VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION OF C. MARTIN GASKELL · Martin Gaskell at the law offices of Baker Kriz Jenkins Prewitt & Jones in Lexington, Kentucky, in a case styled United States District

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURTEASTERN DISTRICT OF KENTUCKY

LEXINGTON DIVISIONCIVIL ACTION NO. 5:09-CV-00244-KSF

______________________________________________________

VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION OF C. MARTIN GASKELL

______________________________________________________

C. MARTIN GASKELL PLAINTIFF

v.

UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY DEFENDANT______________________________________________________

The videotaped deposition of C. MARTIN GASKELL

was taken on behalf of the defendant before Ann

Hutchison, Registered Professional Reporter and Notary

Public in and for the Commonwealth of Kentucky at Large,

at the law office of Baker, Kriz, Jenkins, Prewitt &

Jones, PSC, 200 West Vine Street, Suite 710, Lexington,

Kentucky, on Wednesday, January 13, 2010, beginning at

the hour of 9:38 a.m. The deposition was taken by notice

and shall be used for any and all purposes allowed by

the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, including use at

trial.

______________________________________________________

ACTION COURT REPORTERS184 North Mill Street

Lexington, Kentucky 40507(859) 252-4004

Case: 5:09-cv-00244-KSF-REW Doc #: 21 Filed: 09/28/10 Page: 1 of 242 - Page ID#: 96

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ACTION COURT REPORTERS 2

APPEARANCES

COUNSEL FOR THE PLAINTIFF:

Francis J. ManionGeoffrey R. SurteesAmerican Center for Law & Justice-Kentucky6375 New Hope RoadP.O. Box 60New Hope, Kentucky 40052

COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENDANT:

Barbara A. KrizBaker Kriz Jenkins Prewitt & Jones, PSC200 West Vine Street, Suite 710Lexington, Kentucky 40507

ALSO PRESENT:

Shirley Carter, VideographerDr. Michael Cavagnero


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INDEX

DEPONENT: C. MARTIN GASKELL PAGE

EXAMINATION BY:Ms. Kriz .................................... 4

REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE ........................... 242

EXHIBITS

NO. DESCRIPTION IDENTIFIED

1 Job position posting 95

2 Online job application 96

3 Cover sheet e-mail, CV, and description 98Of experience

4 Modern Astronomy, The Bible, and Creation 123Lecture notes

5 Affidavit 187

(Above-referenced exhibits accompany original and copy

transcripts.)


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VIDEOGRAPHER: We're on videotape

record. Today is Wednesday, January 13, 2010. The time

is 9:38 a.m. We're here to take the deposition of C.

Martin Gaskell at the law offices of Baker Kriz Jenkins

Prewitt & Jones in Lexington, Kentucky, in a case styled

United States District Court, Eastern District of

Kentucky at Lexington, C. Martin Gaskell versus the

University of Kentucky. Case number is

5:09-CV-00244-KSF.

I'm Shirley Carter, the video

technician. The court reporter is Ann Hutchison. The

attorneys will now introduce themselves and state who

they represent.

MR. MANION: Francis J. Manion for

plaintiff, Martin Gaskell.

MR. SURTEES: Jeffrey Surtees for

plaintiff, Martin Gaskell.

MS. KRIZ: And Barbara Kriz on behalf

of defendant, University of Kentucky.

C. MARTIN GASKELL

having been first duly placed under oath, was examined

and testified as follows:

EXAMINATION

BY MR. GASKELL:

Q. Dr. Gaskell, we met before the deposition


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started. My name is Barbara Kriz, and I'm here today on

behalf of the University of Kentucky, who you have named

as a defendant in a lawsuit here in the United States

District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky.

I'm sure you have met with your attorneys

and they've described for you what a deposition is.

This is a question-and-answer session. Primarily we're

going to be focusing on the allegations that you made in

your complaint that you filed. I'm going to be also

asking you questions about your background before you

filed the lawsuit. I'll be asking you some questions

about what's been happening with you in your

professional career since the lawsuit was filed.

If there's any question that I ask you

that's unclear or you don't understand me, please stop

me and have me explain my question to you or repeat it

for you. If you don't do that, I'm going to presume

that you understand my question and that to the best of

your ability you're giving me a full and complete

answer. Is that acceptable to you?

A. Yes, it is.

Q. Also, we have court reporters here today

that are recording your testimony, so we want to make

sure that the record is very clear. So when you respond

to my question, I would appreciate if you would respond


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verbally rather than shaking your head or using any kind

of colloquialism that may not be clear on the record.

Okay?

A. Right.

Q. If there's any problems with your

testimony, I'll try to remind you throughout the

course --

A. Right.

Q. -- of the deposition.

Again, as I told you before we got

started, if at any time you need a break, just let us

know --

A. Right.

Q. -- and we'll be sure to accommodate you.

Okay. Let me start by asking your full

name, please.

A. Okay. Okay. My full name, C stands for

Christopher, Martin, I go by, and Gaskell, which you

have it written down somewhere, G-a-s-k-e-l-l.

Q. Okay. And you are currently residing in

Austin, Texas.

A. That's right.

Q. Is that correct?

And how long have you been living in

Austin?


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A. I have been living there since September

of -- we're in 2010 -- 2007.

Q. And are you currently employed?

A. I am currently somewhat employed.

Q. What do you mean by sole employed?

A. Well, I have a -- I have a position at the

University of Texas, and it is a soft money position, so

it is dependent upon me getting my own grants. And if

they want, and they have, they have me teach.

Q. Do you have a contract of employment with

the University of Texas currently?

A. I'm currently paid independently through a

NASA grant, so I -- that's a complicated question. I

don't know how to answer you want on that.

