Quick Takes

Idaho State University has fired Habib Sadid, a tenured engineering professor who had been suspended, the Associated Press reported. A faculty panel recently released an opinion that there was not enough evidence to justify Sadid's dismissal, but the university president said that his ouster was in the best interests of the institution. Sadid has been a long-time critic of the university's leaders and he says he is being fired for his dissent, while the university says that he crossed lines from dissent into abusive and unfair behavior.

The tenure denials of four women at DePaul University are leading to student protests and threats of legal action, the Chicago Tribune reported. Of 33 professors who went up for tenure this year, seven were rejected, five of whom were women. In the cases of four represented by the same lawyer, departmental reviews were quite positive, but a university-wide committee -- with professors in other fields -- raised questions about the candidacies. The university, without talking about specific cases, has defended the process as free of bias.

Students at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania have been protesting lack of access to a library, poor food service, and the way police treated a student who organized their protests, The Philadelphia Daily News reported. The student -- who was inspired to get more vocal after finding a moth in her salad at the university cafeteria -- staged an 11-day hunger strike over the issues. The library has been closed for renovations since January 2008 and students must use trailers to get access to books, which the students say take 24 hours to arrive. Lincoln officials say that they are working to get the library project and other improvements completed, but will not comment on the protests.

Samim Anghaie, and his wife, Susan, were arrested Friday and charged with fraud for using $3.7 million in government contracts for personal uses, such as the purchase of cars and homes, The Gainesville Sun reported. The two are also charged with submitting false information to get the contracts from various federal agencies. Samim Anghaie has been director of Florida's Innovative Nuclear Space Power and Propulsion Institute. The couple's lawyer said that they had no comment on the charges.

Stephen Sample, president of the University of Southern California, will announce today that he will step down as president next year, ending a 19-year tenure at the institution, the Los Angeles Times reported. Sample is among the longest serving university presidents in the country, having served as president of the State University of New York at Buffalo for 9 years prior to moving to USC.

Just weeks after releasing its latest ranking of universities worldwide, and receiving some criticism over the methodology, The Times Higher announced a new partner for the project and a decision to revisit the methodology. Ann Mroz, editor of Times Higher, said in a statement in her publication that while she was pleased with the influence of the rankings, "we acknowledge the criticism and now want to work with the sector to produce a legitimate and robust research tool for academics and university administrators." The new partner for the project will be Thomson Reuters.

St. Petersburg State University has clarified rules -- of concern to many scholars -- about who must seek approval before presenting or publishing work abroad, The New York Times reported. Researchers in the humanities and social sciences will not be covered by the regulations.

A Brazilian politician is challenging the system under which some of the country's universities have specific quotas for enrollment of black and disadvantaged students, BBC News reported. While some educators say that the quotas are the only way for the universities to enroll black and disadvantaged students in significant numbers, critics say that the quotas are discrimination and are racially divisive.