Earlier this week, we called your attention to Cornerstone University’s decision to fire tenured professors and terminate all humanities and arts programs. Get up to speed here.
Yesterday, WOOD TV-8 the Grand Rapids NBC affiliate, did a story on our story. (WOOD TV-8 Reporter Madalyn Buursma did not mention our piece and the president of the university, Gerson Moreno-Riaño, described our widely-shared piece as “social media buzz.”)
Read Burrsma’s story here.
Cornerstone University seems to like it:
The comments section on this Facebook post have been turned off. As far as I can tell, this is the only post on the Cornerstone FB page that does not allow comments.
Let’s take a deeper look at Buursma’s story:
It begins:
“Cornerstone University has let go of six professors as it reorganizes its programs, combining some and expanding others.“
According to multiple sources, there were eight terminations, not six. Seven of those terminated were full-time faculty and one was a dean. One other dean was removed from his role as dean and will return to the full-time faculty.
Buursma writes:
“There were a small number of majors that we combined because there were not enough students in each of them,” the school’s vice president for enrollment and marketing, Heidi Cece, wrote in an email to News 8. “…This will allow for a much more comprehensive and market-aligned student experience in the Liberal Arts majors.”
It is not clear what Cece means by “the Liberal Arts majors.” The terminated faculty were informed that the History, English, Creative Writing and Music majors were eliminated. Earlier this semester Dr. Matt Bonzo was terminated because he was informed that the Philosophy major was eliminated. Given this, one wonders what majors are left that would fit under the heading “Liberal Arts Majors?” Technically, science majors are part of the liberal arts, but it is a real stretch to say that a university is committed to “liberal arts” without majors in the humanities and the arts.
More from Buursma’s story:
In total, 18 programs were combined, Cornerstone University President Gerson Moreno-Riaño, Ph.D., told News 8 in a Tuesday phone interview.
The literature, creative writing, linguistics, publishing and professional writing programs were all combined into one English major. Students will have the option to concentrate in some of those specialties. The school’s five music programs were combined into two majors, music production and worship ministry.
(NOTE: For some reason this part of the post did not appear when we first published it earlier today. We are adding it here as an update on June 19, 2024 at 1:30pm. Sorry for the confusion):
Our sources tell us that last week three full-time Literature and Creating Writing professors at Cornerstone were informed that the English and Creative Writing programs were being discontinued and that therefore their positions were being eliminated.
It now appears from this report that this is not true and that there is still an English Major. In which case, why were these professors terminated? There is no remaining full-time English or Creative writing professor at Cornerstone. So even if the merger of programs required one or even two of the three faculty to be terminated, wouldn’t it seem that at least one full-time English professor should have been retained to serve in this new English major?
Meanwhile the administration told music students that music programs were going to be sunsetted. However this new statement gives the impression that there are now apparently two new Music Majors – Music Production and Worship Ministry.
But are these actually new and permanent majors in English and Music? Or are they just the holding majors in which students from the existing eliminated programs will be merged together so that they can be “taught out?” by adjuncts plus the one remaining full-time Humanities professor and the one remaining Music Professor?
Madalyn Buursma should ask Cornerstone whether it intends to keep these majors indefinitely, or only until the current cohort of students from the eliminated programs graduate. Alternatively, anyone could try calling up Cornerstone to ask if they can enroll in these majors in the Fall. If they can, then why did Cornerstone dismiss terminated faculty based on the elimination of programs which are not, in fact, eliminated at all? If they cannot enroll, then they are not real and permanent majors. So why is the institution pointing to these merely temporary majors as proof that has not eliminated all Humanities and Arts degrees?
More from the WOOD TV-8 piece:
“We did not let go all of our humanity [sic] professors,” [President Gerson] Moreno-Riaño said, in response to social media buzz that the school had eliminated its humanities division. “The humanities are still very central to who we are, deeply integrated into our general-ed core program.”
Before the termination, Cornerstone had six full-time professors who had been part of the Humanities Division, which existed up until 2023. In Fall 2023 the Humanities Division merged with the Communications Division (which was also home to the Music programs) and with the Bible, Religion and Ministry Division to form the School of Ministry, Media, and the Arts, headed by the Dean of the School (and former Humanities Division Chair) Dr. Michael Pasquale. Pasquale is also Professor of Linguistics.
The full-time professors (all tenured) who had previously been part of the Humanities Division, and thus now became part of the new School of Ministry, Media, and the Arts were: Dr. Cynthia Beach (Creative Writing), Dr. Matt Bonzo (Philosophy), Dr. Martin Spence (History), Dr. Jason Stevens (Literature) and Dr. Michael Stevens (Literature).
