r7950 wrote:
I think some of the more damning things to come out of the OTL report is how the athletic department was self-policing. That combined with the Nassar scandal, it's starting to appear that there is lack of institutional control. Simon was chair of the executive committee right after the PSU scandal and yet her own university lacks the ability to follow through on basic items, which reflects that the President couldn't get people to follow directives, or it just wasn't a priority. There is potentially evidence of statutory non-compliance. AD Hollis did not even formally reach out to female student-athletes until 5 months after Nassar was fired. That does not demonstrate genuine concern.
My wife graduated from COM, Dean Strampel's name is on her diploma. His failings in 2014, in light of his reputation related to being inappropriate (sexually) do not seem to be very surprising. Something smells rotten in East Lansing, and there is an impression that sexual hostility pervades the campus.
All of this, coupled with the complete lack of consideration for victims and tone deaf responses from the top leadership has basically invited a ton of scrutiny. The complete mishandling of this over 16 months lead to the galvanization of the victims and it developed into international media exposure. There is a chance that MSU may get a draconian punishment, and it wouldn't be fair to certain parties. However, sometimes, life isn't fair.
Right now, Sparty (MSU) is looking at a years-long (if not decades-long) black eye and reputation of being the state's "child molester school." Now, that's not fair to the 99 percent of the people associated with MSU who have done absolutely nothing wrong in the Nassar matter as well as ESPN's OTL piece on Mark Dantonio and the football program.
Unfortunately, current (and recent past) school leadership appears to have either taken no action at all when the allegations on the part of all these female gymnasts first came to light or they appear to have actively done things to try to cover it up or gloss it over. Former women's gymnastics coach Kathy Klages, for example, who quietly retired last February, is alleged to have pressured at least one gymnast to remain silent about her concerns, according to an ABC News report.
School president Lou Anna Simon (who just announced her retirement the other day, though she's on the job for the next 60 days to help MSU find her replacement) also appears to have been indifferent to the issues that arose as a result of the Nassar tragedy. At least one credible allegation crossed her desk and she took no action whatsoever, as far as can be told from public records, to do anything about it. She also appears to have been frozen into seeming indifference by the plight of the female gymnasts as they began telling their stories publicly.
The university police appear as a modern-day Keystone Kops in this sorry saga. They prove that NO university police department should EVER be entrusted with obvious criminal investigations.
The school supposedly conducted an internal investigation into the Nassar matter. Yet didn't commit that investigation to paper and can't produce any investigatory materials for public records requests by the media and interested parties?
The athletic director, Mark Hollis, appears to have either been out of the loop -- willingly or unwillingly, we just don't know yet -- on this tragedy which occurred within his athletic department. As one of the leaders with accountability for ALL athletes under his purview, his negligence seemingly borders on the criminal.
As you've noted, the school had a reputation, here in Michigan, for being a slightly rowdy place. Couch burning stories are legendary, for one, as is the "party school" reputation.
Combined with this and many other issues well-known to Michigan residents, and it's clear that all the good done by MSU faculty and students in almost all other areas is likely to be swept away in a sea of criminal and civil trials to come, including the actions taken by the board of trustees (former football coach George Perles, Joel Ferguson and others), who must answer for the fact that their supposed management of Simon, Hollis and all other school leaders and matters of import -- including an annual $1 BILLION budget -- seems to have been so incompetent.
"Politics is just show business for ugly people."