|
In the spring of 1991, the department personnel committee awarded Fabrikant a merit increase, the highest of anyone in the department, in recognition of the excellence of his work as a teacher and researcher. He responded by making fresh demands: he asked Osman for a four-month paid leave to accept a $4,500-a-month fellowship in France. The request was denied on the grounds that it contravened university policy. He couldn’t be paid twice, but he could, if he wished, take a leave of absence. In July, he informed Sheshadri Sankar that he’d been awarded a $10,000 grant by NASA, which could eventually lead to a much larger grant. He wanted to drop all his work for CONCAVE to devote his time to his new project, this despite his contractual agreement to do research relevant to CONCAVE. In early October, he asked Osman for permission to use a $7,000 research grant he’d received from the internal granting system to purchase a release from his teaching responsibilities given the demands of his research work. This, in the circumstances, was outrageous. Osman called Fabrikant to say his request violated both university and federal regulations. Research funds had to be used for research. “Are you trying to scare me?” Fabrikant replied. “I am not scared. I wrote a letter and I want a written reply.”
Fabrikant’s petty insolence cost him a major ally — only weeks away from having his appointment reviewed. Osman wrote a stiff note informing him that what he was proposing was in fact illegal and upped the ante by requesting a detailed report on his future teaching goals. Fabrikant responded, saying he’d been told that Tom Sankar had once bought a release from teaching, and demanded an apology. He reminded Osman of the merit award he’d recently been given and went on to say that he planned to be on sabbatical the following year. (The university didn’t believe he was entitled to one.) Osman went through Fabrikant’s file and found minor discrepancies in his résumés. He asked Fabrikant for proof of his academic qualifications. Fabrikant responded with contempt. “How can a scientist like you ask a scientist like me for proof of my credentials?”
On October 25, sixteen senior members of the mechanical-engineering department met to discuss Fabrikant and passed a motion calling on both the department and the university to take action against him. They were troubled: Fabrikant was now turning his aggression on the department’s chair and former chair. A few days later the departmental personnel committee met to debate whether it was proper to consider Fabrikant’s behaviour in reviewing the extension of his contract. During one meeting, they found him outside the room, accused him of spying on them, and called Security. Fabrikant was escorted from the building. In the early hours of October 31, they decideded not to renew Fabrikant’s contract. Their written recommendation was devoted entirely to what they’d previously insisted was irrelevant. They cited his abusiveness, his attempts to evade his teaching responsibilities — and a new concern, his failure to supervise more graduate students.
On November 1, members of the committee requested an urgent meeting with members of the university’s informal intervention team, saying they were afraid Fabrikant would become violent when he learned of their decision. They wanted him followed, or better still, suspended, under emergency measures contained in the collective agreement. But the intervention team had no such power to act. And the committee wouldn’t substantiate its fears. Members of the intervention team say that they subsequently met with the rector’s new executive assistant, Maureen Habib, and told her they thought something serious was going on, though they weren’t sure what. They thought Concordia should bring in someone from outside to investigate. But the intervention team didn’t put its recommendation in writing. And Habib says she doesn’t remember any such meeting.
That same day, Fabrikant arrived at a university senate meeting ostentatiously carrying a large artist’s portfolio. Catherine MacKenzie, now an associate vice-rector responsible, among other things, for security, quickly assumed there was a gun in the portfolio. She remembered what he’d told her about solving things the American way. She’d also attended part of the intervention team meeting. MacKenzie called Concordia’s security force and had them summon the Montreal police. She then sat beside Fabrikant while he followed the proceedings with theatrical attentiveness. When the meeting ended, the police searched him. There was no gun.
The departmental personnel committee’s recommendation that Fabrikant not be renewed included a declaration of its new-found belief that the competence of a professor included not only his or her “capacity to teach and carry out research activities, it also has bearing on his (her) ethical and moral conduct. ... The lack of these qualities, especially if they interfere with the performance of other members of the university ... cannot be tolerated ... . Many persons inside and outside the university,” they wrote, but without giving specifics, “have been subjected to harassment, threats, blackmail and allegations by Dr. Fabrikant.”
Dr. Fabrikant's Solution, continued >
|
