- In Archive
- 2017-03-16 23:36:24
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Mar. 11. In the early afternoon AUBG students, faculty, staff, and alumni receive the same email from Ivan Manev, Chair to the Board of Trustees. Two sentences grab the attention and raise multiple questions: "The AUBG Board thanks Stratsi Kulinski for his service as President." and "Dr. Steven F. Sullivan has been appointed Acting President of AUBG." Mixed reactions: concerns and hopes, disappointment and relief, met or mismatched expectations, seem to be the dominating mood around the campus now. On Wednesday, Mar. 15th, a meeting with the new president was held, which, contrary to its objective, left the AUBG community with a cliffhanger "To be continued..." In light of the recent changes, faculty, staff, and students expressed their initial reaction, their views on the inconsistent leadership (seven presidents in 14 years), and their expectations about AUBG's new president. In addition, they acknowledged the main issues that need to be tackled.
Diego Lucci; Svetlozar Apostolov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was not surprised honestly, because Elvin Guri, a member of the Board of the Trustees was on campus and he talked with several people, so I had the impression that some important decision was soon going to be made by the Board. There were several issues and the Trustees decided on the basis of what Elvin heard here during those couple of weeks when he interviewed staff and faculty members.
Kulinski had proposals. Some of these proposals made sense, but the problem is that perhaps there was too much of a change. Many people were disappointed and I don't know if those changes exactly can solve the issues we have at AUBG.
There are two main problems. One is about the visibility of AUBG in Bulgaria, and outside of Bulgaria. It is a great place, but it's not well-known. This issue affects our enrollments unfortunately, we would have many more students if they knew what's going on here. Another issue is about updating some programs, or rather adding more programs to what we already have. But it's like a circle – if you want to have more programs, you need more professors and students, on the other hand, if you don't have more programs, you don't attract more students. So the problem is what to do first.
The issue is not so much about changing presidents, but appointing the right people to serve as presidents. I don't want to talk about Steve, he is just starting, but he is an experienced administrator. The last two presidents came from the world of business and they were good at their jobs, but this doesn't mean they were good at university administration. Whoever is hired next must be a person who has a lot of experience and appropriate competences to serve as a university president. It must be someone who has already been at this position, who has been a provost, a vice president. Honestly, I am fed up with seeing people who don't have the qualifications for the job. We ask our students to take some tests and to be interviewed, to be qualified to come to AUBG. We ask our professors to have the necessary academic qualifications to teach at AUBG. We cannot have presidents who are not qualified to do it. And I'm sorry to say it, but this mistake was made twice in a row. It should be avoided. A third time is not acceptable." Diego Lucci, professor of philosophy and history, Department of History and Civilizations
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Sabina Wien; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
Jeffrey Nilsen; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was very disappointed, because I thought that Stratsi Kulinski was dedicated to the university and he was working hard for the university.
His management staff wasn't ideal and he alienated a lot of people. I think that was the key problem in his administration, he didn't listen to people. [The inconsistency of the presidential terms] is tragic. It is severely disappointing. We need someone young, with a vision of the future, and that's what I think Stratsi brought to the university.
I like Steve very much, he's a great colleague. The skills required for a president are different from those for a provost, so there are some challenges ahead. The key problem for the future is getting our house in order, making sure we don't spend money on unnecessary things, and we have to get funding." Jeffrey Nilsen, Associate Professor, Department of Economics
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Emilia Zankina; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was surprised, but this is not the first time that this has happened since I was here.
Given that there is still ongoing negotiations between Kulinski and the institution, I am not allowed to comment on his presendential term, because it can be used against the institution.
I think we need to get a little bit better at attracting and keeping presidents. And I think it was stated at the Community meeting, that perhaps it is not the procedure, but the decisions that we make in that regard. That we need to make sure that the people we choose are a good fit for us and we are a good fit for them. And it is obvious that we have failed in that. I expect the current president - Steven Sullivan to follow the priorities that have been assigned to him by the Board, which are the admissions, the development and the organization of the institution.
We are operating in a very fast-changing environment. When we were founded as an institution, we didn’t need to advertise or to do any marketing, development or to fight for students. It was enough to say that this is an American university in a post-communist Bulgaria. 25 years later this has changed in all fronts. All of that is now something that we have to do, which before that was granted. Working to market ourselves better, to recruit better, to attract funding and to keep up the academic standards." Emilia Zankina, Provost and Associate Professor, Department of Political Science and European Studies
"Of course, surprise – since it all happened so suddenly. And hope that the changing of the guard – following the initial confusion – will help shore up morale and confidence within AUBG. Unfortunately, there was an apparent mismatch between [Kulinski's] qualifications and attitudes and AUBG’s needs. That was the case with the previous president, Kevin Aspegren, too. [The fast-changing leadership] is significant turnover, given the fact that the average term of university presidents in the US is over 8 years. Such turnover can partly be explained by the fact that AUBG offers a less familiar, more challenging work environment than a typical US university or college. I hope the board will do a better job communicating its longer-term plans for the future. The university’s leadership needs to find more effective ways to involve a critical mass of faculty, staff, and students in working together to make the university a more attractive place for prospective students. In my view, improving the experience of first-year students (by increasing the variety of courses – and the number of electives – they can take) can be a more important step in this direction than catchy PR." Ivelin Sardamov, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science and European Studies [caption id="attachment_35261" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
Mark Leonard; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"It was a little bit of surprise when it happened, but it wasn't a surprise that it happened. I think most of the faculty knew it was coming, but most of us were expecting it would probably be in May.
I think Kulinski's term was notable for its tension, there was a lot of unnecessary stress, especially on the faculty and staff. Actually more so on the staff, the staff really got ripped badly. A lot of individual staff members got treated very poorly unnecessary, because they were good staff people. I think there is a need for change, a lot of that change we're in the middle of, because this started when Aspegren was still a president, or actually even before that, when Easton was president.
At most universities this size in America changing presidents is not that unusual. The part that is unusual is that five of the seven effectively were fired.
