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IHL board picks internal choice to head JSU

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1 year ago

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The Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees named Marcus Thompson, a deputy commissioner, the 13th president of Jackson State University by the Institutions of Higher Learning Board of Trustees. He will start on Nov. 27.

Thompson, who has worked at IHL since 2009, has no experience leading a university, and his appointment is reminiscent of IHL’s decision to hire Glenn Boyce to head the University of Mississippi, even though Boyce lead IHL’s search for that university. Both decisions eschewed search candidates in favor of an internal hire.

Thompson would not say if he had applied for the job, but he did complete an interview.

“That’s a hiring issue for the board,” Thompson told Mississippi Today. “I don’t really feel comfortable talking about the internal process.”

There’s much at stake with this hire: Thompson will be watched closely by a university community that doesn’t want this presidency to end in resignation like the last three. The decision comes about a month after IHL was scheduled to make this hire and was made during executive session at the board’s regular meeting Thursday.

“I don’t even think of this in terms of the title of ‘president,’” Thompson said. “In my heart, it’s about being a servant leader for all of our stakeholders.”

Trustee Steven Cunningham, the only Jackson State alumnus on the board and the chair of the presidential search, did not attend the meeting in person to take questions from the media. He did not answer a call from Mississippi Today.

“The Board selected a leader who knows the unique historic importance of the university who will articulate a bold vision for the future and will be indefatigable in the pursuit of excellence for Jackson State University,” Cunningham said in IHL’s press release.

The leadership turnover at Jackson State, the largest historically Black university in Mississippi, has also affected progress on key issues that have hurt enrollment, like campus security, housing shortages and an aging water system. Other ambitious goals, like a new football stadium, have fallen to the wayside.

“One of the things I’ve gained over the years is a lot of knowledge of all the working areas of the university,” he said. “Because of my work, I know about the institutions. I’ve worked with a lot of state officials, legislators. There were already a lot of good relationships there.”

That means Thomspon will have to hit the ground running for the legislative session.

“Marcus Thompson has a deep understanding of the vital role HBCUs play in higher education,” Sen. Sollie Norwood said in IHL’s press release. “His proven leadership will serve him well in taking Jackson State University to new heights.”

Thompson will also need to work to increase trust between IHL, administration and stakeholders like faculty and staff who supported Temporary Acting President Elayne Hayes-Anthony and criticized the presidential search process as lacking transparency.

READ MORE: Only JSU alum on IHL board votes against allowing acting president to apply for permanent role

“Obviously, I’ll spend a lot of time listening to all of the stakeholders on campus,” Thompson said.

Though Jackson State’s financial position has largely recovered from Carolyn Meyers’ tenure, Thompson is also facing concerns that have been raised this year about possible misspending of restricted dollars by the cash-strapped Jackson State Development Foundation.

At listening sessions earlier this year, the community asked the board to bring someone new to the university — a point that multiple trustees took note of.

“Stop hiring your friends,” said Carrine Bishop, a faculty member whose family has deep roots at JSU. “ We need to vet every individual.”

Thompson earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and Spanish and a Master’s degree in Education from Mississippi College. He holds a Doctor of Philosophy degree from Jackson State University in urban higher education

IHL made the decision during the executive session at Thursday’s board meeting, the last meeting of the year. Trustees were increasingly under pressure to choose a president to lead the historically Black college in Mississippi’s capital city.

“We definitely need to make a decision,” the current board president, gastroenterologist Alfred McNair, said before executive session. “That’s the biggest thing we need to do.”

McNair added that the board was aware of the community’s feeling that Jackson State could have avoided the past three resignations if IHL had done a better job of looking into candidates’ backgrounds.

“We’re doing our best job to get all the information we can as far as background checks,” McNair said, shaking his head. “We’re doing the best job we can to make sure we choose the right person. We’ve taken a long time – longer than usual – because we’re really trying to make sure we cover all areas A to Z.”

Jason Johnson, the Jackson State student body president, said his biggest question is what will the university’s next permanent president do to address campus security in the wake of an unsolved shooting that killed one student leader in an on-campus apartment complex.

If he had the chance, Johnson said he would have asked candidates “what are your intentions as far as student public safety?”

Johnson added it was important to him that Jackson State’s new president have experience in higher education.

After the meeting, most trustees refused to take questions. Alfred Rankins, the IHL commissioner, escorted trustee Jeanne Luckey in her wheelchair through a gaggle of TV reporters, repeatedly saying “no comment” before going into a sideroom. 

McNair also said “no comment.”

