Sunday, February 24, 2008

The Mathur watch

.....OCCASIONALLY, I Google “Raghu Mathur,” for the Chancellor is indeed a fascinating fellow. Here's what I came across this morning.

1. Teaming Mathurian women
.....Did you know that Raghu maintains an association with the California Women’s Leadership Association (CWLA)? It’s essentially a club for Republican women who seek power. (See its website.)
.....CWLA has a “statement of belief,” which comprises the usual conservative/libertarian stuff: smaller government, individual freedom, etc.
.....CWLA has goals, too:
The goals of this organization are to…demonstrate and develop the strengths women bring to the policy-making arena of problem solving skills, consensus building, and teaming; and [to] educate women to leverage power to attain specific goals, working within the system.
.....Teaming? Strengths women bring? Leveraging power? Sounds mighty retro-creepy, in an Ayn Rand sort of way.
.....Our man Raghu can be found—in photographs—at several points on the website: see him with OC District Attorney Tony Rackauckas; see him with OC Supervisor John Moorlach; see him with the OC Auditor-controller, Joe Shmo and County Corpse Boy John Williams.
.....Hey! How come there aren't any women in these pictures?

2. ARGOSY won't abide plagiarists

.....As you know, the Chancellor is proud of his association with Argosy University. I came across the fellow’s biography (on the district website) this morning. It explains that "Dr. Mathur serves as an Advisory Board Member for the School of Education at Argosy University where he also teaches courses in educational leadership to doctoral students.”
.....I decided to do a little research on Argosy. The for-profit university has 18 locations in 12 states. It seems to specialize in teaching Psychology, Business, and Education.
.....I came across this: according to Wikipedia, one or two years ago, one of Argosy’s faculty and its Director of Training (at its psychology campus in Chicago) screwed up bigtime. (The incident was fully reported by the Chicago Sun-Times. See also famous plagiarists.) Psychologist Bindu Ganga, who received her doctorate from Argosy, was accused of plagiarism by one of her students! According to the student, Ganga had quoted verbatim from Charles Ford's Lies! Lies!! Lies!!!—without attribution—in her Psych dissertation!
.....Says Wiki, “Initially, the school found ‘no merit’ in the accusations, and scolded the accuser, noting her accusation in her academic record.”
.....What happened next was very odd. Eventually, Argosy “recanted” and fired Professor Ganga. I guess they finally checked. Argosy also took back her doctorate.
.....According to Wiki, such actions are unprecedented in academia. Not so sure about that.
.....But get this: according to Wiki, “One year later, Argosy reinstated Ganga's Doctoral degree, but required the plagiarist to do a completely original Doctoral thesis.”
.....Boy, they sure do have high standards at Argosy.
.....No doubt that's why they hired our Raghu.

•• Just in case you haven't seen this slide show—concerning the early days of the MATHUR ERA—check it out. (Click on any image that interests you. It will enlarge. I especially like the Hugh Hewitt slide. Check it out.)

Roy's obituary in LA Times and Register: "we were lucky to have you while we did"

  This ran in the Sunday December 24, 2023 edition of the Los Angeles Times and the Orange County Register : July 14, 1955 - November 20, 2...