I like Steve Sullivan, I have interacted well with him as a fellow member of the Economics program, he was Dean when I was hired. I think he's a very competent person, that's a positive, but because he is acting president, I don't expect a lot, because the job is to basically hold the place, ensure that there's a president to advance the processes that need a president.
We have a couple of problems here. One is that we've had unrealistic expectations. I'm saying unrealistic, because one of the things in my academic background is demography, and if you look at the demographics of the regions from where we pull students, we're still at a point of time where the birth rates are very, very low. Because of that we can't expect that we're gonna add an additional hundred freshmen over next year, it's not gonna happen, and one of the reasons is that those hundred students don't exist, they were never born. We can look at adding students from the U.S., from Greece, which has not been a traditional market. But you add that many students over five years maybe, not over a single year. We need to be more realistic about how and where we grow, how much we can grow, what it is that we do. These are longer-term issues, some of them involve the Board, but that's a whole other story." Mark Leonard, Assistant Professor, Department of Economics
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Lynnette Leonard; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was surprised, but pleased. It was something I didn't think was going to happen as quickly as it did, but given the direction at which things were going, I think it was the right thing to do. Acting quickly was probably better than delaying it.
This presidential term is a good example of the problem we're seeing around throughout higher education when they decide it is just another business and follows the same business model, so they bring someone in with no experience in the industry to run it. What is fascinating about the model, that tries to have higher education as if it were making widgets, is that it's not that. What seems to be the trend in higher education in some places has been to say: “No, we just need to bring business thinking to running higher education. We're just gonna drop a business person with absolutely no higher education experience.” Successful companies don't do that in their own business, so I'm not sure why they think it will have a successful outcome every time. I'm much aware of all of the examples where it fails, and it fails dramatically.
There is always gonna be some turnover in presidents, particularly when you're looking at foreign appointments. The fact that we have people from other places coming here, it's gonna be more rare that we have someone stay a really long term. What's happening throughout higher education is having a hard time figuring out what do we do when we educate people and what does that mean. We need to identify our product, but what's the product of higher education? There has been a shift in what this means to some, but not a clear, unified shift that would give a vision of where the institution should move.
The future of AUBG would be much about stability and figuring out how to ride the ship through the storm. If you go for change for the change's sake, you end up with problems like what we've had. To change just to change where it doesn't seem to have any kind of grounding and an idea of where we're going, who we are, or what we do – does that really help? Evertything I have read suggests that Prof. Sullivan has been brought in as an acting president, while a search for a new president will go on. I think this is pretty much the idea of providing someone we know, that is known again for stability and maintaining. And while we look for someone that will hopefully be a good fit for the institution, understand our role in the region, understand higher education and who can look to provide a feature that doesn't necessarily mean throwing away our past. So much of what we do and the reason why we were founded is still relevant and needed. I also think that too often we're trying to be too much to too many people and we don't stay true to who we are and what our mission is. When we do what we need to do, we see real response from students, from people in the region. When we have gotten away from that, we tend not to have a good response. The thing that doesn't change is that we have a dedicated staff, a dedicated faculty who really do believe in what we were founded for, and a core group of students that choose this place because they want a learning opportunity they cannot get otherwise in the region." Lynnette Leonard, Associate Professor, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication
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Pierangelo Castagneto; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was honestly not surprised, because the decision was in the air. But at the same time I was a little bit concerned by the new situation.
I was not here when he tried to put in place some of the transformations he had in mind. My sense is that he was concerned with the reorganization of the administration and I cannot judge how much his ideas about the reorganizing in terms of firing people could be functional for a better working of the administration itself. I know for sure when I came back here he found resistance from different departments.
It is a bad signal for the outside world. If I was a possible investor, I wouldn’t trust this institution. In any sort of institution, where someone inputs money, some stability is required in order to see the effect of your investment and to have a clear idea of your agenda. At the same time not having a compass is a problem inside the institution, because we do not know what is next.
About the temporary solution that the Board adopted, I think it was a necessity right now. Hopefully this time the Board could sit down and restart a search and try not to fail." Pierangelo Castagneto, Associate Professor, Department of History and Civilizations
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Laura Kelly; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"It’s concerning. I am not so interested in the people as in the larger idea that this is another change, which makes it difficult for AUBG to keep a strong reputation, strong moral, and strong momentum to go forward.
I interpret these turnovers as a difficulty in clearly defining the role of the Board and the role of the President. And I think institutions that are run by Boards of directors have a very difficult time, it’s a clumsy governmental system.