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Mississippi lawmakers end 2025 session unable to agree (or even meet about) state budget: Legislative recap

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16 hours ago

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April 7, 2025

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mississippitoday.org – @GeoffPender – 2025-04-07 11:50:00

by Geoff Pender, Mississippi Today
April 7, 2025

Infighting between Mississippi’s Republican House and Senate legislative leaders reached DEFCON 4 as the 2025 legislative session sputtered to a close last week.

Lawmakers gaveled out unable to set a $7 billion state budget — their main job — or to even agree to negotiate. Gov. Tate Reeves will force them back into session sometime before the end of the fiscal year June 30. At a press conference last week, the governor assured he would do so but did not give a timetable, other than saying he plans to give lawmakers some time to cool off.

The crowning achievement of the 2025 session was passage of a tax overhaul bill a majority of legislators accidentally voted for because of errors in its math. House leaders and the governor nevertheless celebrated passage of the measure, which will phase out the state individual income tax over about 14 years, more quickly trim the sales tax on some groceries to 5% raise the tax on gasoline by 9 cents a gallon, then have automatic gas tax increases thereafter based on the cost of road construction.

The error in the Senate bill accidentally removed safeguards that chamber’s leadership wanted to ensure the income tax would be phased out only if the state sees robust economic growth and controls spending.

The rope-a-dope the House used with the Senate errors to pass the measure also stripped a safeguard House leaders had wanted: a 1.5 cents on the dollar increase in the state’s sales tax, which would have brought it to 8.5%. House leaders said such an increase was needed to offset cutting more than $2 billion from the state’s $7 billion general fund revenue by eliminating the income tax, and to ensure local governments would be kept whole.

Reeves was nonplussed about the flaws in the bill he signed into law (at one point denying there were errors in it) and called it “One big, beautiful bill,” borrowing a phrase from President Donald Trump.

https://youtu.be/8ovOtFj0vFE

Quote of the Week

“Quite frankly, I think it’s chicken shit what they did.” — Gov. Tate Reeves, at a press conference last week when asked his thoughts about the Senate rejecting his nomination of Cory Custer, Reeves’ deputy chief of staff, to serve as four-year term on the board of Mississippi Public Broadcasting.

Full Legislative Coverage

What happened (or didn’t) in the rancorous 2025 Mississippi Legislative session?

Mississippi Today’s political team unpacks the just ended — for now — legislative session, that crashed at the end with GOP lawmakers unable to pass a budget after much infighting among Republican leaders. The crowning achievement of the session, a tax overhaul bill, was passed by accident and full of major errors and omissions. Listen to the podcast.

Gov. Tate Reeves, legislative leaders tout tax cut, but for some, it could be a tax increase

Many of those retirees who do not pay an income tax under state law and other Mississippians as well will face a tax increase under this newly passed legislation touted by Reeves and others. Read the column.

Trump administration slashes education funding. Mississippi leaders and schools panic

Mississippi schools and the state education system are set to lose over $137 million in federal funds after the U.S. Department of Education halted access to pandemic-era grant money, state leaders said this week. Read the story.

Gov. Tate Reeves says he’ll call Mississippi lawmakers back in special session after they failed to set budget

Gov. Tate Reeves on Thursday said he will call lawmakers into a special session to adopt a budget before state agencies run out of money later in the summer and hinted he might force legislators to consider other measures.  Read the story.

GOP-controlled Senate rejects governor’s pick for public broadcasting board. Reeves calls it ‘chicken s–t’

The Senate on Wednesday roundly rejected the nomination of Cory Custer, Reeves’ deputy chief of staff, to serve a four-year term on the board of directors of Mississippi Public Broadcasting, the statewide public radio and television network. Reeves reacted to the Senate’s vote on Thursday, calling it “chicken shit.” Read the story.

Early voting proposal killed on last day of Mississippi legislative session

Mississippi will remain one of only three states without no-excuse early voting or no-excuse absentee voting.  Read the story.

Mississippi Legislature ends 2025 session without setting a budget over GOP infighting 

The House on Wednesday voted to end what had become a futile legislative session without passing a budget to fund state government, for the first time in 16 years. The Senate is expected to do the same on Thursday.  Read the story.

Mississippi Legislature approves DEI ban after heated debate

Mississippi lawmakers have reached an agreement to ban diversity, equity and inclusion programs and a list of “divisive concepts” from public schools across the state education system, following the lead of numerous other Republican-controlled states and President Donald Trump’s administration.   Read the story.

Fear and loathing: Legislative session crashes with lawmakers unable to set a budget because of Republican infighting

Republican Lt. Gov. Delbert Hosemann and other Senate leaders on Saturday excoriated the Republican House leadership, after the House didn’t show up for what was supposed to be “conference weekend” to haggle out a $7 billion budget. Read the story.

