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A horrifying public drama is being played out by the governing board of the five-member Maricopa Community College District, which has created a paralyzing fear among observers.
 
Rogue Trustees, as they are called, indulge in various unfavourable activities such as levelling personal attacks and bickering in public against each other, intimidating and micromanaging employees, trying to censor students run newspaper and undermining the authority of the Chancellor among many other things. There is no dearth of offensive comments against religion, ethnicity, race and gender, says an independent consulting group.

Rogue tactics adopted by them is evident in the manner the board member Jerry Walker completely rewrote the policies laid out by the governance. He even went to the extent of deleting references to sustainability and diversity in a bid to replace the power of the chancellor with that of the board. All this came to the attention of the local media even though the changes have not been accepted.

The unscrupulous behaviour of the board came into limelight when there was a complaint from an anonymous employee in Maricopa to the Higher Learning Commission. Following this complaint, the commission asked Rufus Glasper, the Chancellor to review the conduct of the board with the help of a consultant group.

September saw the group releasing a harsh report which reprimanded severely the board for its misconduct and ill behaviour. The report even referred to them as rogue trustees and threatened them to desist from extremely unfavourable behaviour.
Dr. Terry O’Banion, one of the researchers coined the term ‘rogue trustee’ in his report which brought to light some of the miscreants in higher education. According to this Walden University Community College Leadership Program director, rogue trustees do not bother about any standards or norms of public behaviour and do not act in a responsible manner as stipulated by the office to which they have been elected. Their own selfish interests are of prime importance to them.

 Contrary to creating and fostering a sense of values, innovation and collaboration in students, they poison the culture of the college and believe in violating laws all the time. They only end up creating fear, subterfuge, paranoia and defensiveness in those around them that result in great damage.

Now, at a time when America desperately needs a solid system based on discipline and interactive quality education, a set of rogue trustees can really hamper progress to a great extent. It is important to nip them in the bud in order to protect the institutions from being ransacked. O’Banion’s report was recommended for the consultants dealing with the Maricopa community colleges case as they analyzed the situation. According to O’Banion, this is a closet issue that has to be dealt with an iron hand.

O’Banion sympathized with the plight of the Maricopa community colleges, which he called was among one of the best community colleges in the nation. He said that it will take a long time for the college to recover from the damage caused by the rogue trustees but assured that the college is strong enough to face the challenge and come out of the situation.