We need stability and that becomes the foundation, from where we make all the rest of our decisions. So I think the difficult position that Dr. Sullivan is in is that he’s new to the role and he is acting, and it’s yet another change. And the difficulty for all of us is that it is somebody else – yet another one. I hope we can get to a place where we have consistency." Laura Kelly, Assistant Professor, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication
"I am delighted with the change as I have complete trust in Dr. Sullivan and the team he has assembled. He has demonstrated his commitment to AUBG and its mission in his years at AUBG and has always been willing to step up and help the university. I worked directly for and with him for many years and know he can bring back the trust and integrity that are so necessary for us to continue our great mission. I think the Board's decision to change the president was necessary to help ensure our future and I am glad they saw the talent that was here all along. We are fortunate they were available and willing to step up for all of us. This is not about them, but rather about us, as a community. These are challenging times for all institutions, for-profit and not-for-profits, and leadership is tricky. Personally, I believe that emergent leaders - those coming from inside as we have now - are able to motivate and energize communities better than those who come in with a steep learning curve. So, for me, it is the right decision at the right time. There is no question about our mission or values with this team. I can tell you from personal experience that I have seen most of the new team working together and they certainly have a good synergy. We have one big internal challenge we must address first - to rebuild trust and a sense of community. Our faculty, staff and students are ready for that and the Board started this with their appointment of Dr. Sullivan. We also have to deal with the other issues of fundraising and attracting the best students ever to AUBG. I, for one, am ready and willing to do my part. I love AUBG and once again feel we have a future. I, like rest of the community, am energized and ready to get to work!" Lucia Miree, Professor, Department of Business
"I think most of us got the information at the same time, I got the same email you did. Faculty, staff, students – we all got that one email. So I was in the middle of flying back from the States, in an airport I got a message that said “Have you looked at your email?” My first reaction was just “Good.” I would never want to comment on someone personally, so what I will say is, that the problems we faced here the last year and a half, you can see in a lot of different colleges in the States. People are all trying the same sort of idea which is: if an education institution is in trouble, why don't you bringing in someone outside of education, to see if that maybe can jump start it, you can learn something. The issue is always whether the people you're bringing in have at least some knowledge and experience of how education institutions work. When you have people who for example don't understand that universities function under a totally different set of laws, or why is accreditation necessary and what we have to do to maintain it. That's just a recipe for problems, no matter how good or bad the intentions of anyone. It is very uncommon to see this much changeover. But then I do have to ask myself how hard it is to find someone who has experience leading a U.S. college, who is wanting to move to Bulgaria, to Eastern Europe, and that I think has to do with where you are in your career. It's not too hard to get faculty, because you can get people who are young and hungry, and this is their first or second job, and they are looking to make a name for themselves, to get established, to get experience. But you don't want somebody young, and fresh, and brand new with no experience running the place, right? But people with experience also have families, and have settled. What we need more than anything is sleep. Things got so bad here for staff, for faculty, for other administrators, everyone is so frightened, and disturbed, and unsettled in their personal lives as a result of their jobs, that I see people here who clearly haven't slept well in months. My hope is that with someone like Steve, who we all know, who is very ethical and has total integrity, just to have if possible a normal last eight weeks. To let people go back to doing what they know how to do, to get some rest, to remind ourselves why we are here and what this place could be like. Everyone just needs to feel safe and comfortable and able to do their jobs. I think that would be a miracle." Dannie Chalk, Assistant Professor, Department of Arts, Languages, and Literature
Ilko Drenkov; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"At first I was a little bit puzzled, because with all of the Town Hall meetings and various changes that we had throughout the administration, I didn‘t think that there would be such an immediate decision on such an important issue for our university. And for it to be done while we were on a break, it was shocking at first, because no one was actually here to find out about it. Kulinski was always around, but a lot of things are not dependent on him, so we cannot count him responsible for things he doesn’t even have in his hand. We should have given Kulinski a little bit more time. The Board of Trustees has seen that he was not fit enough. I thank him for strengthening the communication in-between the student body about the problems that we are facing and between the student body and Student Government and Board of Trustees. I have been a student here for two years and I have already witnessed the third president, so that says a lot. That means that either no one is fit for the job, or the problems are so serious and beyond our fathom that no one can handle them. What do we even expect of a president? Because we complain a lot and demand for rights, but what are we even looking for. And it is weird because an educational institution shouldn’t be so inconsistent. Dr. Sullivan is an acting president, not a permanent one, but I think he can handle the job very well. He has been someone who is familiar with the problematics of this university and the regulations. The fact that there is a lot of gossip and a feeling of uneasiness within the student body and the administration means that something is going on that we cannot fully understand. I really hope for the sake of the students and the university that the president is someone, who can think long term and hears what we have to say. I hope that the functionality of the Student Government with the higher authorities just continues on this road. With better communication a lot of problems can be solved. I really appreciate the fact that we have a Board of Trustees Representative. That means that they do care about us, that we are just not a business and that we are real people. And what we want fundamentally is to get a good education and strengthen our community." Megi Hamza, a second-year student [caption id="attachment_35249" align="alignnone" width="1024"]
Vasily Kulev; Nikoleta Mancheva for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"It was more of an unpleasant surprise in my opinion, because it was a very sudden event and I couldn’t see the rationale behind this decision.
My concern is whether the Board of Trustees has a clear idea of what a great president of the university should be. That’s why there has been such a rotation of people in this position and I don’t think it is a very good sign for AUBG as an organization.
Dr. Sullivan is an experienced person, when it comes to being involved in the university. Appointing him exactly seems like it was a hasty decision, because maybe the Board of Trustees needed someone to take the position fast.
I am becoming concerned with the Board of Trustees’ actions and view of the well-being of the university. Firing and hiring new presidents is probably not the best decision if you want some consecutive change to happen.
The main problem is the ensure, the self-sustainability of the university and the lack of transparency is another issue – Kulinski was fired with no information provided and the selection of Dr. Steven Sullivan was done without any explanation." Vasily Kulev, a second-year student, Senator in the Student Government
"I’ve heard about the problems both the president and the staff have been experiencing for the past one year, but this was out of the blue. I don’t consider myself informed enough to judge the former president of AUBG. I’ve seen him communicate with students on different events and actively promoting the university. But this is a very vague observing. I also think he was harsh with all the changes he wanted to implement for such a short period. I believe that made the community see him as a negative figure. Maybe if it wasn’t of all this rush and better communication with his own staff, his presidency would’ve been more effective. I am an optimist, so I believe change is good. If those times required such an action, then it was for the best. We must embrace what we are given and try to make AUBG a better place, learning from our mistakes. This year I saw much involvement from the student body in a lot of the decisions, so although the outcome for some was not the desired one – we still learned that we matter. It’s always good to not have expectations, this way you don’t get disappointed. But of course, I wish AUBG will keep growing and developing. I hope the new leadership will put current students as a priority and try to meet our needs. Because if we are happy, we’ll bring more students, and that’s the best promotion. Regarding the main issues to be fixed – definitely classes varieties, I know some majors don’t have enough professors, others lack the needed equipment. And a bit more support towards student run events from the university, clubs really need that, in order to make the campus a cheerful and empowering place for young people." Fatme Tsiko, a second-year student, DOC Movie Club President
"I can't say I was surprised or shocked, it was anticipated in some sort. We all knew things were not going smoothly in the top management, however I did not expect it to be that sudden and rapid. Still I can say I was disappointed by the decision by the BoT and especially by the manner the dismissal was conducted. Trick question, was Kulinski the right man for the job? I have to say 'No', but he did some quite good things for the university. I praise his effort for restructuring and change around here because it was something that needed to be done a very long time ago. Probably the execution was not the best, but he did more than the other two guys in less time. I believe he should have been given more time and I especially praise the relationship he managed to establish with students and his openness towards us for the ongoing issues. If you change top management that often, then its easy to say there is a deeper problem somewhere and no one seems to address it. We definitely need to work on that! I expect nothing to change and the restructuring to hit a halt for “evaluation” which we all know will say that the changes done were incorrect and we were better of as we used to be prior. Steve Sullivan is a great economist and professor and I respect him a lot, but I believe under the new leadership things will return to the status quo it used to be. The main issues need to be addressed is mainly transparency. No one tells us anything and all we know are rumors that can not be completely trusted. The BoT needs to become more open, students body needs to unite and become more active and finally start caring what is going on with their establishment. And last but not least we need to solve our issues with faculty and admissions, as those are the driving forces of a university after all." Georgi Chapanov, fourth-year student, Start Up president [caption id="attachment_35265" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
Tsvetiana Zaharieva; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I'm a little bit worried about how AUBG is going to go from now on as there are a lot of changes in the process happening and I'm curious to see what's going to happen next and hoping that the outcome will be good for the whole AUBG community.
