Charges of sexual harassment and unauthorized student fees filed against School of Art Director Rod Parker on Jan. 22 “amount to stealing money from students,” according to a statement released to The Daily Reveille on Monday by Stephen Haedicke, lawyer of former faculty member Margaret Herster.
Herster is suing the Board of Supervisors, Parker and others. Her claim includes the collection of fees unauthorized by the Board of Supervisors, the use thereof for “personal or positional benefit of [Parker] and certain faculty members,” the denial of fair pay to Herster because she is a woman and her firing for uncovering the illegal conduct.
Parker did not return phone calls Monday night.
Along with Parker, defendants in the case alleging the knowledge of years of illegal fee collection include former Interim Dean of the School of Art Ken Carpenter and numerous workers in the University’s Human Resources Management office.
According to an audit released Jan. 10, the collection of unapproved fees began in 2010 and add up to $7,690 in that fiscal year, jumping to $31,000 and $24,915 the two following years.
The audit concluded that more than $55,000 in unauthorized course fees was charged to students for the fiscal years of 2011 and 2012 alone, with more than $20,000 in purchases made that were not used for their intended purposes. Rather than on supplies for art school courses, fees were spent on iPads and Mac Mini computers among other equipment for faculty, the lawyer’s statement reads.
The collection of unauthorized fees began in the fiscal year of 2010, the year Parker was appointed to his position as director, the audit states.
Illegal fees disproportionately harmed students in the digital arts program and those in the Arts, Visualization, Advanced Technologies and Research (AVATAR) program.
“In effect, for at least the past three years, LSU’s School of Art has been stealing money from its students,” the petition states.
Although these fees persisted through the 2012 fiscal year, an email between Carpenter and former University CFO Eric Monday reveals Carpenter requesting additional fee increases for courses ranging from painting and drawing to ceramics and sculpture.
On top of the thousands of dollars’ worth of misappropriated fees taken from students over the past three years, Herster also claims in the lawsuit that Parker sexually harassed her by “denying her fair and equitable pay, benefits such as health insurance… as well as opportunities for career advancement that were given to less-qualified men.”
“When Herster reported the course fee violations and filed a sex discrimination complaint with the [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission], she was promptly fired in a retaliatory scheme orchestrated by all defendants in this matter,” the lawsuit reads.
