UC Berkeley chancellor to resign amid criticism from students, faculty
(Courtesy of UC Berkeley Media Relations)
By Ryan Leou
Aug. 17, 2016 1:12 p.m.
University of California, Berkeley’s chancellor announced Tuesday he plans to resign as soon as the campus finds a successor.
Nicholas Dirks did not give specific reasons for his resignations in his announcement to students, faculty and staff. His announcement comes after months of scandals and criticism from both students and faculty.
“Over the summer I have come to the personal decision that the time is right for me to step aside and allow someone else to take up the financial and institutional challenges ahead of us,” Dirks wrote.
In May 2016, Dirks spent almost $700,000 on a seven-foot tall fence around University House, the chancellor’s residence to keep out vandals. Students also criticized his decision to use $9,000 from UC Office of the President funds to build an emergency exit for his office to escape protesters.
Protesters stormed the chancellor’s office suite in April 2015, banging tables and yelling before being escorted out by UCPD officers.
Students criticized Dirks for proposing changes to academic programs and cutting jobs in an effort to decrease the university’s $150 million budget deficit. Students and faculty said they thought Dirks had not consulted with them enough before carrying out his decisions.
Students and faculty also accused Dirks of handling sexual harassment cases involving several administrators and faculty members too lightly.
In July 2015, UC Berkeley’s law school dean, Sujit Choudhry, was given a one-year salary cut of 10 percent and mandatory coaching on workplace behavior for allegedly making unwelcome advances toward his assistant. Astronomy professor Geoff Marcy was placed on an informal five-year probation in June 2015 for allegedly sexually harassing several of his students.
Dirks is the second UC chancellor to announce his resignation this week; UC Davis chancellor Linda Katehi resigned Aug. 9 after a UC investigation found she violated multiple policies and exercised poor judgment.
On Wednesday the San Francisco Chronicle reported that UC Berkeley spent more than $200,000 on consultants to improve Dirks’ image. UC Davis similarly spent about $175,000 to remove Google searches of campus police pepper spraying student protesters and improve Katehi’s image.
Dirks added he plans to stay on as a faculty member as a professor of history and anthropology specializing in South Asia studies.