As we noted in our last post, Matt Bonzo was terminated earlier this year. Cynthia Beach, Jason Stevens, Michael Stevens, and Martin Spence were all terminated last week. Only Dr. Michael Pasquale remains. He was removed from his position as Dean of the School of Ministry, Media, and the Arts and has returned to be Professor of Linguistics. When Moreno-Riaño says the school “did not let go all of our humanity [sic] professors” he is technically correct: they retained one, but he only became a faculty member again because he was demoted from his former position as Dean!
To Madalyn Buursma’s credit, she goes on to fact-check these claims by examining the University’s website and social media accounts and finds no evidence that there are any Humanities professors employed by Cornerstone other than Dr. Michael Pasquale.
The School of Ministry, Media, and the Arts was comprised of two full-time music professors: Dr. Kent Walters and Dr. Dr. Desmond Ikegwuonu. Dr. Igekwuonu was terminated last week based on the elimination of the music program, presumably leaving Walters to teach out the eliminated music major.
There were three non-humanities and non-music professors in the School of Ministry, Media, and the Arts. They retained their jobs. These are: Dr. Jeremy Osborn (Professor of Communication), Dr. Sodam Lee (Assistant Professor of Graphic Design) and Daryl Yoder (Associate Professor of Ministry).
Last week Dr. Jonathan Marko, formerly Associate Vice President of Academics, was appointed as Dean of the much reduced School of Ministry, Media, and the Arts, replacing Pasquale. Marko was also appointed Dean of the Seminary.
Until last week the Dean of the Seminary was Dr. Jeffrey Halsted, Senior Pastor of Calvary Baptist Church, a flagship congregation of the General Association of Regular Baptists. This was the original denominational affiliation of Cornerstone’s predecessor institution, the Grand Rapids Baptist Bible College.”
Halstead was ousted as Dean last week and terminated as a faculty member, although, our sources tell us, he may have been asked back to teach some classes.
Two other Seminary professors appear to have been terminated. Before last week, the full-time Seminary Professors were: Dr. Royce Evans, (Associate Professor of Pastoral Ministry) Dr. Bruce Henning, (Assistant Professor of New Testament) Dr. Daniel Watson (Associate Professor of Old Testament); Dr Michael Wittmer (Professor of Systematic and Historic Theology); Dr. Kenneth Reid (Assistant Professor of Systematic & Historical Theology) and Dr. Robert Lehman (Professor of Counselling).
Dr. Reid and Dr. Lehman are no longer listed on the Seminary faculty page, and so appear to also have been terminated last week.
The WOOD TV-8 story notes:
The school said it has 12 full-time faculty members who teach in the humanities.
It is difficult to understand how Cornerstone can claim that there are now twelve full-time faculty members in the humanities. There were only four to start with (Beach , Spence , Stevens, and Stevens) and they all got fired!
The phrase “teach in the humanities” is carefully chosen. Moreno-Riaño does not say there are twelve humanities professors, but twelve professors who teach in the humanities. This could simply mean that twelve full-time professors sometimes teach classes within the humanities disciplines. Even with this elastic definition it is difficult to know who these twelve professors would be. Is he including the one Ministry and four Seminary professors because theology and biblical studies draw on humanities disciplines? Is he including teacher education professors who sometimes teach content classes in literature, history and social science for education majors? Madalyn Buursma cannot let this assertion go unchallenged and should ask Cornerstone to provide the names and job titles of these reputed twelve full-time faculty members in the humanities.
More from the WOOD-TV piece:
“Additionally, our VP of Academics is a historian, and our president is a political philosopher, and both have a great love and focus on the humanities and the liberal arts and are both members of the faculty,” Cece wrote in an email to News.
It is true that Dr. Bradford Sample has a PhD in history and Dr. Moreno-Riaño has a PhD in political science with a focus on political philosophy. But neither have ever taught a class at Cornerstone. It is also wrong to say they are “faculty.” They are not. They are Senior Administrators with PhDs.
Buursma’s story notes:
Philosophy is not listed as a program on the website, though Moreno-Riaño said the school has recently hired a new philosophy professor.
Our sources tell us that earlier this year Philosophy professor Dr. Matt Bonzo was terminated on the basis that the philosophy program had been discontinued. Cornerstone University policies in place at the time followed best practice across higher education about how institutions handle the termination of tenured faculty when programs are discontinued. They stated that an institution could not dismiss a tenured professor and then rehire the same position within the two years of the termination.
Yet here Moreno-Riaño seems to have admitted that they have violated their own policies under which Bonzo was terminated.
The new philosophy professor to whom Moreno-Riaño alludes is Dr. Douglas Groothuis, formerly of Denver Seminary.
I wonder how Groothuis – who has often argued that Jesus should be viewed primarily as a philosopher – feels about becoming part of an institution which has eliminated the philosophy program because it is not market-aligned? I wonder how he feels about having joined an institution that treats its humanities faculty in this way? It is worth noting that Groothuis also speaks about “truth decay.”
