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(June 25, 2009) One CoB, Two Deans Within days of them taking the reins at their new b-school dean posts, former CoB administrators Harold Doty (University of Texas – Tyler) and Farhang Niroomand (University of Houston – Victoria) had worked and re-worked their "Dean's Message" statements on their respective college/school websites. Each had also experimented with multiple accompanying photographs before settling in on a preferred one. CoB dean Lance Nail, however, has yet to even draft a single "Dean's Message" for the USM website, even though he's been on board as CoB dean since 1-July-08 (12 months ago). As shown below, Nail's page continues to state that a message is coming soon, and it has for many months now.

(July 6, 2009) New Era Dawns With all of the crises (e.g., budget, numerous interim administrators) facing USM these days, one hardly noticed that the calendar turned on July-09 at midweek last week and that the "new CoB" was born. Gone is the CoB that former associate CoB dean Farhang Niroomand told the world, or at least all of the colleges and universities he applied to during the past 18 months, he alone created. Yes, 1-July-09 ushered in the "new [Lance] Nail CoB," complete with about twice as many departments as the old version headed by former CoB dean Harold Doty. There were no parades or fireworks, just new administrators, like Kirby "Skip" Hughes in accounting, moving into their new suites.

(July14, 2009) The CoB's New BEDS Reporters at USMNEWS.net have noted time and again that the CoB's webpages have failed to note the presence of new faculty members since 2008 (and partially since 2007). Again, as of 14-July-09 there is no evidence of new CoB faculty like Barry Cumbie (MIS), Deniz Gevrek (ECO), Bret Becton (MGT), or Jamye Foster (MKT), etc. Not only that, CoB dean Lance Nail's "Dean's Message" has yet to be uploaded, despite Nail having been on board since 1-July-08.

(July 23, 2009) Accreditors Beckon USM faculty are now posting on the USM Forum – Message Board that, based on discussions with USM administration, academic programs that fall victim to the current budgetary crisis do not have to be supported beyond the year in which the cuts are made. This means that stories about funding the programs until their current students graduate are inaccurate.

(August 6, 2009) breaking news . .. CoB Announces New Honors House HATTIESBURG – According to a 6-Aug-09 USM presser by Van Arnold entitled "College of Business Set to Unveil New Honors House," USM has renovated the old Kappa Sigma fraternity house, which was lost to the fraternity as a result of a hazing incident in Sept-08, to create a new Honors House for USM's b-school.

(August 7, 2009) Special Report Another Nail Pal in the Bad Column? Am Investigative Report on CoB Teaching Quality The recent USMNEWS.net report Another Trip Down Memory Lane? covered the recent hiring of Arthur Sorochinsky, who is coming from the University of Alabama – Birmingham to teach the SoA's new accounting information systems course. That report speculated that, because of Sorochinsky's Birmingham roots, new SoA director Skip Huhges was either coaxed or instructed by CoB dean Lance Nail to hire the finance professor for an accounting spot. As reported previously, Nail's academic area is finance, and before coming to USM Nail was the finance chair at UAB.