Thaddeus J. Kosens

The President of the University of Pittsburgh- Johnstown is being sued for “harassment” for opposing affirmative action.

Affirmative Action Director Clea Patrick Hollis claims that Pitt.-Johnstown President Dr. Albert Etheridge told her that “he did not believe in affirmative action and would do everything possible to avoid implementing its principles.” Dr. Etheridge became president in 1994, replacing Dr. Frank Blackington, an avid proponent of affirmative action. Mrs. Hollis was hired as affirmative action director under Dr. Blackington’s administration.

After President Etheridge reduced Mrs. Hollis job from a full- to a part-time position, she initiated a federal lawsuit against both the school and its president. The charge: “Sex discrimination in hiring, race discrimination in employment, and retaliatory harassment.”
According to the complaint, “Upon the assumption of Dr. Albert L. Etheridge to the Presidency of Pitt Johnstown, its administration began to diverge from the affirmative action and minority support policies and programs of the main campus…This divergence has resulted both from the expressed opposition to affirmative action and minority rights on the part of Dr. Etheridge and also from Dr. Etheridge’s official and personal hostility toward the plaintiff…Dr. Etheridge attempted to phase out the position of affirmative action by failing to include the position in student orientation materials, university directories, and other university publications which should have featured [Hollis] specifically and the affirmative action program generally.”

Mrs. Hollis maintains that Dr. Etheridge’s “hostility toward the plaintiff” was brought about “partially by her protest against her reduction in rank, and partially because of the opposition to affirmative action on the part of Dr. Etheridge.” The only specific example of harassment cited in the report, other than her being demoted, was an incident that occurred at a reception for cabinet level officials. Allegedly, Dr. Etheridge directed Mrs. Hollis to proceed to his house with Mrs. Etheridge so that Dr. Etheridge could, “get down to business” with the other administrators. The other administrators were all men.

Such “harassment” was traumatizing, claims Mrs. Hollis. According to the complaint, “Plaintiff has suffered severe emotional distress, including emotional and psychic pain, embarrassment, stress, loss of self esteem, mental anguish, grief, and generalized anxiety.”

Mrs. Hollis is not the only one who has “suffered” because of this issue. Mike Faher, UPJ student and editor of the student newspaper, The Advocate, described the whole issue as “embarrassing,” saying, “whether the allegations are true or not, it makes us all look bad.”

The affirmative action policy for the University of Pittsburgh system directs the chancellor "to take appropriate steps to ensure the continued support of the University’s affirmative action program." Mrs. Hollis maintains that a President of any of the PITT campuses may not dismantle affirmative action without disobeying general University policy. She avers that Dr. Etheridge’s intention to de-emphasize affirmative action at the Johnstown campus was "contrary to the expressed policies of the University."

According to UPitt’s Nondiscrimination Policy Statement, "The University prohibits and will not engage in discrimination or harassment on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, ancestry." In other words, affirmative action may not be used as a quota system to obtain gender or racial equality.

"Quotas in affirmative action are out," explained Hollis. She declared, however, that Pitt-Johnstown "must look at our mission as diversity…Race and gender, its part of the equation." Commenting on the affirmative action regulations at UPitt, she stated, "They are not regulations for affirmative action, but to have a global campus, to have a global world, to prepare the students for the universe." Hollis held, "The need is to have diversity…When we’re talking about a diversified campus, we’re talking about a diversified campus, we are not talking about diversified opinion…A mixture of different people…a mix of people of color."

"The need is to have diversity," declared Hollis, "a societal mix. So, when you view candidates, you view them overall, for the needs of the area. You have two candidates, male and female, and you have an all-male department in engineering, and this female has credentials, as well as the man you are considering. Then, in order to meet the needs of the department for diversity, I would say the woman should be considered…In a department like nursing, where there are all women, we have to bring in—diversity."

Mrs. Hollis, in an effort to explain the need for racial preferences, states that there are presently no black administrators or tenured professors at Pitt Johnstown. A Campus Report investigation discovered that presently there are thirty-nine tenured professors who are black. In addition, the dean of the school of social work, the dean of undergraduate arts and sciences, the vice-provost, and the assistant to the chancellor are all black. Stacey Schmitt, a Pitt-Johnstown senior, remarked: "I know white people, black people, there are Latin people here—I have never encountered any discrimination situation against them that I know of."

According to Deborah McCool, a 1974 graduate of UPJ, the policy of racial and gender quotas had been fully used by the University in the past. In a letter to the editor of the local paper, the Tribune Democrat, she wrote: "At one point I worked in the UPJ’s financial aid office. I was asked to witness the ‘mark’ of a minority student who was getting a complete scholarship to attend school. I later asked why someone who could not even sign their name was getting a free ride. The answer: to meet percentage quotas to get federal monies."

Concluding her letter, McCool writes: "This incident has never left me. I say, hire the best qualified person who applies for a position, whatever their race. Stop worrying about minority quotas."