[THREAD]

1. I had hoped that on Friday, @UTLaw and @UofT leadership would begin in good faith addressing concerns around abuse of process and improper political influence in the IHRP director hiring process.

Instead, they have gone in the opposite direction.

2. As a result, I feel ethically compelled to speak again. I resigned partially so that I *could* speak.

I will directly address:

(a) Claims made by Dean Iacobucci on a Thurs letter to faculty
(b) Statement made Fri by Kelly Hannah-Moffat, @UofT VP HR & Equity

3. Let me contextualize my statements with a few important observations.

Ed Iacobucci barely interacts w/ IHRP. A telling indicator is despite being one of only two full-time staff, I have not had *one* direct interaction, physical or digital, with him in 15 months of work.

4. The primary avenue in which he is informed of IHRP developments is through reports from Assistant Dean Alexis Archbold. I have had over a dozen meetings with Alexis on the in-depth substance of IHRP work, finances, and programs. She has been generally cordial and supportive.

5. The IHRP has not had a permanent full-time director since @SamerMuscati left in Sept 2019. @_PMolnar was installed as interim director and finished her term late Aug 2020.

A first search to find a new director ultimately failed in early 2020.

6. In late June 2020, I was approached by Alexis to join the hiring committee for a second try at searching for a new director. I accepted. So the hiring committee was set:

- Alexis Archbold, Assistant Dean
- Audrey Macklin, Prof and Chair of IHRP Faculty Advisory Board
- Myself

7. Okay that should be enough context, now I'll go into addressing specific claims. Here is the letter of the Dean to faculty on Thursday, reproduced in full so that the reader may follow along:

8. Dean Iacobucci starts with his conclusion and primary claim: "that assertions that outside influence affected the outcome of that search are untrue".

He supports this conclusion with a set of claims, each of which I will interrogate, with supporting documentation.

9. His first supplementary claim is that an offer was never made, and therefore never rescinded. Whether or not an offer was extended is beyond the point of whether there was undue influence exerted, but he goes out on a limb that the idea of an offer being extended "is false".

10. This characterization is directly contradicted by the evidence. Our second (and final) round of interviews took place on Jul 30, after which the hiring committee settled on a unanimous consensus that Valentina was the top choice. We set out immediately to review references:

11. The references were glowing. On Aug 7/20, I nudged Alexis to see if we had extended an offer to Valentina. On Aug 9/20, Alexis replied that she was to talk with Robyn Hunter from HR on Aug 10 re: details of offer and then discuss the offer on Aug 11 with Valentina.

12. My understanding is that an offer and the specifics of the details of that offer were made over Zoom on Aug 11 from Alexis to Valentina. It is my understanding that after a period of discussion, it was accepted by Valentina on Aug 19. But I do not have the direct emails.

13. Still, this should be enough to refute the assertion from Iacobucci that there was no offer on the table for Valentina. This assertion is, at the very least, a serious mischaracterization, at the most, an outright and deliberate falsification.

14. The other supplementary claims made by the Dean is that no offer was made because of "legal constraints" and "timing needs". These will be addressed together because they are relate to one another.

15. The legal constraints argument refers to the fact that Valentina is based in Germany and therefore there would some immigration and work hoops to jump through.

Without giving away too much information however, all three of the final round interviewees were based outside Cda.

16. The Dean's statement refers to "legal constraints on cross-border hiring" that apparently were so severe and fatal to the process that Valentina couldn't start in time. Let us examine this claim further.

17. Was this the position of the @UTLaw administration prior to the timing of the alleged interference. The answer is no. Here is a Aug 20/20 letter from Alexis, showing positive progression and her efforts talking to Valentina immigration and employment lawyers.

18. The immigration lawyers estimated that she could have a work permit in "2-3 months" and that efforts were being made to bridge the time in between. Valentina for her part was willing to start working remotely immediately.

19. I have to go now but will complete this thread as soon as I can for the benefit for transparency in this serious matter. Thanks to all for your patience and check back soon.

20. Thanks for waiting, let's continue. The next day, there was another update that was even more optimistic regarding putting together the immigration situation. @UofT employment lawyers even confirmed it was possible to hire Valentina as an independent contractor to bridge.

21. Afterwards, the plan was to roll Valentina over to the permanent position once the work permit came in. Perhaps some immigration legal experts like @TheWillTruth or @AidanConCam can chip in, but this sounds above board given unis frequently hire folks abroad.