‘We’ll go another year’ without relief: Pharmacy benefit manager reform likely dead

Hotly contested legislation that aimed to increase the transparency and regulation of pharmacy benefit managers appeared dead in the water Tuesday after a lawmaker challenged the bill for a rule violation. Read the story.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

The post Mississippi lawmakers end 2025 session unable to agree (or even meet about) state budget: Legislative recap appeared first on mississippitoday.org

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On this day in 1909, Matthew Henson reached the North Pole

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2 days ago

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April 6, 2025

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mississippitoday.org – @MSTODAYnews – 2025-04-06 07:00:00

by Jerry Mitchell, Mississippi Today
April 6, 2025

April 6, 1909

Matthew Henson arrived ahead of the Admiral Peary Expedition to plant the American flag at the North Pole.

Matthew Henson reached the North Pole, planting the American flag. Traveling with the Admiral Peary Expedition, Henson reportedly reached the North Pole almost 45 minutes before Peary and the rest of the men. 

“As I stood there on top of the world and I thought of the hundreds of men who had lost their lives in the effort to reach it, I felt profoundly grateful that I had the honor of representing my race,” he said. 

While some would later dispute whether the expedition had actually reached the North Pole, Henson’s journey seems no less amazing. 

Born in Maryland to sharecropping parents who survived attacks by the KKK, he grew up working, becoming a cabin boy and sailing around the world. 

After returning, he became a salesman at a clothing store in Washington, D.C., where he waited on a customer named Robert Peary. Pearywas so impressed with Henson and his tales of the sea that he hired him as his personal valet. 

Henson joined Peary on a trip to Nicaragua. Impressed with Henson’s seamanship, Peary made Henson his “first man” on the expeditions that followed to the Arctic. When the expedition returned, Peary drew praise from the world while Henson’s contributions were ignored. 

Over time, his work came to be recognized. In 1937, he became the first African-American life member of The Explorers Club. Seven years later, he received the Peary Polar Expedition Medal and was received at the White House by President Truman and later President Eisenhower. 

“There can be no vision to the (person) the horizon of whose vision is limited by the bounds of self,” he said. “But the great things of the world, the great accomplishments of the world, have been achieved by (people with) … high ideals and … great visions. The path is not easy, the climb is rugged and hard, but the glory at the end is worthwhile.” 

Henson died in 1955, and his body was re-interred with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery. The U.S. Postal Service featured him on a stamp, and the U.S. Navy named a Pathfinder class ship after him. In 2000, the National Geographic Society awarded him the Hubbard Medal.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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A win for press freedom: Judge dismisses Gov. Phil Bryant’s lawsuit against Mississippi Today

Published

3 days ago

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April 5, 2025

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mississippitoday.org – @GanucheauAdam – 2025-04-04 13:35:00

by Mississippi Today, Mississippi Today
April 4, 2025

Madison County Circuit Court Judge Bradley Mills dismissed former Gov. Phil Bryant’s defamation lawsuit against Mississippi Today on Friday, ending a nearly two-year case that became a beacon in the fight for American press freedom.

For the past 22 months, we’ve vigorously defended our Pulitzer Prize-winning reporting and our characterizations of Bryant’s role in the Mississippi welfare scandal. We are grateful today that the court, after careful deliberation, dismissed the case.

The reporting speaks for itself. The truth speaks for itself.

This judgment is so much more than vindication for Mississippi Today — it’s a monumental victory for every single Mississippian. Journalism is a public good that all of us deserve and need. Too seldom does our state’s power structure offer taxpayers true government accountability, and Mississippians routinely learn about the actions of their public officials only because of journalism like ours. This reality is precisely why we launched our newsroom nine years ago, and it’s why we devoted so much energy and spent hundreds of thousands of dollars defending ourselves against this lawsuit. It was an existential threat to our organization that took time and resources away from our primary responsibilities — which is often the goal of these kinds of legal actions. But our fight was never just about us; it was about preserving the public’s sacred, constitutional right to critical information that journalists provide, just as our nation’s Founding Fathers intended.

Mississippi Today remains as committed as ever to deep investigative journalism and working to provide government accountability. We will never be afraid to reveal the actions of powerful leaders, even in the face of intimidation or the threat of litigation. And we will always stand up for Mississippians who deserve to know the truth, and our journalists will continue working to catalyze justice for people in this state who are otherwise cheated, overlooked, or ignored.

We appreciate your support, and we are honored to serve you with the high quality, public service journalism you’ve come to expect from Mississippi Today.

READ MORE: Judge Bradley Mills’ order dismissing the case

READ MORE: Mississippi Today’s brief in support of motion to dismiss

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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