By Michael Hill
Correspondent
One week after Essex County College fired President Gale Gibson and its general counsel and Vice President Rashidah Hasan, more heads rolled — 21 contracts not renewed for vice presidents, administrators, faculty members and others. President Emeritus Zachary Yamba is running the school and says the moves are about saving money, not about anyone with ties to Gibson and Hasan who had complained of financial irregularities and had recommended discipline of another politically connected vice president of the school.
The student representative to the Board of Trustees said the cuts will have an impact in the classroom.
“They don’t care about this institution or the students or they would not have done what they did the way they did it. The timing that they did it. During mid terms, finals, right before graduation, middle states accreditation. They were not thinking about the students and this institution,” said Deborah Salters.
A ’93 Essex County College graduate read a list of demands for transparency and more.
“We want accountability. We want to have honesty. We want to have integrity, pride, respect and professionalism,” said Lev Zilbermintz.
“You all made this about Gale Gibson. I always made this about the institution, the validity of the decisions that you make, due process and the things that you do how is it going to best affect our students and the moving forward of this community college because the community owns it,” Salters said.
Long-time education advocate and member of the New Jersey Black Issues Convention, James Harris, said Gibson had been “besmirched” and he bemoaned the apparent politics at play and the potential impact.
“I will be watching along with a whole lot of other people from this community who have a great interest in seeing that Essex County College remains a beacon of opportunity for some of the poorest students in the state,” Harris said.
The county is responsible for some of the school’s funding and operations. Today, former freeholder Carol Clark said, “I’m saddened and troubled by what has happened to Dr. Gale Gibson. This whole incident hurts the reputation of Essex County College. On its face it seems mean-spirited. People of goodwill don’t handle things this way.”
As all this plays out, the Justice Department is investigating Essex County College and reports of shredded materials, materials that are said to be at the center of the fired president’s claims of financial irregularities here.