Letters to Campus

August 5, 2009

Dear K-State Faculty and Staff,

Greetings once again from Anderson Hall. Over the past six weeks, my office has been heavily involved in addressing many of the issues raised in the Grant Thornton transition audit. While we have already taken immediate action on several items identified in the audit, it is critical that we have significant involvement from the K-State family in ensuring that we have addressed every concern raised during the auditing process.

In consultation with the president's cabinet, I have appointed a 12-member committee to assist me in preparing our response to the Kansas Board of Regents and the university community at large. This committee has representation from faculty, staff, students, alumni and friends of Kansas State University, and will be tasked with examining current university practices, providing oversight to additional planned external audits at NISTAC and K-State Athletics, and ensuring that we respond in a transparent fashion to all issues raised.

The following individuals have agreed to serve on the Transition Audit Advisory Committee:

Chair - Brian Spooner, University Distinguished Professor and interim dean, College of Arts and Sciences;

Faculty Senate president - Melody LeHew, College of Human Ecology;

Faculty Senate - Fred Fairchild, College of Agriculture;

Classified Senate president - Carolyn Elliott, office of student life;

Student government president - Dalton Henry, College of Agriculture;

Dean - Lori Goetsch, dean of libraries;

Department head - Eric Higgins, department of finance, College of Business Administration;

University Distinguished Professor (faculty) - M.M. Chengappa;

Faculty, K-State at Salina - Les Hannah;

Department of Athletics (ex-officio) - Reid Sigmon;

Legal Affairs - Peter Paukstelis;

External (community) - Lee Borck, Manhattan;

External (non-Alumnus) - Judd Neal, Overland Park.

If you have any questions or concerns about the committee or the audit in general, please feel free to contact me at any time. I appreciate the willingness of each of our colleagues to serve on this committee, and wish them the best of success in helping K-State move forward.

Regards,

Kirk