It appears that being a nationally recognized wetlands expert and working to save the coastline is not good for an academic career in Louisiana. We can read all about it in the Baton Rouge Daily Advocate.
Paul Keddy’s university issued the following press release about him May 2:
Southeastern Louisiana University wetlands expert Paul Keddy has been selected from researchers across the country to receive the 2007 National Wetlands Award for Science Research co-presented by the Environmental Law Institute.
The prize will be awarded at a national ceremony May 9 at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. Five other individuals will also be recognized in other categories. Keddy, Southeastern’s Schlieder Endowed Chair for Environmental Studies, will receive the award in recognition of his work in developing strategic plans for scientific wetland restoration.
“The award recognizes the seminal work in wetlands ecology that Dr. Keddy has developed and is sharing with students and colleagues as we work on rebuilding our wetlands environment,” said Southeastern President Randy Moffett. “This award Dr. Keddy’s work as among the most comprehensive treatments available on wetland conservation.”
Keddy is the author of more than 100 scholarly papers on plant ecology and has been designated a Highly Cited Researcher in Ecology and Environment by the Institute for Scientific Information. He has written internationally-acclaimed books, including “Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation,” a work considered fundamental for students and professionals involved in wetland conservation and management and which received the Society of Wetland Scientists’ Merit Award. His book, “Competition,” received the Lawson Medal by the Canadian Botanical Association and the Gleason Prize by the New York Botanical Garden. He co-edited “Ecological Assembly Rules: Perspectives, Advances, Retreats” and “The World’s Largest Wetlands: Ecology and Conservation,” a 10-year research project involving 22 authors to catalog by size and significance the top 11 wetlands on earth.
“The Schlieder Endowed Chair has been very important in allowing me to continue my research,” said Keddy, who was recruited as Southeastern’s first Schlieder Chair in 1999. “I have taken risks, spoken openly and honestly about important issues and pushed the boundaries of wetland ecology to achieve maximum benefits for the citizens of Louisiana, as well as for the plant and animal species so important to our environment. It is also recognition that wetlands conservation is a global ecological and environmental concern and an issue of tremendous and immediate importance.”
“In addition to the support provided by the university, the work of Professor Keddy has been supported by our EPA-funded Pontchartrain Basin Research Program,” said Daniel McCarthy, dean of the College of Science and Technology. “We are delighted that the work that has come from this program is proving to have such a widespread impact.”
A native of Ottawa, Canada, and resident of Ponchatoula, Keddy’s current work focuses on biodiversity and competition among marsh plants. Forthcoming work includes a 35-page environmental history of the Manchac Swamp, a book chapter on the beneficial effects of alligators in wetlands, a new text on plant ecology and an eco-tourist guide to Louisiana.
Keddy’s web site includes his research papers as well as pages of advice for students, commentaries on scientific and environmental concerns and descriptions of work in progress. […]
Then they relieved him of his endowed chair. I wish I had sources at his institution who could say what was going on.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
Humm…
Asher Heimermann
http://blog.asherheimermann.com
Why would they do something like this? I don’t understand.
It’s not necessarily as bad as it sounds, because these name chairs do rotate or are intended to do so, at least as I understand it.
In theory it could just be that they have some other massively underpaid person who is publishing well and who they want to keep – there is a small salary supplement in the name chairs, and a small course reduction. Or, in theory, it could be that the faculty person in question has just committed a felony and will have to go on administrative leave anyway.
However it would seem that for someone like this Keddy, especially at the current juncture, none of that fits – and it looks as though they are trying to silence his research.
I wonder if it is just that there is an administrator who doesn’t like him – maybe he voted in a way that displeased someone?
Paul Keddy got fired for getting a bit too close to the truth. Shell and Southeastern University have a long history togther and Shell depends on Southeastern to go along with the program in regards to wetlands.
That program is oil exploration has no impact on the wetlands.
Now my guess is that Shell oil is destroying the Wetlands and our friend Paul Keddy has proof. Scientific proof, not circumstantial like writers like myself tend to have. I am just a snooper, not a scientist…
Since Keddy is doing research on the wetlands it was only a matter of times before a scientist like Keddy mustered up enough courage to actually say what everyone in science community is thinking.
Shell Oil gives Southeastern University lots and lots of money. Many of it’s alumni (from the science department) go on to have long careers with Shell Oil. Shell Oil funded Southeastern University’s new (2004) environmental major, well at least one of the labs.
This bs
http://www.americaswetland.com
That’s Shell Oil.
This is why foundations and the corporations love the dumb kind of environmentalist that wants nothing to do with politics or reading or research or talking to people outside of other vegans.
