Four days before the FBI searched homes belonging to IU Libraries analyst Nianli Ma and professor Xiaofeng Wang, the university terminated her with no provided reason, a source close to Ma said.
Her termination note — sent over email at 8:49 a.m. March 24 — was similar to Wang’s termination letter which came on March 28. The source said the email told Ma she would not be eligible for re-hire and that employment for university employees is “at will.”
The email allegedly cited policy HR-08-40, which says the university may “may terminate an employee for any reason, with or without cause or notice.”
The policy’s section on Immediate Involuntary Termination says supervisors should provide notice with reasons to the employee under termination and allow the employee to respond.
Because the email didn’t provide Ma with a reason behind her termination, the source told the Indiana Daily Student, the university likely violated its own policy.
Other IU faculty organizations have condemned Wang’s termination, saying the university violated policy by not following due process.
The source said Jamie Gayer, IU Bloomington’s senior human resources director, sent the email. Gayer could not be reached for comment by time of publication.
The university said IU does not comment on personnel matters. The nature of the FBI’s investigation is still unknown, and IU has refused to answer questions on it.
A document previously obtained by the IDS, written by a close collaborator, shows IU was looking into a 2017-18 Chinese grant proposal Wang was listed on in December.
The university asked Wang to explain why he was listed on that grant, which he allegedly had not disclosed to IU, according to the document. The university notified Wang in February it would investigate further.
Then in early March, the document said, Wang told IU that he had accepted an offer from an unidentified Singaporean university and was set to start in June. The document alleges the university responded by putting him on administrative leave, wiping his IU web page and disabling his email.
On March 28, the FBI searched Ma and Wang’s homes in Carmel and Bloomington.
Have a tip? Reach out at newstips@idsnews.com or more securely at @idsnews.25 on Signal.
UPDATE: This article was updated to include comment from IU.