Q. Well, let me ask you this. Do you have an

office there at the --

A. Yes, I do.

Q. -- University of Texas?

Okay. And are you performing any services

for the University of Texas such as teaching or research

or anything --

A. Research, yes.

Q. -- for the university?

A. Yes. But the funding of that is through

independent grant money.


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Q. And you used the term "soft money," --

A. Yes.

Q. -- and I know people in academics are --

A. Right.

Q. -- familiar with that term, but generally

the general public --

A. Yes. Let's explain that. So a hard money

position, that is one where there's a fixed budget item

for it on the university budget. It's sort of a

permanent job, although it will also include what are

called tenure track people in there as well. Now, a

soft money position, that is very dependent upon there

being money. And actually in my department, there are

quite a lot of people in that position. I don't know

how many, 20 people maybe in that position.

Q. And the NASA grant that is currently

funding you --

A. Yes.

Q. -- is that a grant that is a recent grant

or -- I noticed in your --

A. It will expire.

Q. -- disclosures that you had had a grant

previously.

MR. MANION: May I jump in?

MS. KRIZ: Yeah.


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MR. MANION: You're breaking one of

the rules already.

THE WITNESS: I am?

MR. MANION: Yes. You're anticipating

what her question is. I can tell that the court

reporter is having difficulty.

THE WITNESS: Oh, I'm sorry.

MR. MANION: I'm looking at her. You

two are looking at each other, and you understand each

other, but she may not be. I don't know how she could.

So try to wait.

Q. Let me repeat my question.

MR. MANION: Try to wait for Barb to

ask her question.

Q. Is the NASA grant, is that a recent grant

that you've obtained?

A. It will expire in November 2010, this

year.

Q. And when did you obtain that?

A. I -- it started in November 1, 2007, so

it'll be three years. But I applied for it before that,

of course.

Q. At the termination of this grant is it

your expectation to seek additional soft fund --

A. I am already doing that, yes. That is a


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continuing, ongoing process.

Q. And with that funding would you continue

to remain at the University of Texas?

A. Well, I have been on the job market for

the last few years and, of course, applying for the

Kentucky position was part of that. So what one would

like is a more permanent position. And if I did that,

then my current grant or future grants I applied for

will be transferred to my new institution.

Q. You said that you obtained this grant in

November of 2007.

A. Well, the starting date is November 1st.

Q. Starting date. Would you have applied for

that during the period of time you were working for the

University of Nebraska?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. And without getting too technical, could

you tell us what the grant is and who is the sponsor of

that grant?

A. It's NASA.

Q. And what is that funding, for what type of

research?

A. Astronomy.

Q. You indicated that you are currently

funded by that grant, although you're physically present


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at the University of Texas where your research is

being --

A. It's carried out in my office at the

University of Texas, yes.

Q. And do you utilize graduate students and

other staff at the University of Texas on this grant?

A. Not this particular grant. Now, there's

other research I'm doing with facilities at the

University of Texas. And the financial support for that

is coming through the University of Texas.

Q. So in addition to your grant work, you're

also doing work for the University of Texas?

A. You could say "for." I would say "with,"

but yes.

Q. Do you have a boss of sorts --

A. Yes.

Q. -- at the University of Texas?

A. David Lambert.

Q. David Lambert? And what is his position?

A. He is the director of McDonald

Observatory. My appointment is technically with

McDonald Observatory.

Q. Okay.

A. But the -- we don't make much of a

distinction between the astronomy department and the


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observatory.

Q. And until you find a more permanent

location is it your plan to stay at the University of

Texas --

A. Yes.

Q. -- in your current situation?

A. Yes.

Q. There's no end date for your work at the

University of Texas at this time?

A. As far as I know, they'll be very happy to

have me continue.

Q. You have indicated that you have been on

the job market for some time, I think you said --

indicated over the last three years?

A. Yes.

Q. What type of position are you seeking?

A. I have applied for a variety of positions,

so I have applied for, well, obviously, the Kentucky

job, which was a teaching and public outreach position

in the observatory. I've also applied for other

observatory positions with no teaching. I have applied

for regular faculty positions, administrative positions,

so -- in astronomy, so a variety of things there.

Q. And have all these jobs been in the

academic world or have you applied for --


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A. Depends how you define the academic world.

Q. Are they -- are you seeking employment

with educational institution only or are you -- is your

job search --

A. No.

Q. -- broader than that?

A. No, it's a little bit broader than that.

Q. Okay.

A. It's all astronomy.

Q. Tell me where you have sought employment

outside of a school setting.

A. Outside. Well, one example would be with

the National Science Foundation. Another example would

be with the Keck Observatories, which is -- it's an

independent organization which has connections with

major universities, and I can't be more precise than

that without going to their website.

Q. In your job search have you utilized any

outside resources to assist you, like a search firm or

placement firm?

A. No. Things are fairly simple in

astronomy. There is an American Astronomical Society

job register with every post position. So that, for

example, was where the Kentucky position was posted, and

one looks at them, goes there, clicks on them and


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applies.

Q. I want to talk to you about, you know,

your background. From your accent, I presume you're not

from United States; is that correct?

A. I'm not from Kentucky, right.

Q. Okay.

MR. MANION: This is how they talk

outside of Kentucky.

Q. Where were you born and raised, I guess?

A. I was actually born and raised in England.

But Texans have a hard time figuring that out. I have

been accused -- you can type this up too -- I've been

accused of being from Boston.

MR. MANION: There you go. They like

to pretend up there.

Q. In looking through some of the information

that was submitted after the lawsuit was filed, I

understand that you obtained your B.S. in astrophysics

from Edinburgh University in 1975; is that correct?

A. That's actually in my resume submitted

when I applied for the job, yeah.

Q. Okay. Was all of your education before

college in England?

A. That's all in the information that you

have from the university.


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Q. Okay. When did you come to the United

States?

A. I -- do you want to know when I first came

or when I --

Q. Not just for a visit. I'm talking about

to reside.