For the four years I have had at AUBG, Kulinski was the third president I had seen in action, and from my observations he was pretty active and very persistent in his actions. He was definitely trying to implement changes, some for the better, some for the worse, we cannot tell exactly. I just like the fact that there was something going on and a progress was being made. I appreciated the fact that Kulinski was extremely approachable and students could contact him and get a response in a rather easy way. It's very unfortunate what happened, I would be curious what would happen with the reforms he started, but I guess now it's a matter of time to see.
I cannot really comment on the previous presidents that have been there, because no one knows exactly the amount of work a person in this position puts. But it shows that we have a problem and we still haven't solved it.
It seems like a logical decision, given the fact that Prof. Sullivan has been in several positions that are part of the leadership team. I believe I can speak only on behalf of the students, but right now the most pressing issue is with the meal plan and there was also a proposal for the tuition decrease for the incoming class. I cannot set any expectations, because this person was appointed on a short notice, so I don't expect him to make any huge changes, but I expect that he keeps moving AUBG in, hopefully, the right direction." Tsvetiana Zaharieva, a fourth-year student, Student Representative to the Board of Trustees
"When I first read the email, it was a sort of deja vu on steroids. As a junior at AUBG, I had already been through a presidential change but this one felt completely different. The fact that it was so sudden and unannounced made me grasp the extremity of the situation - I can't say I was surprised, I was more like offended, as if someone was playing around with an institution that, with all it's flaws, I really like and actively enjoy. To me personally he seemed like one of us. Now this could have all been a façade but an ex-student president seemed as good as it can get. He wanted to bring change and obviously evoked sharp responses from both – those who agreed and disagreed with him – but I have two distinctive perspectives towards him. As a member and treasurer of SG he offered nothing but cooperation and transparency on student matters. As a president of More Honors I saw someone who doesn't take himself too seriously to the extent that he had the courage to come on stage at the show last year. This man walked out in front of 700 of his own students, both those who love and hate him, and took it all in. The previous guy didn't even show up. I'm gonna paraphrase a saying we have in my home country - whoever takes his time to pick for too long, ends up being all alone. If AUBG keeps acting this way (especially the Board), we'll end up being the university parallel of an old single lady living with 36 cats. The cats being 36 people who enrolled by accident. I'm trying to be an optimist so I do hope that whoever ends up with a permanent position actually lives up to the word 'permanent', at least for more than six seconds. I have one major issue - more transparency with the finances. I hope AUBG stops tempting its luck, thinking it can go on like this forever. Keep one thing in mind - it's very easy for student disappointment to turn into anger, and nobody wants riots." Uros Vasilev, a third-year student, More Honors Club President
Faculty
[caption id="attachment_35244" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Diego Lucci; Svetlozar Apostolov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was not surprised honestly, because Elvin Guri, a member of the Board of the Trustees was on campus and he talked with several people, so I had the impression that some important decision was soon going to be made by the Board. There were several issues and the Trustees decided on the basis of what Elvin heard here during those couple of weeks when he interviewed staff and faculty members.
Kulinski had proposals. Some of these proposals made sense, but the problem is that perhaps there was too much of a change. Many people were disappointed and I don't know if those changes exactly can solve the issues we have at AUBG.
There are two main problems. One is about the visibility of AUBG in Bulgaria, and outside of Bulgaria. It is a great place, but it's not well-known. This issue affects our enrollments unfortunately, we would have many more students if they knew what's going on here. Another issue is about updating some programs, or rather adding more programs to what we already have. But it's like a circle – if you want to have more programs, you need more professors and students, on the other hand, if you don't have more programs, you don't attract more students. So the problem is what to do first.
The issue is not so much about changing presidents, but appointing the right people to serve as presidents. I don't want to talk about Steve, he is just starting, but he is an experienced administrator. The last two presidents came from the world of business and they were good at their jobs, but this doesn't mean they were good at university administration. Whoever is hired next must be a person who has a lot of experience and appropriate competences to serve as a university president. It must be someone who has already been at this position, who has been a provost, a vice president. Honestly, I am fed up with seeing people who don't have the qualifications for the job. We ask our students to take some tests and to be interviewed, to be qualified to come to AUBG. We ask our professors to have the necessary academic qualifications to teach at AUBG. We cannot have presidents who are not qualified to do it. And I'm sorry to say it, but this mistake was made twice in a row. It should be avoided. A third time is not acceptable." Diego Lucci, professor of philosophy and history, Department of History and Civilizations
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Sabina Wien; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"The privilege of age is that you don’t get so emotional anymore. What I learned so far in the 10 years I have worked for AUBG is that first you need to take care of your own priorities and find out your own faults. My husband and I talked about what would change for us and what would we want to change in our everyday life in terms of working for AUBG. So it was not so much emotional, rather pragmatic.
