Students React to Vice President’s Ouster, Status of Administrative Restructuring

On Friday, July 31, Frostburg State University President Ronald H. Nowaczyk announced that the Division of Enrollment Management would be dissolved and the head of that division, Vice President Arlene Wesley Cash, would no longer be an employee of the university. Prior to joining the FSU staff in 2018, Cash was previously the vice president for Enrollment Management at Guilford College, and the Chief Enrollment Management Officer at Spelman College, the University of Arkansas, and the University of the Pacific. Cash holds a bachelor’s degree from Keuka College and a master’s from Kent State University.

Nowaczyk justified his decision to faculty and staff arguing that, “As a cost-saving measure, I am dissolving this Division effective today. I have met with Vice President Arlene Cash and informed her of my decision to eliminate her position as part of the restructuring.”

Cash’s division at Frostburg oversaw the Office of Admissions, Financial Aid, Registrar, and Student Success program offices. These offices regularly interact with students, especially incoming freshmen and transfer students.

It is unknown why the email regarding Cash’s ouster was not sent to the student community. Nonetheless, after TBL published the announcement of Nowaczyk’s decision, students took to Twitter to vent their frustrations.

Ismerai Reyes, an SGA Senator wrote, “So they really fired one of the few Black women in positions of power? Dr. Cash deserved at the very least to be offered another position if her division was to be dissolved. She clearly means a lot to students and her hard work deserves to be respected.” Note: Cash does not hold a doctorate degree.

Lyric Mitchell, another SGA Senator and the Chair of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee of that body wrote, “I don’t care what nobody say they cut Ms. Cash because she’s a strong, independent, opinionated, outspoken Black woman and the university has a problem with that, just like America has a problem with that.”

At least five other FSU students agree that the decision feels racially-motivated. Others believe the decision was premeditated either way.

Tyler Bauer, an FSU alumni who worked as an intern in the Office of Student Affairs during the 2019-2020 school year, says Cash’s removal feels shady. “I feel that FSU wrongfully fired VP Cash for reasons mostly related to things outside of the budget and that the budget finally gave them the opportunity to do so. I feel that they have been desiring to do this over the past year and a half, and saw the opportunity and took it,” he says.

No matter the reason for Cash’s removal, the student body expressed sincere pain as the news broke on social media.

Samuel Bankole, a Senior in the President’s Leadership Circle says that Cash “was really an inspiration to so many of us” and that he is “very disappointed and lost for words.”

Kaylah Mason, President of the Black Student Alliance, echoes Bankole. “She’s the only person who actually made things happen,” says Mason, and that the decision “hurts for real.”

Other students question the logic of the decision.

An anonymous student, who transferred during the 2019-2020 school year, says that, “Ms. Cash did everything in her power to get me at FSU. She proved she really cared about student retention and their success. Something you don’t see at a lot of colleges.”

The student also says, “If cost cutting measures are being taken, it doesn’t make sense how we are unveiling new locker rooms, hiring new staff, and making a lot of renovations and additions to the college.”

President Nowaczyk reported during his July virtual Town Hall that FSU was experiencing an “$8 to $9 million dollar budget shortfall” because of the coronavirus, and that furlough days and temporary salary reductions for the highest earners on campus would be necessary to weather the financial crisis. He had previously indicated that staff reductions were not in the plan.

According to the Baltimore Sun Public Salary database, Cash earned $184,000 in 2019.

Cash’s tenure at FSU coincided, however, with significant enrollment decline and high turnover within her division.

According to the Spring 2020 semester enrollment data, the total student population at FSU fell each of the three semesters that Cash was VP of Enrollment Management. It is important to note that Cash came to Frostburg in October 2018, thus is not responsible for the Fall 2018 enrollment period. Declining college enrollment is a national issue; however, and has been anticipated since the low birth rates of the 1980’s. Add this to the COVID-19 pandemic and reports that say colleges all over the country are seeing smaller incoming classes than expected, and it becomes unclear just how much of FSU’s enrollment decline is attributable to Cash.

Nonetheless, significant personnel turnover in Cash’s division caused concern across campus over the last year. In October 2019 Cash announced that both Patricia Gregory and Wray Blair were retiring and leaving the Division of Enrollment Management. Gregory had been with FSU since 1983 and was the Director of Admissions. According to LinkedIn, Blair’s “retirement” did not last long as he accepted the Director of Admissions position at Ashland University in February 2020. Multiple other admissions counselors left in the Fall 2019 semester, as well. An anonymous staff member in the Student Support office says that the root of the turnover, “lies directly at Arlene Cash’s feet.”

Furthermore, the Division of Enrollment Management was understaffed leading into the Fall 2020 semester. In February 2020, J. Michael Harpe, the Interim Director of Admissions departed from FSU after only one week on the job. In a resulting investigation, TBL found that Harpe was actively under Title IX investigation for a complaint filed by a female coworker at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore where Harpe was accused of creating a sexually hostile work environment and for firing the woman in retaliation.

After Harpe’s resignation, Cash said, “I plan on being in that seat [Director of Admissions], personally, while we do another search.” It does not appear that a full-time permanent Director of Admissions was identified over the last six months to replace Harpe or Cash.

President Nowaczyk did cite some of Cash’s achievements in his announcement on Friday. “During her tenure here, VP Cash took several important steps to improve admissions and student success, including reorganizing several of our admissions operations, increasing our undergraduate application pool through the use of the Common App, and working to establish our cohort of student success coaches,” he wrote. The cohort of student success coaches who are tasked with guiding incoming freshmen through their first year to ensure retention were hired in December 2019. The program is still in its infancy.

The Office of Admissions and Financial Aid will now report to Dr. Alan Walker. Walker was previously announced as the Assistant to the President, an entirely new position which was initially described as a one-year appointment. The Academic Success Network and the Registrar’s Office will now report to Interim Provost Mike Mathias. Mathias is in the acting role of Provost following Dr. Elizabeth Throop’s resignation from the position. Throop; however, has not left FSU and is teaching three sections of Sociology 100 and one section of Sociology 224, Cultural Anthropology, in the Fall 2020 semester.

Cash has not returned TBL’s request for comment on her firing, but for students, the news comes at a time when morale was already low.

“I just feel like with Frostburg these days it’s just disappointment after disappointment. That’s why people are transferring and your enrollment is down. There’s no reason to stay at this point! No one is enjoying their time at your University, Frostburg State!” says Senior Alexis Walker.