A. Okay. I came -- I visited in 1973 but --

to visit grad schools, then I really came to start grad

school in 1975.

Q. And was that for the purpose of attending

classes at the University of California Santa Cruz --

A. Correct.

Q. -- toward your master's?

A. And a Ph.D., correct.

Q. And your resume indicates that you stayed

there to complete your Ph.D. in -- which was completed

in 1981; is that correct?

A. Correct.

Q. Okay. Your first academic appointment

after obtaining your Ph.D., I understand, was with

the -- well, I don't know if the Institute of Astronomy

was an academic appointment.

A. Very much so.

Q. Okay.

A. That's with the University of Cambridge.


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Q. And that would have been your first job

that you had after you --

A. Yes.

Q. -- completed your Ph.D.

That was a postdoctorate?

A. What's called a post doc, yes.

Q. And my limited understanding of a

postdoctorate is that that does have some limitation in

terms of a time frame.

A. Always, yes. Yes.

Q. And was that just a two-year appointment?

A. I came in the middle of the academic year

there, so it was two years, and then the institute gave

me an extension until the end of the academic year. So

it became two and a bit years.

Q. And did you complete your postdoctorate

there or --

A. Yes.

Q. -- or what was the reason that you stopped

that job in '83?

A. Well, two things, I was offered a

temporary position at the University of Texas and the

position was ending there anyhow. So it was a very

natural transition.

Q. And then you came to work at the


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University of Texas. Was that also in Austin or --

A. Yes. I'm now back there for the second

time.

Q. And was that a limited appointment?

A. Yes.

Q. And it looks like that was for a period of

two years --

A. Right.

Q. -- '83 through '85?

A. Yes.

Q. And that was as a lecturer?

A. Yes.

Q. As an academic, in addition to your --

perhaps your academic appointments, have you always been

involved in your own type of research in the area of

astronomy independent of your job?

A. Always, yes. Now, the fraction of that

which is officially on company time varies.

Q. And is there a particular area of

astronomy that you have concentrated on?

A. Yes. I work in extragalactic astronomy --

extragalactic -- and I work on super massive black

holes. Let me throw in one more word there --

Q. Okay.

A. -- which is active galactic nuclei.


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Active galactic nuclei are black holes that are actively

swallowing material.

Q. And did this interest grow out of your

Ph.D. focus?

A. Yes. I did my thesis in that.

Q. At the University of Texas from '83 to

'85, was that your first experience as a teacher in the

college setting?

A. No, because when I was a graduate student

I was a teaching assistant. So in a sense I learned how

to teach as an -- as a graduate teaching assistant.

Q. And at University of Texas in '83 to '85

were you teaching all levels of college?

A. I taught one graduate class and otherwise

they were large introductory classes.

Q. And at that time did you have any

affiliation with an observatory at the University of

Texas?

A. In Texas there are two institutions and

they're meshed like this. So like I put my hands

together like this, fingers, they're like this. So

there's the -- the observatory is McDonald Observatory,

which I'm now officially with, then I was with the

astronomy department, but everyone in the astronomy

department uses the observatory and sometimes people


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from the observatory teach classes. It's a very close

relationship. The director of the observatory, for

example, my boss, has a tenured position in the

astronomy department.

Q. So University of Texas did have the

observatory back in '83?

A. Oh, yes. They've had it for 75, 80 years

or something.

Q. What was the reason that that -- you left

that job in '85?

A. It wasn't a fixed-term position. And also

I got another position.

Q. Before we move -- was there any

possibility of becoming in that lecture position, was

that a tenure tract possibility?

A. No, it wasn't. There were three or four

of us in those positions there and one of the four of us

did get a tenure track position in the department.

Three of us. Actually, I'm sorry, three of us.

Q. Now, you left that job in '85 and it looks

like you went to -- as a visiting professor at Ohio

State in 1986 --

A. Correct.

Q. -- is that correct?

A. That's correct.


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Q. And was that immediately after the job at

Texas?

A. Yes.

Q. Tell me what a visiting professor is.

A. It's a nontenure track position. So let's

talk about academic positions. There are people who are

tenured and have very high degree of job security.

Sorry, I'm moving my hands. And then there's an

apprenticeship period, a sort of period to check people

out for that so usually not more than six years before

that, and those are called tenure-track people. Now,

there are also other people at universities, quite a lot

of people actually, maybe some universities half the

faculty who are not what are called tenure track, and

they are on fixed-term appointments, and there are

various names for that that different universities have,

and the name that was used at Ohio State was visiting

position.

Q. What would be a comparable term at other

universities? Associate or assistant professor?

A. Well, if you keep asking me these

questions about different places, we'll get to some more

of those terms.

Q. Okay. Okay. Okay. And that was -- you

understood when you took that job that was for a limited


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time frame?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. And was it just a year appointment?

A. It was a two-year appointment, but I

resigned it -- no, it was for -- I was actually there

less than one year. It was -- I can't remember if it

was one or two years, but the thing was I resigned that

position to take a more permanent one, a two-year

position.

Q. And that was with SUNY --

A. Yes.

Q. -- or State University of New York in

Stony Brook?

A. Right. And that was a two-year position.

Q. And that was from 1986 to '87?

A. Sounds good.

Q. Okay. And you have your job listed there

also as a visiting assistant professor.

A. Yes.

Q. Was that a similar type of appointment?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. So that was a non-tenure track.

A. That's right. That would have been for

two years.

Q. At the -- at Ohio State University did you


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have work associated with an observatory in that job?

A. Not really. Let's say no to that one.

They had an observatory. I did not use their

observatory. And there was a small teaching telescope

on the roof, but I wouldn't quite count that as an

observatory.

