Officials at Mays Business School are furious over questions about its record being questioned by an article Monday in the University of Texas' student newspaper, The Daily Texan.
Daily Texan writer Lomi Kriel questioned the validity of the school's ranking in April's U.S News and World Report graduate school rankings.
Mays Business School earned 23rd place, the same as UT's McCombs Business School.
Kriel said the rankings were suspect because records of A&M's graduate placement, which ranked first in the country in job placement at graduation and job placement three months after graduation, were not made available to her.
A&M ranked 62nd and 74th, respectively, in the same categories last year.
"But after outshining even schools such as Harvard, A&M could not verify any of its data," Kriel wrote in the article. "An open records request yielded figures that backed up UT's 2003-2004 results, but A&M officials said no such records exist at their school."
The Faculty Senate will hold a faculty/staff meeting today to discuss the article and allegations that the school embellished its records to score high in the prestigious U.S. News rankings. The meeting is set for 2 p.m. in Wehner 160.
"Honestly, this was an attempt by (Kriel) to tarnish the image of our program," said Associate Dean for Masters Programs John Dinkel. "And I consider it to be outrageous and unfounded."
Dinkel said the article was an attempt by The Daily Texan to deflect criticism directed toward UT's dismal placement record for 2003-2004.
Texas beat out only Penn State.
Graduate Business and Career Services director Jim Dixie was directly quoted by Kriel as saying A&M did not keep graduate employment placement records.
"I have no clue what she's talking about," Dixie said. " I never told her we didn't have the records. She would be a good candidate to write for The New York Times."
Dixie said Kriel asked for records containing students' names, contact information, employer, supervisor's contact information, salaries and bonuses. He said giving her access to the records would constitute a violation of privacy and damage A&M's reputation and relationship with employers.
"Think about it," Dixie said. "As a graduate student, do you want to wake up one day to see your name and employer and salary published in the newspaper?"
"Let me set the record straight," Dinkel said. "She distorted the article to say that we don't keep records. She didn't print what she asked us for or why she wanted it."
Dixie said the motivation behind the article went beyond responsible reporting.
"The whole approach here was 'this is impossible because you're A&M and we're UT,'" Dixie said. "This is not an A&M issue, this is a UT issue," Dixie said.
CORRECTIONS: The original story ran in the Daily Texan on June 16. The Mays faculty, not the A&M Faculty Senate, met in closed session June 23. The University Texas business school tied with Texas A&M in the U.S. News rankings.
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