“You can’t make positive choices for the rest of your life without an environment that makes those choices easy, natural, and enjoyable.” – Deepak Chopra
Askia Muhammad Suggests Firing NFL Team Owner See Page 26 •
C e l e b r a t i n g 4 9 Ye a r s o f S e r v i c e
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Serving More Than 50,000 African American Readers Throughout The Metropolitan Area / Vol. 49, No. 5 Nov. 14 - Nov. 20 2013
Remembering Our Veterans! Vietnam Veteran W.T. Walley, 67, a member of the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team, shares stories with his grandson, Mykah Walley, 11, about the soldiers who he served with while in Vietnam on Veterans Day. /Photo by Khalid Naji-Allah
UDC Focused on Program Cuts, Accreditation By Dorothy Rowley WI Staff Writer A year ago, the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) appeared to be in big trouble. An inadequate accounting system – to which university officials reluctantly conceded in 2011 – allowed spending in
unauthorized areas – including extravagant trips abroad by then-President Allen Sessoms. Also, while UDC officials hustled to make ends meet, enrollment languished, cost-of-living increases came to a standstill and university officials’ considered slashing programs and personnel.
But only after the city refused to cough up $4 million last year to fund 25 severance packages, did the Board of Trustees get serious about a new vision: They fired Sessoms, who’d insisted the cuts were needed to steer the university toward greater operating efficiency. “We have been put in a posi-
tion by the funding mechanism to cut back on spending, and in doing so, we’ve had to look at how much flexibility we have regarding faculty and staff size and facilities costs,” Sessoms said in October 2012. This past summer, however, D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson participated in a retreat with
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Urban League’s Maudine Cooper Honored Page 27
UDC officials where the school’s strategic plan took center stage. During the three-day gathering, Mendelson recalled discussing the school’s plight with his council colleagues. “The view [among us] was that the university was in a bit
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