Q. What about at State University of New

York? Was there an observatory that --

A. They had a small observatory a little bit

like the one that is being built in Lexington. I did

use that. In fact, I taught a graduate class using

that. Graduate and undergraduate class.

Q. And did you leave that position after the

two-year appointment was over?

A. No. I resigned that position early but

because I got a tenure track appointment at the

University of Michigan.

Q. And it looks like you were there at the

University of Michigan from approximately '87 to '91?

A. Right. Four years.

Q. And your title there was assistant --

A. Assistant professor, yes. That is the --

Q. And that was a tenure track?

A. -- that is the almost universal name for

starting tenure-track position.


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Q. And does the University of Michigan have

an observatory?

A. Yes, it does. It has several.

Q. And did your work include work --

A. Yes.

Q. -- with the observatory?

What were the circumstances that led you

to leave in 1991?

A. I did not -- not get tenure. I applied

early -- for early tenure and got turned down. This is

a thing that happens to about a third of all faculty.

Q. Once you apply for tenure and are denied

it, is there a possibility of reapplying at some later

point, or is that more or less the end point of an

appointment?

A. For me that was the -- that was the end

point, yes.

Q. Okay. After you were denied tenure did

you begin looking for --

A. Oh, yes.

Q. -- other work?

Okay. And it looks like you were able to

find work at the University of Oklahoma?

A. Right.

Q. Which you began in 1991?


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A. Yes.

Q. And that title, according to your resume,

was as visiting assistant professor.

A. Right.

Q. Again, that was not a tenure track

position?

A. That's right. Yes.

Q. And did the University of Oklahoma also

have an observatory?

A. Yes, they did. Just like the one now in

Lexington.

Q. And what was the circumstances that led

you to leave that position?

A. I left -- I left that, that was a one-year

position, and I left that to take my position at the

University of Nebraska.

Q. It appears that you had your longest

tenure of employment with University of Nebraska, and

that was from a period of 1992 to through 2007.

A. Right.

Q. Is that correct?

A. Right.

Q. Now, when you took that position was that

a tenure track or was that --

A. No. No.


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Q. Was there a limited time frame for the

appointment when you were initially hired in 1992?

A. The nature of my employment at the

University of Nebraska is complicated, so if you want, I

can detail every little step of it and how they changed

titles and positions and so on if you want.

Q. Well, I think I will need that

information.

A. Okay. Okay. Okay. So -- and I'm afraid

I can't even remember all of it, but I'll do best I can.

So --

Q. To begin with, though, you understood it

to be a non-tenure track?

A. Oh, yes. That's right. I always

understood it was not a tenure-track position. It was

very clear.

Q. And what happened?

A. Okay. So initially it was a two-year

appointment, and then for a number of years it was a

one-year appointment, and for various reasons the name

of the position changed but my duties did not change

much.

Q. What would the titles that you had?

A. Okay. So at first I was a visiting

associate professor. Then I -- then the next


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appointment was a visiting associate professor again,

and then somewhere in there I -- somewhere in there the

title was changed to associate professor, a special

appointment.

Q. But essentially --

A. If you want, I can tell you why but --

then it got changed to research associate professor.

Although I -- still mostly teaching. Again, if you

want, I can tell you why they did that. And then --

then I was made a senior lecturer. Now a senior

lecturer initially was a three-year rolling appointment.

Q. When you say rolling, what does that mean?

A. Rolling means that at each -- at the end

of each year -- sorry.

THE WITNESS: The camera can mind my

hands.

MS. KRIZ: You can use your hands.

It's no problem.

MR. MANION: That's right.

THE WITNESS: Explain visually.

A. At the end of each year, unless anything

was done, the contract was automatically renewed for

another three years. So I always have three years' job

security ahead of me there, and that's called a rolling

appointment. That didn't -- did not last long. That


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only lasted three years. And the reason was that the

regents of the university decreed that there could not

be that type appointment. So the position then became a

fixed-term appointment. And I was then given a

three-year fixed term non-rolling contract.

Q. In 2007 what was your specific

appointment?

A. Well, you want to hear all the other ones?

Q. Oh. I mean, you hadn't finished? Go

ahead and finish your description of your evolution of

your job there.

A. Well, you wanted all the details. I'm

giving them to you.

Q. That's fine.

A. But I'm warning you there were a lot. So

where did we get to?

MR. MANION: You were rolling

something.

A. Okay. There's a fixed-term contract.

Now, then the University of Nebraska had an external

review and decided to close down their astronomy

program.

Q. When was that?

A. That review, I think, was in 2000, might

be 2001. If you want, I can -- I can give the


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information to my lawyers.

Q. Just a ballpark. That's okay.

A. So I was in the middle of a three-year

contract there. After that, the -- see, the external

review recommended the astronomy program be closed and

the astronomy positions be converted to physics

positions, in certain areas of physics. After a -- so

then the question was what happened to people like me

who are non-tenure track, and then the dean wanted --

told the department chairman that in order to get more

tenure track positions he needed to take away the non-

tenure track positions because they all cost money, and

they had to balance the budget. So there were three of

us on these -- again, I'll use the word "soft money."

Not really soft money. We were on these fixed-term

contract positions. And of the three of us, one was a

dual career situation, he was kept, and the other two

were told to leave.

Q. Okay. And you were one of those?

A. And I'm obviously one of those two, yes.

Yes. What I mean by dual career situation is that his

wife had a faculty position.

Q. And when were you informed that -- of

this -- the termination of your relationship with

Nebraska?


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A. Let me finish details --

Q. Okay.

A. -- in there. So my title was changed

rather often during this period because I was -- I

was -- I had National Science Foundation funding, and I

was working part-time on my research with that. So I

was oscillating between being designated as a lecturer,

which is a pure teaching appointment, and a research

associate professor, which this time really was a

research appointment. The previous time was a teaching

appointment.

