to his budget cuts and mishandling of government funds. We are fighting the same fight that Smith and Brown died for. If you don’t know who they were you should. They are the name sake of the union we dine at every day. They gave their lives fighting for better conditions at Southern. Southern’s Board of Supervisors should share some of the blame because they are the ones that cast the votes. There or a few questions that many would like to bring to them. The number one question is raises, why during a fiscal problem, Southern has faced for the last couple of years would these people continue to give themselves enormous raises? The only people on this campus that deserves raises are the faculty and staff who do all the hard work like teaching, cleaning, cooking, and clerical work. Our faculty hasn’t seen a raise in over eight years when it seems like the board gets one every year. These practices are demoralizing to the professors who teach us and the staff that takes care of us on campus. When was the last time you saw Tony Clayton pick up a piece of trash, serve student or teach a class? The Board of Supervisors has many answers to give. Another question, why would you invest $12 million on a building project instead of trying to fix what is already broken, the mainly the buildings? According to black history month hero and scholar Booker T. Washington, this is a holdover from slavery. The attitude of spending money you don’t have if you have more important situations to worry about. This so called Board of Supervisors need to take notes from Washington on self-sacrifice. We need to put these people on notice. Stop using the SU System’s money irresponsibly. Show some appreciation to the faculty and staff they are our most important resource. Since they combined the office of President Chancellor, why wont they revamp the board? It does not take many people to make good choices for Southern obviously because they haven’t made that many good decisions over the last few years many of their offices should be combined. We as students and faculty have the right to know and decide were the universities resources are being spent. We need a strong leadership who cares more about the university then themselves, we need the leadership of the past that made southern great and we must demand it.