I contacted ABET, the licensing authority that allows universities to award degrees. I later found out (PDF at the end) they did not investigate because I was in a Ph.D. program, which explains why Dr. Hull has insisted I was not a Master's student, and why President Faulkner supports him in this.
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July 29, 2002
Dr. George Peterson
ABET
Dear Dr. Peterson,
In the fall semester of 2001 I had submitted several formal complaints via email to Dr. Dayne Aldridge about problems I was having at the University of Texas at Austin, where I was in graduate school studying toward a Ph.D in Aerospace Engineering. I eventually got dismissed and when ABET took no action, I appealed for help from the U.S. Department of Education Office of Civil Rights in Dallas. They will investigate the situation as retaliation, but need proof that I engaged in a protected activity (i.e. contacting ABET) before going further. I have emailed Dr. Aldridge several times asking for him to forward the original letter I sent to him about UT, but have not heard anything back. If, in fact, you do have this letter, please forward it to Ms. Elnora Stokes at the address noted on the enclosed letter. I talked to her just this afternoon and she said her office would reopen the case immediately upon receipt of this letter from ABET.
To recap what happened at UT Austin.
I started graduate school in the fall of 1997, and by last fall had passed all the courses required for a Ph.D, and passed my written qualifying exams. I had a GPA of3.7 and had also done most ofmy research (it’s all on the web at http://www.inviticus.com) in Orbital and Celestial Mechanics. My advisor was Dr. Broucke, who was elderly and severely visually impaired. He was the last professor in Celestial Mechanics, and when he retired in the summer of 2001, I had to find another advisor, Dr. Fowler (who had been my secondary advisor since February 2001.) I had had a lot of problems with Dr.
Broucke, having signed up for a total of forty semester hours of “supervised graduate research” classes, but had gotten absolutely no supervision in any of my research. I complained about this up the UT Chain of Command, even to my Texas State Senator but all to no avail.
I eventually wrote to ABET, after which time the Department agreed to evaluate my research, but by that time Dr. Fowler had found out about my writing to ABET and quit as my advisor. He placed the attached letter in my Department file and so, when the Department Chair asked other professors in the Orbits Group if they would be my advisor, they looked at my file, and of course would not be my advisor. Dr. Fowler makes it seem as if I had not spent three solid years going patiently up the Chain of Command to have my problems with Dr. Broucke resolved, and going to ABET as a last resort. These are the “irresponsible actions” to which he refers. The small problem with the Office of Student Judicial Services involved my placing source code for my optimization program on my web site – which he supported, and encouraged – but about which somebody complained, and I had to straighten it out with the SJS office. No disciplinary action was taken.
Dr. Fowler was well aware of the problems I had been having with Dr. Broucke, and actually when Dr. Fowler became my second advisor he would not help with my research either. I was at the time signed up for six hours of “supervised research classes” (three more such hours in the summer; and nine more in the fall) and felt that if not Dr.
Broucke, then Dr. Fowler, should have helped me with my research. Dr. Fowler, whose own interests lie firmly in my trajectory optimization research area, wouldn’t give me the time of day. So I complained, and he resented my doing so. Ultimately I wrote to ABET, which clearly upset Dr. Fowler a lot, and so he quit as my advisor, and in breaching the confidentiality of my letter to ABET to everybody else in the Department, made it impossible for me to find another advisor.
There are a great many more issues involved.
(I) When I started at UT Austin they had the best Celestial Mechanics group in the world. Now they have nobody on the Graduate Studies Committee who has ever published any papers in any of the classical problems of Celestial Mechanics. I complained about this, since most of my research is in Celestial Mechanics, believing they were incorrect to expel me for trying to get what was advertised in the Graduate Catalog. To date no one at the University has even remarked on this situation.
(2) The Department rejected my appeal to dismissal solely on the basis that my research was not good enough for a Ph.D. I had not even been admitted to candidacy yet, so they have no right to make such a requirement upon my work.
I have submitted complete details as part of my appeal (currently being considered by the Dean of the Graduate College, Dr. Teresa Sullivan) and also to the U.S. Department of Education. At this point all I require is for you to send a copy of my original letter to ABET to Ms. Stokes in Dallas; unless, of course, ABET will look into the situation and help me to resolve it.
Thanks for your time and effort, and I look forward to hearing from you soon. Regards,
William H. Clark II, P.E.
21203 Paseo de Vaca Street
Lago Vista TX 78645
512-267-1518
Attachments (3)
January 10, 2005
Dr. George Peterson ABET, Inc.
111 Market Pl., Ste 1050
Baltimore MD 21202
Dr. Peterson,
This is a follow to my letter of July 29, 2002 about problems I had in the Aerospace Engineering Graduate program at the University of Texas at Austin. I have been appealing through the bureaucracy since then, and I got an authoritative evaluation from Texas State Representative Ron Baxter’s office. They reviewed all the appeal documents and decided that the reason I was expelled was because I did not pass the Ph.D. qualifying exams after my second semester in graduate school. This 11violation” was noted in writing by the Graduate Advisor in my department, and the Graduate Dean spent a whole page on the issue in a response to my appeal petitions.
Neither saw anything wrong with the fact that the Aerospace Department guidelines and the Graduate Catalog clearly specify that a doctoral candidate must pass the Ph.D. qualifying exams two semesters after receiving a Masters Degree~ I started grad school with a Bachelor’s Degree (from UT Austin in mechanical engineering, 1978).
I assume it is fairly universal that a Masters Degree takes about two years to earh – more if you do a thesis (which was the option I chose); also longer if you have been out of school a long time and if your undergraduate degree was in a different discipline. Once you get the MSE you spend the next two semesters taking a series of intense classes specifically to prepare you for the qualifying exams. I did get a Masters, and I did pass the Ph.D. qualifying exams after my third year~ which according to the criteria applied to any other grad student, is right on schedule. I had, by the time I was dismissed a few months after passing the exams, passed all the coursework required for a Ph.D. with a 3.7 grade point; and completed most of my research~ so, in fact, I was way ahead of schedule. I found out I had been expelled the day I went in to take my oral Ph.D. qualifying exam~ I was given no advance notice, I was not put on probation, or even reasonable accommodation for my disability ~ I was simply expelled, I believe with malice.
Be that as it may, I fought the University so long that I have been black listed by the Aerospace Engineering Department. I fought that too, and eventually The University assigned the UT System Vice President of Legal Affairs, Dr. Lee Smith, JD to handle my case personally. He simply barred me from contacting anybody at the University. I tried to submit a completed dissertation to the Department faculty to support my appeal for re-admittance; Dr. Smith had all eight copies of the 200-page document shredded before anybody even saw it.
I believe these events clearly show the University in grave violations of the most basic rules of procedure in conducting graduate education in engineering. I hereby request an investigation by ABET into the circumstances of my dismissal.
Regards,
William H. Clark II, P.E.
(inactive license)
21203 Paseo de Vaca Street
Lago Vista TX 78645
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