22. This email is also critical in showing that the law school was at the time, knowing and accepting of the 3 month timeframe for Valentina and even went as far asking her if she was okay with it.

23. On timing, the Dean's letter states that moving away from Valentina was necessary because it was hoped that a new director could start right away and "mount a full clinical and volunteer program for students this academic year."

24. This is another questionable assertion, as given the timing of the situation, there was no way that the IHRP clinic would have been started Sept 2020 anyway. It would have started earliest in the Winter semester - Jan 2021.

25. This is consistent with what happened in academic year 19/20, when the clinic was taught only in the Winter semester (Jan 2020) capably by my colleague, Ashley Major.

26. If the Dean had simply allowed this situation to take its natural course, Valentina could have started immediately from Europe and we would have worked with her to get her up to speed and there would have been lots of time to get ready for the clinic in Winter semester.

27. Even if the bridging contract was a no-go, we could have still waited for the work permit and brought Valentina up to speed in time. I would have been happy to help (if I were ever asked about it). There were ample ways to work around the issues presented.

28. Also, referring back to the context of the director search, a reasonably informed observer would question where this desperate need to hire someone immediately came from?

We have not had a full-time permanent director for over a year.

29. Further, because the IHRP staff was (including myself) was largely left in the dark regarding when Valentina would start, Ashley and I were already working towards starting the semester without a director anyways and keeping our working groups, fellowships, projects going.

30. We were not consulted about the urgency of this alleged timing need that disqualified Valentina.

This "need" didn't appear to come from students, faculty chair, or rest of faculty advisory board (who all resigned in protest). Nor did I ever hear that directly from Alexis.

31. It is also ironic that the Dean blames "unnecessary controversy" for his decision to entirely stop the director search, which fulfils the prophecy of not having a director in a timely manner which was allegedly so critical as to disqualify Valentina in the first place.

32. School started again on Sept 8. As there was still no word on Valentina, I asked Alexis for an update on the situation on Sept 10. I received the following reply. For me, this was the turning point in which I lost trust w/ fairness, transparency, and integrity of the process.

33. Not only did nobody care to consult with us, but what was before a sure thing from the immigration and employment lawyers all of a sudden became irreconcilable.

Further, I was informed that the Dean would step in and input his *own* decision in lieu of the hiring committee.

34. I volunteered for this hiring committee in good faith and with the expectation that our expertise and knowledge re: IHRP would be respected. How was I to respect this hiring process when the Dean clearly did not by substituting his own judgment without consulting us?

35. Finally, I will now turn to the disappointing Friday statement from Kelly Hannah-Moffat, VP of Human Resources & Equity at @UofT, as reported by @ShreeParadkar, it states the following:

36. I will address three parts of the statement: (1) managerial vs. faculty hires, (2) confidentiality, (3) select disclosure of information published out of context.

37. Ms. Hannah-Moffat emphasizes that the IHRP director position is a managerial staff position, not a faculty (tenured) position. So what? Is it the position of the Vice President that managerial staff positions can be subject to political influence as opposed to faculty?

38. Academic freedom is academic freedom. Procedural fairness is procedural fairness. Whether the hire was for a tenured faculty or a non-academic position, those considerations and obligations of fairness remain.

39. On confidentiality, there is no doubt that the hiring process is intended to be confidential. However, you cannot have your cake and eat it too. When serious allegations are made, denial from the administration along with outright mischaracterizations are insufficient reply.

40. Notice the moves of power in this context: the administration is claiming confidentiality to relieve itself of the duty of providing sufficient reply to serious allegations, which themselves arise from an alleged violation of confidentiality in the hiring process.

41. Despite this, Ms. Hannah-Moffat is still able to add a smear to this statement (in rebuke to folks like me), saying that our disclosure of information is "selective" and "out of context".

Okay, then doesn't transparency compel you to give us the full picture and context?

42. This is why the administration is trying to have its cake and eat it too.

Confidentiality is being used both as a tool to avoid disclosing anything damaging/give proper reply while also being used to discredit others trying to get to the truth.

43. As I have stated earlier, I would not have shared these emails and this information publicly if there was some indication that there would be an independent and transparent investigation into the hiring process for the position of IHRP Director. https://twitter.com/InitialVW/status/1306984210457071621?s=20

44. So that is what I have to say. Thank you for bearing with me to this point.

I would like to leave you with a quote from one of my heroes, Tiananmen square activist and survivor Rose Tang:

"I'm an ordinary person, a small potato, but I won't shut up."