The most shocking experience for me in the whole situation – I think I have always been a person who had a clear opinion about things, but in this situation I really don’t know what to expect. Because in order for me to make a statement about things, I really need to see the facts, which I do not know. What I saw in the last Town Hall meeting with Kulinski was a clear split in the leadership. The CFO was sitting on the one side; the President was sitting on the other side. What I realized back then is that we cannot continue anymore like this, because once we have a split in the leadership, this split will go deeper and eventually there would be a split in the whole community. So what I hoped for was not to keep the old president or to have a new one, it is not about the person. What I hoped for was for us to continue being a community, a real one. I think there was a clear message at the Community meeting that the university – student body, faculty and staff, including the administration, would like the Board of Trustees to join the community and it is not an attack, it is an invitation. Because we have people who have potential and because we care about this institution, and they need to experience it first hand. Therefore, I asked the question about the function of the Board of Trustees to its member – Elvin Guri. I think being an Alum, a professor, and a Board Member, he sees AUBG from three different perspectives, which make a unity. Maybe this could be a starting point for improving the communication with the Board. The acting president is a professor and was for a long time a Provost, and a Dean. He is also a parent, so he also sees the big picture. I am very hopeful that at least as long as he is an acting president, the voice of faculty will be heard more. There were times when we had a say in the management of the institution. I think these were the better times of the university. I see students now are very active. So I wish that now professors have more of a say and students have more time to invest in class activities and extracurricular activities and not so much in university politics. Not that I don’t like it, but I hope we will be able to solve the problems with the help of the students, but not under their guns. Professor Stefanovich has been mentioning this many years now, that we were founded as a democratic institution to educate future leaders of the region. We knew who we were back then. Now we need to define our new identity, in what way are we different from other universities out there. Once we have this and we believe in this, we will be more convincing even for prospective students, parents, employers and the whole world." Sabina Wien, Adjunct Instructor, Department of Arts, Languages, and Literature [caption id="attachment_35258" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Jeffrey Nilsen; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was very disappointed, because I thought that Stratsi Kulinski was dedicated to the university and he was working hard for the university.
His management staff wasn't ideal and he alienated a lot of people. I think that was the key problem in his administration, he didn't listen to people. [The inconsistency of the presidential terms] is tragic. It is severely disappointing. We need someone young, with a vision of the future, and that's what I think Stratsi brought to the university.
I like Steve very much, he's a great colleague. The skills required for a president are different from those for a provost, so there are some challenges ahead. The key problem for the future is getting our house in order, making sure we don't spend money on unnecessary things, and we have to get funding." Jeffrey Nilsen, Associate Professor, Department of Economics
[caption id="attachment_35256" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Emilia Zankina; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was surprised, but this is not the first time that this has happened since I was here.
Given that there is still ongoing negotiations between Kulinski and the institution, I am not allowed to comment on his presendential term, because it can be used against the institution.
I think we need to get a little bit better at attracting and keeping presidents. And I think it was stated at the Community meeting, that perhaps it is not the procedure, but the decisions that we make in that regard. That we need to make sure that the people we choose are a good fit for us and we are a good fit for them. And it is obvious that we have failed in that. I expect the current president - Steven Sullivan to follow the priorities that have been assigned to him by the Board, which are the admissions, the development and the organization of the institution.
We are operating in a very fast-changing environment. When we were founded as an institution, we didn’t need to advertise or to do any marketing, development or to fight for students. It was enough to say that this is an American university in a post-communist Bulgaria. 25 years later this has changed in all fronts. All of that is now something that we have to do, which before that was granted. Working to market ourselves better, to recruit better, to attract funding and to keep up the academic standards." Emilia Zankina, Provost and Associate Professor, Department of Political Science and European Studies
"Of course, surprise – since it all happened so suddenly. And hope that the changing of the guard – following the initial confusion – will help shore up morale and confidence within AUBG. Unfortunately, there was an apparent mismatch between [Kulinski's] qualifications and attitudes and AUBG’s needs. That was the case with the previous president, Kevin Aspegren, too. [The fast-changing leadership] is significant turnover, given the fact that the average term of university presidents in the US is over 8 years. Such turnover can partly be explained by the fact that AUBG offers a less familiar, more challenging work environment than a typical US university or college. I hope the board will do a better job communicating its longer-term plans for the future. The university’s leadership needs to find more effective ways to involve a critical mass of faculty, staff, and students in working together to make the university a more attractive place for prospective students. In my view, improving the experience of first-year students (by increasing the variety of courses – and the number of electives – they can take) can be a more important step in this direction than catchy PR." Ivelin Sardamov, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science and European Studies [caption id="attachment_35261" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
Mark Leonard; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"It was a little bit of surprise when it happened, but it wasn't a surprise that it happened. I think most of the faculty knew it was coming, but most of us were expecting it would probably be in May.
I think Kulinski's term was notable for its tension, there was a lot of unnecessary stress, especially on the faculty and staff. Actually more so on the staff, the staff really got ripped badly. A lot of individual staff members got treated very poorly unnecessary, because they were good staff people. I think there is a need for change, a lot of that change we're in the middle of, because this started when Aspegren was still a president, or actually even before that, when Easton was president.
At most universities this size in America changing presidents is not that unusual. The part that is unusual is that five of the seven effectively were fired.
I like Steve Sullivan, I have interacted well with him as a fellow member of the Economics program, he was Dean when I was hired. I think he's a very competent person, that's a positive, but because he is acting president, I don't expect a lot, because the job is to basically hold the place, ensure that there's a president to advance the processes that need a president.
