Not so fast, Kemos sabe

In March, we noted the addition of Dr. Alex Kemos to the TAMU leadership. Kemos was hired for a paltry salary equivalent to a mere 10 English lecturers. Today's Eagle reports that Kemos wasn't Dr. Kemos after all:

Texas A&M's No. 3 administrator presented himself as a warrior-scholar: A former Navy SEAL with a doctorate from Tufts University.

But records obtained by The Eagle indicate Alexander Kemos never was part of the elite fighting force, and Texas A&M officials confirmed Friday that he doesn't have a doctorate or even a master's degree, which was a posted requirement for the $300,000-a-year position that serves as the top adviser to Texas A&M President R. Bowen Loftin.

On Friday morning, the day after he was confronted with questions about his background by Loftin in Maine, where the pair were vacationing, he resigned.

"It's a human tragedy," said Jeffrey Seemann, Texas A&M's vice president for research and the chair of the search committee that selected Kemos, who lives in College Station and has a wife and three children.

In a message to the campus Friday afternoon, Loftin said Kemos will no longer serve as senior vice president for administration, effective immediately. He said Kemos cited "a desire to spend more time with his family."

Vision 1920 is shocked by this scandal in academia. Tufts clearly committed a FERPA violation in releasing information about Kemos' records to the Eagle.

Don't get your hopes up

The Eagle headline:

A&M picks new leaders

is actually about this:

The chief of staff for Texas A&M University's president will be the new senior vice president for administration, and a Washington University philosophy professor will be dean of the College of Liberal Arts, under appointments approved Friday.

Chief of Staff Alex Kemos will fill the high-level post that a search committee began looking for earlier this month. The $300,000-a-year position will oversee non-academic operations such as facilities and be a senior adviser to the president.

The story also reports the selection of a new Dean for Liberal Arts.