Remington upset over denial of transfer to UNLV

Friday, March 12, 2004 | 11:25 a.m.

University Chancellor Jane Nichols has denied former community college president Ron Remington's request to transfer to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas instead of returning to the college he once presided over.

Nichols instead is recommending Remington return to the psychology department at the Community College of Southern Nevada as a full-time professor following a two-semester leave to reacquaint himself with that discipline, according to a letter from Nichols to Remington.

Remington will receive his presidential salary until his contract runs out in June 2005. It will then revert to the highest paid salary in the psychology department.

The announcement came as a shock to Remington, who said he read about it first in Jon Ralston's electronic newsletter Flash before he received the official letter from Nichols. Flash is published by Greenspun Media Group, which is owned by the publishers of the Las Vegas Sun.

Nichols had indicated to Remington in previous correspondence that she had cleared the transfer to UNLV with university President Carol Harter and "am happy to support this recommendation to the board as offered by Dr. Harter and UNLV," according to a copy of the correspondence obtained by the Sun.

Nichols acknowledges as much in her letter to Remington. But she writes that she changed her mind because the UNLV position meant Remington would lose his tenure and only be given a three-year contract.

Nichols also writes that the Board of Regents policy on involuntary reassignment of a president also influenced her decision.

Nichols and Harter were not available for comment this morning.

Remington was upset at the about-face.

"Truly, what I think that this shows, and this is just one example, is that I can't trust anyone," Remington said this morning. "And I think it shows very little in terms of professionalism."

Nichols couches the concern for Remington's tenure in terms of current debate among faculty at CCSN on the importance of tenure. Remington, however, said he knew the UNLV job meant losing his CCSN tenure and that "was OK by me."

"I didn't require tenure," Remington said.

In his letters to Nichols, Remington stresses his desire to stay in Southern Nevada but says that returning to the community college would "be a constant reminder of the callous and capricious actions of the scant majority of the Board" for both him and his colleagues.

Remington also believed teaching education would be a better fit since he has not taught psychology for 20 years.

Harter, Gene Hall, the dean of the College of Education, and all of the education college's faculty had approved his transfer, Remington said, and he had received official letters welcoming him to the university.

Remington, who is protesting his reassignment and still desires to be reinstated as CCSN president, said he made the transfer request at the mandate of then-interim president Thomas Brown.

The transition proposal was made in order to retain his employment in any capacity, Remington said. In letters from his attorney, Kathleen England, to attorneys for the University and Community College of Nevada System, Remington retains his full right to "contest the underlying necessity of the transition" and continue his "battle to be restored to the presidency of CCSN."

"It really did come as a shock to me that the regents voted as they did" to remove him in November, Remington said. "I had no indication that they would vote that way. And I had no indication from the chancellor that what I worked out as a transition would be trumped by her as it was."

The Board of Regents is scheduled to hear Nichols' recommendation at its March 19 meeting at the Desert Research Institute.