Trustee Dan Kelly requested that Whipple’s appointment be extracted from the rest of Provost Teresa Woodruff’s Personnel Actions and Information reports. Kelly said the administration should pause on the appointment and he would be voting no.

“I think that investigation should go on, it should be completed,” Kelly said. “I hope it will be completed very timely.”

Trustee Pat O’Keefe also said he would vote no on the appointment due to the ongoing investigation and said he thinks it’s reasonable to give Gupta a due process hearing.

Trustees Dianne Byrum, Melanie Foster, Renee Knake-Jefferson, Brianna Scott and Kelly Tebay voted yes on the appointment, while Trustee Rema Vassar abstained, appointing Whipple as interim dean of the Broad College of Business.

During Woodruff’s personnel report, the board also passed six tenure appointments and a new five-year contract with basketball coach Tom Izzo.

“I think we were particularly excited about the language that’s in the contract,” President Samuel L. Stanley Jr. said. “That ties him into continuing with the university when he finishes his basketball coaching.”

During the academic affairs report the board passed revisions to Policy 03-17-03 which deals with overload pay for faculty and staff. The revision will remove section V.4 which says overload pay can be replaced by release time for research, assigning additional support staff or other forms of professional support.

The board also approved authorization to begin planning renovations to the MSU Dairy Facilities and MSU Greenhouses. The Dairy Facility – Research and Teaching and Learning project will add new dairy facilities and renovate the methane digester, expanding feed production capacity and nutrient management operations at the current location.

MSU Greenhouse renovations will include adding LED lighting that responds to external climate conditions. This will allow the greenhouses to produce a controlled environment for experiments regardless of seasonal and temperature changes.