We have a couple of problems here. One is that we've had unrealistic expectations. I'm saying unrealistic, because one of the things in my academic background is demography, and if you look at the demographics of the regions from where we pull students, we're still at a point of time where the birth rates are very, very low. Because of that we can't expect that we're gonna add an additional hundred freshmen over next year, it's not gonna happen, and one of the reasons is that those hundred students don't exist, they were never born. We can look at adding students from the U.S., from Greece, which has not been a traditional market. But you add that many students over five years maybe, not over a single year. We need to be more realistic about how and where we grow, how much we can grow, what it is that we do. These are longer-term issues, some of them involve the Board, but that's a whole other story." Mark Leonard, Assistant Professor, Department of Economics
[caption id="attachment_35260" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
Lynnette Leonard; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was surprised, but pleased. It was something I didn't think was going to happen as quickly as it did, but given the direction at which things were going, I think it was the right thing to do. Acting quickly was probably better than delaying it.
This presidential term is a good example of the problem we're seeing around throughout higher education when they decide it is just another business and follows the same business model, so they bring someone in with no experience in the industry to run it. What is fascinating about the model, that tries to have higher education as if it were making widgets, is that it's not that. What seems to be the trend in higher education in some places has been to say: “No, we just need to bring business thinking to running higher education. We're just gonna drop a business person with absolutely no higher education experience.” Successful companies don't do that in their own business, so I'm not sure why they think it will have a successful outcome every time. I'm much aware of all of the examples where it fails, and it fails dramatically.
There is always gonna be some turnover in presidents, particularly when you're looking at foreign appointments. The fact that we have people from other places coming here, it's gonna be more rare that we have someone stay a really long term. What's happening throughout higher education is having a hard time figuring out what do we do when we educate people and what does that mean. We need to identify our product, but what's the product of higher education? There has been a shift in what this means to some, but not a clear, unified shift that would give a vision of where the institution should move.
The future of AUBG would be much about stability and figuring out how to ride the ship through the storm. If you go for change for the change's sake, you end up with problems like what we've had. To change just to change where it doesn't seem to have any kind of grounding and an idea of where we're going, who we are, or what we do – does that really help? Evertything I have read suggests that Prof. Sullivan has been brought in as an acting president, while a search for a new president will go on. I think this is pretty much the idea of providing someone we know, that is known again for stability and maintaining. And while we look for someone that will hopefully be a good fit for the institution, understand our role in the region, understand higher education and who can look to provide a feature that doesn't necessarily mean throwing away our past. So much of what we do and the reason why we were founded is still relevant and needed. I also think that too often we're trying to be too much to too many people and we don't stay true to who we are and what our mission is. When we do what we need to do, we see real response from students, from people in the region. When we have gotten away from that, we tend not to have a good response. The thing that doesn't change is that we have a dedicated staff, a dedicated faculty who really do believe in what we were founded for, and a core group of students that choose this place because they want a learning opportunity they cannot get otherwise in the region." Lynnette Leonard, Associate Professor, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication
[caption id="attachment_35264" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Pierangelo Castagneto; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was honestly not surprised, because the decision was in the air. But at the same time I was a little bit concerned by the new situation.
I was not here when he tried to put in place some of the transformations he had in mind. My sense is that he was concerned with the reorganization of the administration and I cannot judge how much his ideas about the reorganizing in terms of firing people could be functional for a better working of the administration itself. I know for sure when I came back here he found resistance from different departments.
It is a bad signal for the outside world. If I was a possible investor, I wouldn’t trust this institution. In any sort of institution, where someone inputs money, some stability is required in order to see the effect of your investment and to have a clear idea of your agenda. At the same time not having a compass is a problem inside the institution, because we do not know what is next.
About the temporary solution that the Board adopted, I think it was a necessity right now. Hopefully this time the Board could sit down and restart a search and try not to fail." Pierangelo Castagneto, Associate Professor, Department of History and Civilizations
[caption id="attachment_35262" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Laura Kelly; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"It’s concerning. I am not so interested in the people as in the larger idea that this is another change, which makes it difficult for AUBG to keep a strong reputation, strong moral, and strong momentum to go forward.
I interpret these turnovers as a difficulty in clearly defining the role of the Board and the role of the President. And I think institutions that are run by Boards of directors have a very difficult time, it’s a clumsy governmental system.
