Fisheries hot topic at UAPB

Alumni, faculty back chancellor

PINE BLUFF — An effort to shift administrative control of the aquaculture and fisheries program away from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff has prompted ongoing debate among fish growers, university officials and UAPB alumni.

Farmers and wildlife experts ship samples to the UAPB center’s fish pathology unit to identify diseases and halt their spread, and industry insiders have said the school’s program is among the best. The program is the only one at UAPB to offer a doctorate.

Members of UAPB’s National Advisory Committee on Aquaculture are leading a push to place administrative control of the

aquaculture and fisheries program under the University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, saying they are unhappy with changes that UAPB Chancellor Laurence Alexander has proposed regarding research methods.

Last week, the committee passed a nonbinding resolution supporting such a move. But University of Arkansas System President Donald Bobbitt has said that moving any part of UAPB’s aquaculture and fisheries program to another entity is not up for discussion.

One of the chancellor’s research proposals includes seeking grants for cutting-sciences such as nanotechnology, which is the manipulation of matter on an atomic, molecular and supramolecular scale.

“There is a lot of misunderstanding of what we are doing,” Alexander said. “We are simply expanding … not seeking to change. There are ways to improve and ways we can become even better.”

Meanwhile, UAPB’s faculty senate and alumni representatives have expressed support for keeping all aspects of the program on campus.

Tammie Hall, UAPB’s national alumni president, spoke out in defense of Alexander and Bobbitt in a letter addressed to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette last week, saying that the university leaders know what is in the best interest of UAPB and all of its programs.

“We wanted to make you aware that alumni stand strongly behind Dr. Laurence Alexander … on the issue,” Hall wrote.

“Dr. Alexander fully understands the relevance of the stakeholders and the continuance of collaboration while aligning with the university’s research mission. He has further indicated that academic freedom is of importance to him, which allows faculty to broaden their research perspective,” Hall wrote.

Michael Bates, president of UAPB’s assembly and senate, said moving administrative control of the aquaculture and fisheries program away from Alexander’s office “would be harmful to the university’s image and future growth.”

“This program is an integral part of who we are as a university. Over the years, the university has invested numerous resources to bring this program to prominence in our state and world.”

But Mike Freeze, a Lonoke County fish farmer and the advisory committee’s vice chairman, said moving the program would allow it to be “run by those who know agriculture and how it operates.”

The committee operates independently of the university and holds no authoritative power. One of the aquaculture and fisheries program’s requirements for receiving federal dollars from the USDA, however, is seeking input from and working with such stakeholders.

At last week’s advisory committee meeting, Alexander told committee members that they had overstepped , saying: “This is outside the scope of anything you should be involved in. This is not the way advisory groups work. They don’t control; they seek support. I want this group to work with me and sustain this program at UAPB.”

Carole Engle, director of UAPB’s aquaculture and fisheries program, has supported the advisory committee’s stance and said last week that she plans to resign in the coming months over the issue.

She said pursuing more new research would damage the program’s current mission of assisting fish growers with such work as disease testing and prevention.

Engle also said that recent administrative structural changes, such as having her report directly to James O. Garner Jr., the interim dean and director of UAPB’s School of Agriculture, have created friction.

Engle said she has received “very little response or guidance” from Garner since she began reporting to him last year, a move directed by Alexander. Garner has deferred to the chancellor when asked about the aquaculture and fisheries program.

Engle and members of the advisory committee say the conflict began when Alexander took the helm at UAPB in 2013 and asked for more vigorous research campus-wide.

Alexander said his proposals would in no way hinder the program’s current work.

Bobbitt said any changes to the program would have to be vetted through the UA board of trustees.

Freeze and other advisory committee members say they are currently talking with Arkansas legislators about the issue in hopes of “finding another option” to shift control over the aquaculture and fisheries program at UAPB to the UA Division of Agriculture.

Arkansas is the second-largest producer of aquaculture products in the United States, behind Mississippi.