Now, where are we now? And the teaching

part of my appointment, I was given about a year's

notice on this, ended in 2006, and I continued in the

research part of that for another year, and then I went

to the University of Texas. The University of Texas, my

position was and is still what's called a research

fellow.

Q. So in 2006 is it fair to say that you knew

that your appointments --

A. Yes.

Q. -- at University of Nebraska --

A. Was ending, yes.

Q. -- were ending? And was it at that point

that you began to actively search --


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A. Yes.

Q. -- for another position?

A. Yes.

Q. Prior to that, or during the entire time

that you were at University of Nebraska, were you

continuing to do somewhat of a job search for other

positions?

A. I think somewhat of a job search is a good

description of it because I had a relatively permanent

position there. Had it not been for closing down of the

astronomy program, I'd probably still be there right

now. And I -- it was a job I liked. It was a balance.

It was -- it was a lot of teaching, public outreach,

running the observatory, doing my research there. We

had a nice house there. Our family liked it so -- so

probably if the astronomy program not closed, I would

still be there.

Q. Who would -- did you answer to the dean of

the college while you were at University of Nebraska?

A. My immediate boss for all academics is the

department chairman. And I had two chairmen during the

time I was there.

Q. And who were they?

A. The first chairman was an atomic physicist

called Tony Starace.


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Q. And do you know how to spell his last

name?

A. Star Ace.

Q. S-t-a-r-a-c-e. Okay. And then is that --

did he leave and another department chair come up?

A. No. He -- he'd been chairman for

13 years, got tired of being chairman and went back to

being just an ordinary faculty member.

Q. And who was the chair that succeeded him?

A. He was succeeded by a chairman called

Roger Kirby, a solid-state physicist.

Q. Tell me about the jobs that you -- if you

can recall, that you would have applied for after you

learned that the position in Nebraska was going to be

ending. Obviously the University of Kentucky

Observatory.

A. Well, I think we've already answered that

question because you asked me the type of jobs I'm

applying for.

Q. Right.

A. So the same spectrum of jobs.

Q. Okay.

MR. MANION: Again, Martin, if

possible, wait till you see the question mark above her

head.


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THE WITNESS: Oh, I'm sorry.

MR. MANION: Because it's -- I know

it's difficult. The two of you understand each other

perfectly well, but she's even more important.

THE WITNESS: Okay. Sorry.

MR. MANION: In a way.

Q. Not to go back, but when you were in the

one tenure-track position that you had and you were

denied tenure --

A. Yes.

Q. -- were you provided any information as to

the reason for that denial?

A. Yes. The simple answer would be that I

was not aggressive enough in obtaining external funding,

which is a major consideration of universities.

Q. And is this -- I'm completely ignorant of

the tenure process other than just some general

knowledge. You go before a committee, and they -- do

they orally advise you as to what their decision is, or

do you receive some sort of document explaining what the

decision is?

A. The process is that -- the review is based

on one's research, one's teaching, and one's service.

But a large unwritten one in that is also based on how

much money you bring to the university, which is never


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officially mentioned, but actually, it's -- I think it

belongs under research really so -- so my research

record in terms of what I was publishing and how many

scientists were citing my research was good, but my weak

point was in not bringing in as much funding as would

have been -- would have been liked.

And so the process is that documents are

collected and external letters. Probably about half a

dozen external letters I got from famous scientists in

my field around the world. Teaching evaluations are

looked at, how many grants I've got, and then the

faculty as a whole votes on that.

Q. And are you provided -- when you're

advised the final decision, are you provided some

documents --

A. There's no written document. There was --

there's an official debriefing by the chairman, and this

was where the chairman explained to me that I was weak

on getting funding and not aggressive enough there.

Q. Do you recall any other information

relayed to you by the dean explaining why you're

denied --

A. It wasn't the dean. It's the chairman.

Q. Or the chairman, excuse me -- denying you

faculty -- your tenure?


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A. What else did he say? Because this is a

long time ago, you realize now.

Q. I understand.

A. He made one -- I forgot -- incorrect

statement, which was my teaching evaluations were a bit

weak, he thought -- I think that was incorrect -- but

that was the only other thing he mentioned.

Q. Did you contest the denial of tenure?

A. I did, yes.

Q. And tell me how you go about contesting

that.

A. There is a university committee, and they

voted two to one to uphold it. It's a three -- if they

had -- they would either -- their decision would either

have been, I imagine, to say it stands as it is or it

would be referred back to the department. The

department decision was made by the department.

Q. And who serves on this appeal committee of

sorts?

A. Well, it's one of those college committees

which they always have a hard time getting people to

serve on.

Q. I presume it's a different group than --

A. Oh, it's highly --

Q. -- served on your --


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COURT REPORTER: Wait, wait, wait.

MR. MANION: She couldn't have got any

of it.

MS. KRIZ: And you're continuing to do

that so I'm going to repeat my question.

THE WITNESS: I'm sorry.

Q. Okay. I presume that none of the members

on this appeal committee would have been the same

members on the initial committee --

A. No.

Q. -- that review?

A. Right.

Q. And in terms of a presentation to this

appeal committee, do you make your case on your behalf

or do you have another --

A. It's just -- I made the case on my behalf.

Q. And does someone argue on the -- to

support the position of the tenure committee?

A. They -- the chairman of the department

would also have made a presentation on this.

Q. Okay. After that level of appeal did you

have any other further recourse?

A. No.

Q. Did you ascribe any --

A. I think, by the way, that -- that I didn't


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feel that way at the time, but looking back on it from

decades of experience later, I think it was reasonable

grounds for turning me down for tenure. That was

correct. At that stage in my career I was not

aggressive enough in applying for funding.

Q. Did you pursue any type of litigation as a

result of --

A. No. No.

Q. And did you charge the initial tenure

track committee with any improper motivations in their

denial of your application for tenure?