Nothing is a coincidence, nothing is a separate issue.
Well at least they didn’t kill him, I mean they could have killed him that’s not outside the scope of possibility.
Lo
Thanks Lo – and that’s fascinating re SLU and Shell. Kill him, sure they would, these oil companies *really* play hardball.
However – one note for all – he’s not fired, he’s just moved out of the endowed chair. These chairs here in LA are sponsored, small salary supplements, honorific titles, and sometimes a small course reduction. They are renewable. They’re not a job, they’re an honor you can have sometimes while you are at your job. Keddy may not want to stay without the endowed chair, but I am quite sure it’s true he still keeps his regular tenured job at SLU.
Well that’s not nearly as fun…everytime you type LA I think you mean Los Angeles, but then I remember you’re not in la la land…
I’m still wondering though when is someone with a science degree just going to come out and talk about big oil and the wetlands. I feel like a kid before Xmas, someone is dying to say it. Why don’t they just do it?
My request to Santa this year will be scientific proof that Shell is killing the wetlands off Louisiana.
Lo
Well I used to live in L.A. and there were lots of Louisianians there, it’s sort of an outpost, and it’s funny that they have the same initials!
Maybe Keddy will publish that himself. The thing is that, despite the fact that the removal from the endowed chair is officially non-apocalyptic, it’s pretty clear that they’re trying to slow down his work. He’ll have more teaching duties and less research time. In my departments / my school, a lot of the ‘rotation’ of these endowed chairs is more or less non-controversial: it’s sort of like, whoever has been publishing the most gets a three-year stint at the endowed chair. In my department, someone who was producing the way he has been, would get renewed in the endowed chair. So in his case, this is repression.
One day about a few months ago I was remembering all of my drives over the Atchafalaya Swamp, so I decided to look it up on wiki. This portion made me sad.
Degradation of the buffer marshes
Aerial view of the Big Island Mining Project restoration site on Atchafalaya Bay.The control of the river’s floods, along with those of the Mississippi, has become a controversial issue in recent decades. It is now widely suspected that the channeling of the river and subsequent lowering of siltation rates has resulted in severe degradation of the surrounding saltmarsh wetlands as well as widespread submerging of populated and agricultural lands of the bayou country. The US Geological Survey (USGS) reports that over 29 square miles (75 square kilometers) of land is lost to the sea each year.[5]
The coastal salt marshes form a buffer zone protecting the entire coast of Louisiana from the effects of hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico and dissipating their accompanying storm surges. The marshes depend on replenishment from deposited silt, which is now being deposited over the edge of the continental shelf, due to the artificially canalized flow of the Mississippi. From the 1950s through 1970s, the oil industry dredged deep channels into the marsh so that they could move barges in as work platforms. The edges continued to degrade, until wide shallow channels in the saltmarsh have resulted.[6]
The disappearance of the delta country is considered by many environmentalists, as well as by the State of Louisiana, to be one of the most significant ecological threats in the United States. The loss of the delta lands was discussed by author Mike Tidwell in his 2003 book Bayou Farewell: The Rich Life and Tragic Death of Louisiana’s Cajun Coast.
Profacero,
They haven’t just moved him out of the chair. They have increased his course load in spite of the fact that he has a physical disability, and they have violated his contract by taking away his office assistant.
Blagueur
CM, yes, isn’t it awful? And Joe, those things should be fightable on their own terms, right? If they were using the endowed chair to accomodate the physical disability, wasn’t that an irregularity – shouldn’t that be a separate issue – at LSU anyway, I don’t think HRM would be at all pleased with that arrangement, it isn’t ADA complaint, which makes the University vulnerable to lawsuits, which they do not like. Office assistant, contract, if it’s in his contract he should be able to get them back, depending on how it is written, of course.
I mean, it’s a clear case of repression but still, if they’re that poorly covered on it, a lot of this is bluster. He probably can’t make them give back the endowed chair, but I’d bet he can make them be ADA complaint and also fulfill his contract. Were I he, I would call one of these tough Baton Rouge labor lawyers, the kind that win against Exxon and LSU, and see what kind of effect a well worded letter from such a firm might have.
Finally – note that this is precisely what tenure is about: academic freedom. Keddy has tenure so he cannot be fired except for things like malfeasance. The worst they can do is what they’ve done. That is why tenure is a good thing, and that is what it is designed to protect – academic freedom.
For more on threats to tenure and academic freedom in the New Orleans area please drop by my blog for this post:
http://joefromla.blogspot.com/2007/05/aaup-report-post-katrina-some.html
Thanks for posting that link, Joe – I got the text by e-mail and in hard copy and had seen it so many times, I didn’t have the heart. But it is important.