We need stability and that becomes the foundation, from where we make all the rest of our decisions. So I think the difficult position that Dr. Sullivan is in is that he’s new to the role and he is acting, and it’s yet another change. And the difficulty for all of us is that it is somebody else – yet another one. I hope we can get to a place where we have consistency." Laura Kelly, Assistant Professor, Department of Journalism and Mass Communication
"I am delighted with the change as I have complete trust in Dr. Sullivan and the team he has assembled. He has demonstrated his commitment to AUBG and its mission in his years at AUBG and has always been willing to step up and help the university. I worked directly for and with him for many years and know he can bring back the trust and integrity that are so necessary for us to continue our great mission. I think the Board's decision to change the president was necessary to help ensure our future and I am glad they saw the talent that was here all along. We are fortunate they were available and willing to step up for all of us. This is not about them, but rather about us, as a community. These are challenging times for all institutions, for-profit and not-for-profits, and leadership is tricky. Personally, I believe that emergent leaders - those coming from inside as we have now - are able to motivate and energize communities better than those who come in with a steep learning curve. So, for me, it is the right decision at the right time. There is no question about our mission or values with this team. I can tell you from personal experience that I have seen most of the new team working together and they certainly have a good synergy. We have one big internal challenge we must address first - to rebuild trust and a sense of community. Our faculty, staff and students are ready for that and the Board started this with their appointment of Dr. Sullivan. We also have to deal with the other issues of fundraising and attracting the best students ever to AUBG. I, for one, am ready and willing to do my part. I love AUBG and once again feel we have a future. I, like rest of the community, am energized and ready to get to work!" Lucia Miree, Professor, Department of Business
"I think most of us got the information at the same time, I got the same email you did. Faculty, staff, students – we all got that one email. So I was in the middle of flying back from the States, in an airport I got a message that said “Have you looked at your email?” My first reaction was just “Good.” I would never want to comment on someone personally, so what I will say is, that the problems we faced here the last year and a half, you can see in a lot of different colleges in the States. People are all trying the same sort of idea which is: if an education institution is in trouble, why don't you bringing in someone outside of education, to see if that maybe can jump start it, you can learn something. The issue is always whether the people you're bringing in have at least some knowledge and experience of how education institutions work. When you have people who for example don't understand that universities function under a totally different set of laws, or why is accreditation necessary and what we have to do to maintain it. That's just a recipe for problems, no matter how good or bad the intentions of anyone. It is very uncommon to see this much changeover. But then I do have to ask myself how hard it is to find someone who has experience leading a U.S. college, who is wanting to move to Bulgaria, to Eastern Europe, and that I think has to do with where you are in your career. It's not too hard to get faculty, because you can get people who are young and hungry, and this is their first or second job, and they are looking to make a name for themselves, to get established, to get experience. But you don't want somebody young, and fresh, and brand new with no experience running the place, right? But people with experience also have families, and have settled. What we need more than anything is sleep. Things got so bad here for staff, for faculty, for other administrators, everyone is so frightened, and disturbed, and unsettled in their personal lives as a result of their jobs, that I see people here who clearly haven't slept well in months. My hope is that with someone like Steve, who we all know, who is very ethical and has total integrity, just to have if possible a normal last eight weeks. To let people go back to doing what they know how to do, to get some rest, to remind ourselves why we are here and what this place could be like. Everyone just needs to feel safe and comfortable and able to do their jobs. I think that would be a miracle." Dannie Chalk, Assistant Professor, Department of Arts, Languages, and Literature
Staff
[caption id="attachment_35263" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] Ilko Drenkov; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I was not surprised. I have been expecting that. I have not been able only to foresee the name of the interim president.
We shall learn from all that happens and surrounds us, because everything affects us one way or another. The initial idea of Kulinski to take the feudalism out through HR reform was good but the implementation was inadequately executed and rather than improving the situation it got worse. In accordance with the Daoist tradition I have learnt to transform the disadvantages into advantages and I kept sanity and I have not involved into egocentric battles and confusions.
There is a good movie called “Inherit the wind” from 1960, based on a true story from 1925, which describes a conflict of the status quo and the change. Evolutionally every change is inevitable. Analytically we can link all the transitions at AUBG with the events in Bulgaria and the world. We are witnessing the decline of the authorities. Nowadays everyone is an expert and a manager, but a leader who inspires is rare to find. To demolish the feudal clientelism and to make such a reform that would transform AUBG into a real pillar of democracy. Once we achieve that we will be attractive to talented students, faculty and staff." Ilko Drenkov, Residence Hall Director of Skaptopara II
Students
"Naturally, I was surprised at first because it was such an unexpected decision. I felt deeply frustrated at the announcement of such a major change through an e-mail, during spring break, without any reasoning or further information. From a purely student perspective, I was fairly pleased with Stratsi Kulinski’s term. Although I have no basis for comparison as a freshman, I felt like he successfully established a good working relationship with the student body for the short time he spent in office. This was evident through the different channels of communications he facilitated such as Town Hall meetings, conversation during lunch at the canteen and open door days. I feel like the main issue with the leadership is the lack of transparency which was once again highlighted by the sudden change of president without any notice. I believe that Stratsi made a positive step towards changing that through his communication with students and I hope that the new administration will continue to address student concerns. For example, I would like to see progress with the meal plan proposal put forward by the Student Government shortly before the change of presidency." Iliyana Georgieva, a first-year student, Chair of Student Government"At first I was a little bit puzzled, because with all of the Town Hall meetings and various changes that we had throughout the administration, I didn‘t think that there would be such an immediate decision on such an important issue for our university. And for it to be done while we were on a break, it was shocking at first, because no one was actually here to find out about it. Kulinski was always around, but a lot of things are not dependent on him, so we cannot count him responsible for things he doesn’t even have in his hand. We should have given Kulinski a little bit more time. The Board of Trustees has seen that he was not fit enough. I thank him for strengthening the communication in-between the student body about the problems that we are facing and between the student body and Student Government and Board of Trustees. I have been a student here for two years and I have already witnessed the third president, so that says a lot. That means that either no one is fit for the job, or the problems are so serious and beyond our fathom that no one can handle them. What do we even expect of a president? Because we complain a lot and demand for rights, but what are we even looking for. And it is weird because an educational institution shouldn’t be so inconsistent. Dr. Sullivan is an acting president, not a permanent one, but I think he can handle the job very well. He has been someone who is familiar with the problematics of this university and the regulations. The fact that there is a lot of gossip and a feeling of uneasiness within the student body and the administration means that something is going on that we cannot fully understand. I really hope for the sake of the students and the university that the president is someone, who can think long term and hears what we have to say. I hope that the functionality of the Student Government with the higher authorities just continues on this road. With better communication a lot of problems can be solved. I really appreciate the fact that we have a Board of Trustees Representative. That means that they do care about us, that we are just not a business and that we are real people. And what we want fundamentally is to get a good education and strengthen our community." Megi Hamza, a second-year student [caption id="attachment_35249" align="alignnone" width="1024"]
Vasily Kulev; Nikoleta Mancheva for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"It was more of an unpleasant surprise in my opinion, because it was a very sudden event and I couldn’t see the rationale behind this decision.
My concern is whether the Board of Trustees has a clear idea of what a great president of the university should be. That’s why there has been such a rotation of people in this position and I don’t think it is a very good sign for AUBG as an organization.
Dr. Sullivan is an experienced person, when it comes to being involved in the university. Appointing him exactly seems like it was a hasty decision, because maybe the Board of Trustees needed someone to take the position fast.
I am becoming concerned with the Board of Trustees’ actions and view of the well-being of the university. Firing and hiring new presidents is probably not the best decision if you want some consecutive change to happen.