A. There were a few irregularities in there.

The main one was that the -- the main one was that the

chairman of the department -- let me try to explain

this. When you go for tenure, you have to give a list

of people from whom they may not solicit letters of

recommendations, and there was one person I was involved

with in a scientific controversy at that time. And so I

put that person's name down as somebody not to get an

external letter from. And, in fact, the chairman did

solicit an external letter for that.

Q. You told me that you had a scientific

controversy with this individual?

A. Yes.

Q. And what was the nature of that


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controversy?

A. It was over how -- do you really want to

know this?

MR. MANION: Yes. I do.

A. Okay. It was over how accurately you can

measure the time delays of light echos in quasars using

two different statistical methods.

MR. SURTEES: Very well said.

MR. MANION: Did you come to blows

over that?

A. This is a very normal scientific

controversy.

Q. You had a difference with this scientist

and the tenure committee contacted them despite --

A. The chairman contacted them.

Q. The chairman. Okay.

A. The tenure committee is the entire tenured

faculty in the department.

Q. Do you recall the name of the chair of the

department that you were dealing with?

A. Yes. Douglas Richstone.

Q. And because of this scientific

disagreement you had with Dr. Richstone --

A. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Q. I mean with the other gentleman.


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A. Right. Right.

Q. Dr. Richstone was the chair of the

department.

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. Who was the individual that you had

the scientific controversy with?

A. It's a professor Julian Krolik,

K-r-o-l-i-k.

Q. And presumably this contact that you had

asked them not to make --

A. Right.

Q. -- was negative, had been negative toward

you?

A. No. The chairman contacted this person

and members of the faculty, they strongly objected to

this and the letter was not included in my tenure file,

but it was -- it was an improper step that he approached

this person.

Q. And was that a point that you raised to

the appeal --

A. Yes.

Q. -- in your appeal?

Okay. Any other irregularities with that

review of your application --

A. Yes.


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Q. -- for tenure?

A. There was. There was another one.

MR. MANION: Let her finish. Let her

finish her question.

THE WITNESS: Oh, sorry, sorry.

Q. Any other irregularities in terms of your

application for tenure at the University of Michigan?

A. The other irregularity was that the

chairman did not want to show a very positive letter

from a famous theoretical astrophysicist.

Q. And did he advise you why he was

reluctant?

A. Well, I didn't hear about this from the

chairman.

Q. Okay.

A. I heard about this from the other faculty.

Q. Do you know why he was --

A. He gave no reason. He gave no reason to

them or to me that I'm aware of. He also

mischaracterized the letter as well.

Q. And I presume this was another point that

you raised in your appeal?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay.

A. Those were the two main points.


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Q. Any other irregularities that you can

recall?

A. I don't think so, no.

Q. Have you ever applied for a job which you

were denied and you believed that the reason for the

denial was based on anything other than your scientific

expertise and background?

A. I applied for a lot of jobs, so I have a

lot to think about there. I don't know the reasons for

any job really why I was turned down for it. That's --

I'm pausing because that's a -- it's a big question.

Q. I understand that's a broad question,

right.

A. So nothing jumps out on the top of my head

there. Maybe you could clarify your question.

Q. Okay. Well, we'll move on and we'll come

back to that.

Have you ever been terminated from a job

other than the denial of your tenure?

A. Well, the one in Nebraska is effectively

termination. Yes.

Q. Okay.

A. Yes.

Q. That is considered termination. And

that's due to the elimination --


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A. Right.

Q. -- of the department?

A. No, no, no, no. It's not the elimination

of the department. It's the -- it's the elimination of

the astronomy program.

Q. Okay. Was that a separate department?

A. No.

Q. Okay. That was always in the college

of --

A. Right.

Q. -- of what? What was it -- what was it

contained in?

A. I think it was called the College of Arts

and Sciences.

Q. Okay.

MR. CAVAGNERO: Was it called the

Department of Physics and Astronomy?

THE WITNESS: (Nods head.)

Q. Was it the Department of Physics and

Astronomy?

A. Astronomy, yeah.

MR. CAVAGNERO: Prior to that it was

the Department of Physics and Astronomy.

A. Yes.

Q. And the change at University of Nebraska


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was it just became the Department of Physics, and they

assumed some of the classes of astronomy in that

department?

A. It was suggested that they might even want

to think about renaming the department. I have not

checked. I don't think they have.

Q. Do you know what the department is called

at University of Nebraska now?

A. As far as I know, it's the Department of

Physics and Astronomy.

Q. Okay.

A. But the former chairman, Roger Kirby, did

say that he'd give thought to renaming the department

just the Department of Physics.

Q. During your tenure of employment with the

University of Nebraska, did you do anything to change

or -- the job duties of what you were appointed for? I

mean, you were a lecture --

MR. MANION: Let her finish.

THE WITNESS: Sorry.


THE WITNESS: Thank you.

Q. I'm not -- I'm not -- I'm not saying that

very clearly, but I guess the way you've described your

job at the University of Nebraska, you had teaching


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responsibilities as well as research.

A. Right.

Q. Throughout that period of time was there a

fairly even distribution of your efforts in terms of

research and teaching, or did that change from year to

year?

A. It changed from year to year.

Q. Did you ever take any -- you yourself take

any affirmative steps to change the nature of your

duties --

A. Yes.

Q. -- from -- and what were those changes?

A. Okay. At the stage where my appointment

was 100 percent teaching -- sorry, it was not a hundred

percent, it was almost a hundred percent teaching, there

always was some research in it -- I spoke with the

chairman and my dean about getting more time for doing

research. Faculty typically have a -- well, a three-way

split, I'm not going to say equal, between service

activities, teaching and research. And I was very much

on the teaching side to get most of that. So I was

wanting to get that increased, so I spoke with both --

my chairman, Roger Kirby.

