Bret Marsh, the state veterinarian of Indiana, is set to become the next dean of the Purdue School of Veterinary Medicine starting Nov. 4, nearly a month after faculty raised concerns that a private donor was influencing the search process in Marsh's favor.
In an email Thursday, Provost Patrick Wolfe told faculty and staff that Marsh had been appointed by Purdue administration "following your input and extensive consultation and feedback."
Marsh's appointment, though, is marred with controversy. According to emails obtained by the Exponent, private Purdue donor David Brunner and other veterinarians in the state have attempted to influence the months-long search for the vet school's new dean, utilizing an email-based letter writing campaign to urge Purdue administration to choose Marsh.
Brunner, a private veterinarian in Indiana and Purdue alum, donated $10 million two years ago to help build the David and Bonnie Brunner Purdue Veterinary Medical Hospital Complex, a sprawling 162,500-square-foot compound that houses the vet school.
This donation, vet school faculty told the Exponent, may have given Brunner significant influence over the search process, which was otherwise conducted in private by a search committee consisting of faculty, staff and Purdue administrators.
As part of the campaign, Brunner wrote to an unknown number of Purdue alumni and veterinarians in Indiana, urging them to email Purdue administrators -- particularly the provost's office -- and endorse Marsh as dean.
"I assure you, together, YOU CAN INFLUENCE WHO IS SELECTED FOR THE NEXT DEAN," Brunner wrote to alumni in all capital letters Aug. 29. "WE CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE!!!"
In an email to vet school faculty on Sept. 9, search committee member and vet school department head Catharine Scott-Moncrieff accused Brunner and his "campaign" of "undermining the integrity of the search process."
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Word of Brunner's involvement in the search process first spread in the vet school when Scott-Moncrieff emailed faculty Sept. 9 to raise the alarm, almost two weeks after Brunner began sending emails.
It's unclear how many letters have been written to Purdue administrators from alumni and veterinarians in favor of Marsh, but Scott-Moncrieff said she believes there have been enough to potentially influence the search.
"There is an intense letter writing campaign underway," she wrote, "with letters sent to veterinarians and other stakeholders in Indiana, as well as the Purdue board of trustees and Purdue administration in support of Dr. Marsh."
But Brunner said his involvement stopped at telling other alumni to email administrators, and he himself never emailed Purdue administrators.
"It wasn't a campaign," Brunner said. "I sent two letters out."
But in an email sent to alumni, Brunner explicitly calls on recipients to spread the word to others in the state.
"I encourage you to email Provost Dr. Patrick Wolfe, informing him that you strongly endorse Dr. Marsh," he wrote. "Additionally, I ask you to contact colleagues and ask them to do the same."
Following the announcement Thursday, Scott-Moncrieff told the Exponent she was "pretty upset" with Marsh's appointment, adding that Purdue administration had appointed Marsh separately from the search committee.
"The provost did not want or allow committee recommendations. Just strengths and weaknesses of each candidate," she said. "It was an 'advisory' committee."
Brunner declined a request for comment.
Search committee information out in the open
For the majority of the search process, information on the other dean candidates, including their names and credentials, remained private, Scott-Moncrieff said, only accessible to search committee members and Purdue administrators through a password-protected portal.
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But Brunner, who does not work for Purdue and is not a member of the search committee, apparently had knowledge of who the other candidates were well before that information had been released to the public.
Though he told the Exponent he didn't know about Marsh's candidacy or the details of the dean search until an unnamed vet called him, he outlined the credentials of five other candidates in his Aug. 29 email urging alumni to ask Purdue to appoint Marsh.
"The selection committee has narrowed the list to six final candidates. Four candidates have research backgrounds, one is from academia and several are out-of-state applicants," he wrote.
Brunner told the Exponent he had learned of Marsh's candidacy and the other candidates when an unnamed veterinarian -- whom he had never met -- called him one day to ask for his help on starting the letter writing campaign.
"Because of my donation, people thought I might know what's going on," Brunner said.
In an email to the Exponent, private Indiana veterinarian Kurt Strueh, a Purdue alum, claimed he was the unnamed caller who had given Brunner the information.
"After I found out that NO practicing veterinarians were on the search committee, I started a grassroots letter writing campaign," he said.
Strueh told the Exponent he had learned of the candidates' names and credentials from his daughter, who is an undergraduate vet student at Purdue, when she was given private YouTube links containing the candidates' information.
But it's unclear who gave Strueh's daughter the links, which are only accessible to viewers who already had access to them. Strueh said they were made available to all vet school undergraduates, but the Exponent has been unable to confirm whether that's true.
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No matter how the information was transferred to Strueh, and in extension Brunner, Scott-Moncrieff said the fact that it was out in the open could have been enough to sway the search in Marsh's favor.
"My biggest concerns are really that this is further evidence that a number of individuals had prior knowledge of the candidates before their names were released publicly," she said. "There's a small group of veterinarians that are having inappropriate influence and access."