Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, April 26, 1994 TAG: 9404260117
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: MURRAY, KY. LENGTH: Medium
Alexander, who joined the Tech faculty in 1988, was best known in Virginia for serving as a consultant to a coalition of local school systems that sued the state over disparity in education funding.
At Murray State, university officials said the ``healing process'' has begun between Alexander and faculty members following a closed three-hour meeting Saturday with Faculty Senate President Nancy France and other leaders.
France said Alexander seemed open to meeting regularly with the senate's executive committee. ``We believe the healing process has begun.''
The senate had voted unanimously Thursday to oppose Alexander's candidacy.
Alexander told a news conference Saturday that raising faculty salaries would be a top priority. He said he thought the faculty senate's vote calling him ``unacceptable'' arose because the senators were misinformed.
Murray's student newspaper also had been harshly critical of Alexander, but editor E.L. Gold said he would seek common ground.
``We are all going to work with him, but we will report the news as we see it and as it happens on campus,'' he said.
The Murray State News is student-edited, ``and I would like to see it stay that way,'' Gold said.
Alexander, former president of Western Kentucky University, was accused in 1988 of attempting to stifle the independent student newspaper there after it printed stories critical of his administration.
Alexander's hiring as the western Kentucky school's ninth president apparently pleased the community, however, where people seemed relieved to have a Kentucky native at the helm.
``I just feel this man brings to the table what Murray and western Kentucky need,'' said coffee-shop owner Pete Waldrop. ``He offers new leadership that has vision and credibility.''
Alexander intends to take office July 1. Sid Easley, vice chairman of the Murray board of regents, said there was no timetable for negotiating Alexander's contract. Although he earns significant royalties and fees as an author and consultant, Alexander said he would phase out consulting, calling the Murray job something that would take his time from daylight to dark.
In Virginia, his role as an unpaid consultant to the group of local school boards that sued the state at the same time as he was a state employee generated some angry comments from then Gov. Douglas Wilder and his top education aides.
by CNB