To the editor:

Saturday’s column critical of Kansas University Provost David Shulenburger was a disservice to honest journalism and a good man. Its author, Journal-World editor Dolph C. Simons Jr., apparently believes that labeling his words as commentary absolves him of a journalist’s responsibility to be fair and to name sources of damning facts or opinions.

Claiming as his sources “Many, both on and off campus” and a “sizable number of faculty,” he writes that the provost’s office has been a “bottleneck” stopping worthy projects and that the provost quickly says no to requests rather than adopting a can-do attitude. Without bothering to interview him, he imagines a “quote” from Chancellor Hemenway suggesting he held the door open for the provost rather than asking him to stay.

In truth, this provost has a remarkable record of accomplishment. At a time when most public universities were suffering financially, he spearheaded a tuition retention plan and much needed tuition increases to fund new faculty, provide raises to current faculty and purchase badly needed equipment.

Shulenburger also is a man of compassion and integrity. One example is how hard he worked to rescue the university’s lowest paid employees from a state system that kept wages so low that many were below the poverty level.

The Journal-World would have been better served had its editor produced honest commentary, attributing opinions to named people, or at least confessed that the damning opinions were his own and not those of unnamed sources at the university.

Ted Fredrickson,

Tonganoxie