Q. So you wanted to do more research as

opposed to teaching in terms of the distribution of


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your --

A. Of the distribution, yes. Yes.

Q. What point was that? Do you remember a

year when --

A. This would have been -- I could -- I was

going to say I could look up the year and tell you. I

might not get it right right now. It would have been

around 2001. Might have been 2000, might have been

2002. Probably around 2001.

Q. And other than speaking to your -- the

chair and the dean about perhaps changing your duties,

were you able to do anything else to change that?

A. Well, when I went to speak with the dean,

what the dean recommended that I do was to do what is

called buy out of teaching, and that is get a large

research grant which would provide money for the

university to get someone else to teach my class so that

I could do the research. So that was the recommendation

of the dean. I then applied to the National Science

Foundation to do that, and in 2003, I think, I got a

large National Science Foundation grant.

Q. And were you able to buy out --

A. Yes.

Q. -- your teaching responsibilities?

A. Yes. Actually, I got another grant as


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well also, let me buy out. Now, then the dean changed

his mind about the buyouts.

Q. Before we get in to that, what year, what

academic year would you have bought out the teaching

portion of your duties?

A. I have to think about that. I think I got

the grant in 2003. The first buyout was in the 2003-

2004 academic year, and I'll say plus or minus one on

that.

Q. And then -- and so the way that works is

you get the grant money and that enables the university

to go and hire other people to --

A. Yes.

Q. -- teach classes that they had

contemplated you teaching?

A. Right. Right.

Q. Okay.

A. This is -- this is a very normal thing at

universities, by the way.

Q. And how many years were you able to buy

out the teaching aspects?

A. I did that for three or four years.

Again, I have to think about that. At least three, I

think. Might have been four.

Q. And you said that the dean at some point


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changed his mind about these kinds of buyouts.

A. Yes, he did. The dean had initially

recommended this was the way to do things. Then he --

when it came to approving the first buyout, the

department was completely happy with it; my chairman, my

colleagues, everything was fine there. But the dean

was, as my chairman put it, opposed on philosophical

grounds to hiring a lecturer do research. The -- I

spoke with the dean about this, and he changed his mind

and went back to what he said in the first place. So I

was okay. Then the next year came around and he changed

his mind back to being philosophically opposed to it

again, and the chairman and I had discussions with the

dean about this, and reluctantly and with annoyance, he

flipped back to approving it again. But he was not

happy with doing that.

Q. From 2003 up until the end of your work

with the University of Nebraska, were you continuing to

buy out the teaching portion of your responsibilities?

A. My last year I was just doing research.

Q. Okay.

A. I explained I was a research associate

professor there. I was actually just doing research

that year.

Q. And that work did not require you to buy


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out any teaching aspect?

A. No.

Q. Okay.

A. No.

(Off-the-record comments.)

MS. KRIZ: Just take a break.

VIDEOGRAPHER: Stand by, please.

We're going off video. It's 10:29 a.m.

(Off the record.)

VIDEOGRAPHER: We're back on video.

It's 10:36 a.m.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, you have -- we've been

talking about your employment history, and you have

indicated that, you know, over the years you have sought

other appointments other than what's -- jobs that you --

A. Uh-huh.

Q. -- actually were hired to do. Do you keep

any kind of file in terms of applications you filed or

inquiries you've made, say like over the last five

years, in terms of job applications?

A. I can -- I can certainly have it this

year.

Q. Okay.

A. I'm not sure about how complete my records

are going back beyond that.


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Q. Okay.

A. Particularly back in the days of paper,

and I guess recycled paper. But no, I know how many

jobs I've applied for this year.

Q. And I'll follow up with a more formal

request, but to the extent that you can provide us

information as to the employers where you have actually

filed applications for employment from the period of

2007 to the present, that's what we're going to be

looking for. Okay?

A. Right.

Q. And again, I'll follow up with a request

through your attorney.

A. Right.

Q. Now, Dr. Gaskell, you have obviously

worked extensively as an astronomer in an academic

environment for the last couple of decades. You've

written extensively in your area. Are there other areas

of personal interest where you have actually published

any type of articles, written any type of books, those

kinds -- published material is what I'm focusing at this

point.

A. I'll have to think a moment about that.

Q. And, for example, I notice from your

website and your resume that you have an interest in


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music?

A. That was the other thing.

Q. You have an interest in contra dancing?

A. I think I'm thinking about -- I think in

the academic sense of publishing, no. I do sell my

music, but this is -- this is produced privately on my

own imprint.

Another -- I can't swear that there hasn't

been something somewhere that I've -- I've published

because I don't list anything on my resume.

Q. Right. And I understand that.

A. Nothing springs out at me, but I do a lot

of things and could well be something in there.

Q. In the area of religion have you published

any type of articles, written any kind of books?

A. No.

Q. Lectured in any --

A. Lectured --

Q. -- formal capacity?

A. Well -- sorry.

MR. MANION: I haven't seen a question

mark yet.

Q. I'm not getting my questions --

MR. MANION: I'm seeing commas, not

question marks.


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MS. KRIZ: Exactly.

Q. In the area of religion you said you don't

recall publishing any type of articles or writing any

books but you have lectured in -- on religious topics;

is that accurate?

A. You've asked a number of questions there.

So could you ask them one at a time, please?

Q. Have you published anything that you can

recall as it relates to any religious topic?

A. I don't think so.

Q. You -- have you lectured on religious

topics?

A. What sort of lectures?

Q. Any type of lectures. Lectures to any --

any --

A. To churches, yes.

Q. Churches, yes. Any private groups?

A. Yes. Private groups, yes. To a major

university in Lexington as well.

Q. Do you keep any type of documentation of

the lectures that you've done in the area -- on the

topic that involves any kind of religious topic?

A. What do you mean by documentation?

Q. Lecture notes, dates on which you've done

the lectures, invitations to speak on particular topics,


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those kinds of things?