On the other hand, perhaps Groothuis is at ease with what is happening. He has written against Critical Race Theory and is in favor of the values of western and American culture. He is therefore aligned with President Moreno-Riaño’s ideological vision. Was Bonzo ousted so that Moreno-Riaño could appoint someone whose ideological and political views were more to his taste? Indeed, during the last year Moreno-Riano has upped the number of right-wing, Christian nationalist speakers on campus. Trump conspiracy theorist Erik Metaxas was invited to speak on campus in October.
Meanwhile, the President established a “Presidential Fellows” program to mentor selected student fellows.
Groothuis is one Fellow. He serves alongside controversial Republican politician Tudor Dixon. Dixon, who has starred in horror sex movies (a fact she has justified saying they were made for adults, not children), and who last month used a sexually-explicit insult against Michigan Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer, is apparently President Moreno-Riano’s choice to help Cornerstone students develop “Biblical wisdom, and Christ-centered character.” Moreno-Riano has been a guest several times on Dixon’s podcast, in which he decries a “lack of moral leadership” on college campuses.
The WOOD TV-8 piece says:
“We did not eliminate all the humanities programs. What we did was just combined programs,” he said. “We still have a lot of humanities professors in theology and English here … who will be teaching our programs.”
Let’s break this down. What does it mean to say “we still have a lot of humanities professors in theology?” There is one full-time Ministry and four full-time Bible and Theology professors at Cornerstone University now. In addition, Jonathan Marko (the Dean of Ministry, Media and the Arts and Dean of the Seminary) has written and taught in Philosophical Theology. But what is meant by calling these Bible and theology faculty “humanities” professors? Certainly, humanities and theology overlap – both requiring attention to text, context, and questions of ultimate meaning. But theology professors are not, and never have been at Cornerstone, classed as “humanities professors.”
Also, what about the claim that there are “a lot of humanities professors in…English.” As Madalyn Buursma makes clear, there are in fact no full-time faculty in English at Cornerstone University. They were all fired last week. These statements bear little resemblance to reality.
Buursma writes:
Moreno-Riaño said the school just saw its first year of growth in more than 12 years.
This statement, which has been repeated several times over recent months, was first made in a WOOD-TV 8 report on February 12, 2024. The report was also written by Madalyn Buursma. In this article Cornerstone claimed that it had seen an “an 82% increase in new student enrollment over last Spring,” reversing a 10-year decline. It is difficult to know what to make of this claim. Our sources tell us that there was no significant increase in on-ground student enrollment last year. Online programs had become very small by 2022, so a 260% growth here was on a relatively small base number of students, meaning it represented a modest but not large, increase of online student numbers.
But it not clear how this online increase averaged out with on-ground figures to arrive at an 82% overall increase figure. If Cornerstone enrollment grew by 82% this would represent an institutional success story probably unparalleled anywhere in America. The article itself states that Grand Rapids Community College was happy with its (by comparison minuscule!) 3.6% growth. If Cornerstone has found a way to increase enrollment by 82% it ought to have been building hundreds of new dorms, classrooms, and hiring new faculty to accommodate around 1000 new students. Something seems off about these numbers. Once again, Madalyn Buursma should not let these assertions go unchallenged.
More from the most recent (June 18, 2024) Wood-TV8 piece:
“Growth is always hard, but we’re listening continually to new students and current students and demands, and we want to make sure we provide a great education that’s focused on them.”
Apparently unable to express any sorrow or regret about what has happened, here Moreno-Riaño claims that people are upset because of growth, not because of the huge loss of what has just occurred. He says the institution is continually listening to new and current students. I wonder if the institution is listening to the countless students across social media and across campus who have expressed anger, grief, and shame about the nature of these cuts, and about the way that they have been made, and communicated?
Of course, the attempt at spinning these cuts as good for humanities and liberal arts, and the highly dubious statements and numbers provided by the administration to Wood TV-8, suggests that Cornerstone may well be listening – and panicking about the negative publicity and anger that these actions have triggered and is now seeking to arrest the damage.
The fact that Cornerstone shared Buursma’s article on Facebook shows that the university thought it gave a good representation of the official Cornerstone view. WOOD–TV8 has some Cornerstone ties. Our sources tell us that the Vice Chair of Cornerstone’s Board, Lori Cook, known by her stage name Maranda, hosts a popular television show on the local Wood-TV8 network.
We are told by two sources that yesterday, at an all-campus meeting to celebrate the success of the President’s vision of “program refinements,” faculty and staff were warned that if they shared any information about the program eliminations or faculty terminations with students the University would take action against them.
What a mess.