The main problem is the ensure, the self-sustainability of the university and the lack of transparency is another issue – Kulinski was fired with no information provided and the selection of Dr. Steven Sullivan was done without any explanation." Vasily Kulev, a second-year student, Senator in the Student Government
"I’ve heard about the problems both the president and the staff have been experiencing for the past one year, but this was out of the blue. I don’t consider myself informed enough to judge the former president of AUBG. I’ve seen him communicate with students on different events and actively promoting the university. But this is a very vague observing. I also think he was harsh with all the changes he wanted to implement for such a short period. I believe that made the community see him as a negative figure. Maybe if it wasn’t of all this rush and better communication with his own staff, his presidency would’ve been more effective. I am an optimist, so I believe change is good. If those times required such an action, then it was for the best. We must embrace what we are given and try to make AUBG a better place, learning from our mistakes. This year I saw much involvement from the student body in a lot of the decisions, so although the outcome for some was not the desired one – we still learned that we matter. It’s always good to not have expectations, this way you don’t get disappointed. But of course, I wish AUBG will keep growing and developing. I hope the new leadership will put current students as a priority and try to meet our needs. Because if we are happy, we’ll bring more students, and that’s the best promotion. Regarding the main issues to be fixed – definitely classes varieties, I know some majors don’t have enough professors, others lack the needed equipment. And a bit more support towards student run events from the university, clubs really need that, in order to make the campus a cheerful and empowering place for young people." Fatme Tsiko, a second-year student, DOC Movie Club President
"I can't say I was surprised or shocked, it was anticipated in some sort. We all knew things were not going smoothly in the top management, however I did not expect it to be that sudden and rapid. Still I can say I was disappointed by the decision by the BoT and especially by the manner the dismissal was conducted. Trick question, was Kulinski the right man for the job? I have to say 'No', but he did some quite good things for the university. I praise his effort for restructuring and change around here because it was something that needed to be done a very long time ago. Probably the execution was not the best, but he did more than the other two guys in less time. I believe he should have been given more time and I especially praise the relationship he managed to establish with students and his openness towards us for the ongoing issues. If you change top management that often, then its easy to say there is a deeper problem somewhere and no one seems to address it. We definitely need to work on that! I expect nothing to change and the restructuring to hit a halt for “evaluation” which we all know will say that the changes done were incorrect and we were better of as we used to be prior. Steve Sullivan is a great economist and professor and I respect him a lot, but I believe under the new leadership things will return to the status quo it used to be. The main issues need to be addressed is mainly transparency. No one tells us anything and all we know are rumors that can not be completely trusted. The BoT needs to become more open, students body needs to unite and become more active and finally start caring what is going on with their establishment. And last but not least we need to solve our issues with faculty and admissions, as those are the driving forces of a university after all." Georgi Chapanov, fourth-year student, Start Up president [caption id="attachment_35265" align="aligncenter" width="1024"]
Tsvetiana Zaharieva; Dimitar Bratovanov for AUBG Daily[/caption]
"I'm a little bit worried about how AUBG is going to go from now on as there are a lot of changes in the process happening and I'm curious to see what's going to happen next and hoping that the outcome will be good for the whole AUBG community.
For the four years I have had at AUBG, Kulinski was the third president I had seen in action, and from my observations he was pretty active and very persistent in his actions. He was definitely trying to implement changes, some for the better, some for the worse, we cannot tell exactly. I just like the fact that there was something going on and a progress was being made. I appreciated the fact that Kulinski was extremely approachable and students could contact him and get a response in a rather easy way. It's very unfortunate what happened, I would be curious what would happen with the reforms he started, but I guess now it's a matter of time to see.
I cannot really comment on the previous presidents that have been there, because no one knows exactly the amount of work a person in this position puts. But it shows that we have a problem and we still haven't solved it.
It seems like a logical decision, given the fact that Prof. Sullivan has been in several positions that are part of the leadership team. I believe I can speak only on behalf of the students, but right now the most pressing issue is with the meal plan and there was also a proposal for the tuition decrease for the incoming class. I cannot set any expectations, because this person was appointed on a short notice, so I don't expect him to make any huge changes, but I expect that he keeps moving AUBG in, hopefully, the right direction." Tsvetiana Zaharieva, a fourth-year student, Student Representative to the Board of Trustees
"When I first read the email, it was a sort of deja vu on steroids. As a junior at AUBG, I had already been through a presidential change but this one felt completely different. The fact that it was so sudden and unannounced made me grasp the extremity of the situation - I can't say I was surprised, I was more like offended, as if someone was playing around with an institution that, with all it's flaws, I really like and actively enjoy. To me personally he seemed like one of us. Now this could have all been a façade but an ex-student president seemed as good as it can get. He wanted to bring change and obviously evoked sharp responses from both – those who agreed and disagreed with him – but I have two distinctive perspectives towards him. As a member and treasurer of SG he offered nothing but cooperation and transparency on student matters. As a president of More Honors I saw someone who doesn't take himself too seriously to the extent that he had the courage to come on stage at the show last year. This man walked out in front of 700 of his own students, both those who love and hate him, and took it all in. The previous guy didn't even show up. I'm gonna paraphrase a saying we have in my home country - whoever takes his time to pick for too long, ends up being all alone. If AUBG keeps acting this way (especially the Board), we'll end up being the university parallel of an old single lady living with 36 cats. The cats being 36 people who enrolled by accident. I'm trying to be an optimist so I do hope that whoever ends up with a permanent position actually lives up to the word 'permanent', at least for more than six seconds. I have one major issue - more transparency with the finances. I hope AUBG stops tempting its luck, thinking it can go on like this forever. Keep one thing in mind - it's very easy for student disappointment to turn into anger, and nobody wants riots." Uros Vasilev, a third-year student, More Honors Club President
This article was a joint effort of AUBG Daily’s Owls Nikoleta Mancheva, Leda Dragieva, and Dimitar Bratovanov.