A. Not intentionally. In a rather haphazard

way. When we left the University of Nebraska, we had to

move to a smaller house and we threw an awful lot of

stuff away. Also, with lectures, they used to be on

overhead transparencies, and now -- I haven't actually

given this lecture recently, but we moved up to

PowerPoints, so I've ditched the old transparencies.

But my lecture notes are available, and have been

available.

Q. Tell me the kinds of topics that you have

addressed in lectures in the religious field.

A. Okay. The lectures -- I have a 16- or 17-

page transcript detailed, not transcript, theme, which

has the title Modern Astronomy, the Bible, and Creation,

I think is the title, something like that, and this is

the main lecture that I give. It has a little bit more

and a little bit less than any one actual lecture I

give.

Q. When did you first recall lecturing on

that topic?

A. That is difficult to remember. Certainly

when I was at the University of Michigan.

Q. And tell me how that interest developed in

that area.


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A. Oh. Well, when I was a graduate student,

I was part of a Christian graduate student group which

was -- had many scientists in it.

Q. What was the name of that group, or did it

have a name?

A. We called ourselves the Christian -- CGS,

Christian Graduate Students, at the University of

California Santa Cruz. I did not give a talk to them

but -- and in the church library of the church I was a

member of there had a copy of the Journal of the

American Scientific Affiliation, which I read and later

joined. So that's -- was the stage where I got

interested in these topics. But it was a gradual

interest.

Q. And do you believe that as a graduate

student you would have first begun lecturing in this

area?

A. No, no. No, I did not -- I certainly did

not lecture to graduate students. The earliest time for

sure I can -- I can remember now, this is -- there are

public lectures, there are lectures to churches, there

are lectures to groups, and some are more formal than

others, and I just can't -- more informal ones, I cannot

remember all of those, and these things tended to start

off more informally, so I -- so I just can't remember


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that.

Q. You know, how did you get started

lecturing in this area? Did someone --

A. Oh, yes.

Q. -- invite you to speak on a specific

topic?

A. Yes. People thought, oh, this is

interesting. Sorry. People thought this is

interesting. He's a Christian. He's an astronomer.

Let's see what he has to say.

Q. And tell me some of the organizations that

you have lectured to on this topic.

A. Oh, that's hard to remember.

Q. Obviously, it's not an exhaustive list

today.

A. No. So let us throw out a few. Campus

Crusade for Christ.

Q. And what campus was that?

A. No, no, that's an national organization.

Q. Okay.

A. Campus Crusade for Christ. It's multiple

campuses. Intervarsity Christian Fellowship; again,

that's a National Organization on multiple campuses.

And let's see. Churches; I'm afraid I can't remember

all those. Lectures at universities of the more public


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type. These also tend to be sponsored by some of the

groups I already mentioned there. I think both those

groups were probably cosponsors of the one in Lexington.

Q. If you were invited to lecture on this

topic at a university, are you telling me you're

typically invited by some Christian organization that

was sponsoring the lecture?

A. Lectures on campuses are frequently

sponsored by multiple organizations. For example, if a

democratic candidate for U.S. president came to a campus

and spoke, that group would be sponsored by the campus

democrats; it might also be sponsored by the political

science department, that sort of thing. It might be

sponsored by the Dean of Undergraduate Studies or

something. Often when these people are sponsoring, they

are bringing in a bit of money to pay for speakers.

Q. Have you ever been invited by a university

to speak on a topic involving religion that was -- the

invitation was made to you through the -- directly by

the university as opposed to --

A. Only once. Only once.

Q. And what was that?

A. And that was the University of Kentucky.

Q. And when was that?

A. It was about 1996, give or take a couple


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of years. I'm not sure what year, but you have the

information on that.

Q. Okay. And tell me how that invitation was

extended to you.

A. The invitation was extended from the

physics department.

Q. And was there an individual that you had

contact with there?

A. My contact with that was Gary Ferland.

Q. And had you known Dr. Ferland before he

invited you to come to the university?

A. Yes.

Q. And how had you come to know Dr. Ferland?

A. We work in the same field.

Q. So you had a professional association?

A. Yes. Yes. I first met him when I was a

postdoc in Cambridge.

Q. And he was serving at Cambridge at that

time too?

A. I think he had just joined the University

of Kentucky at that time. But he was at Cambridge

before that.

Q. So you've known Dr. Ferland since the

'70s.

A. No, not -- did I say '70s? If I did, I


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was mistaken. From 19 -- we first met in 1982 or 1983.

We published a paper together in 1984.

Q. And was that paper -- was that in the

field of astronomy?

A. Yes.

Q. So sometime in 1996 Dr. Ferland contacted

you and invited you to come to speak at the university?

A. Yes.

Q. And what did he tell you about what that

lecture was?

A. How much do you want to know about that?

Q. As much as you can tell me.

A. Right. Dr. Ferland came to Nebraska to

give a colloquium on astrophysics and atomic physics,

and during that he and I had a conversation about

religion and science. And when people ask me these

questions, my standard response is to give them the

handout. So I gave him a copy of the handout of my

lecture notes.

Q. On what topic?

A. This is the -- this is this -- the only

one I mentioned so far.

Q. Okay. The Modern Astronomy --

A. Basically the only lecture I give.

Q. Okay.


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A. Yes.

Q. So he asked you a question and you gave

him your lecture notes?

A. Right. And he was very interested in

this. So he brought that back to Lexington and shared

it with colleagues around the department, and after

discussing this with other colleagues in the department,

he thought it would be very worthwhile to have me come

and give a lecture.

Q. And would that lecture have been directed

at any particular audience or at the university

population as a whole?

A. It was directed at the university

population as a whole.

Q. And was there payment associated with that

lecture?

A. No, there was not.

Q. Okay. Were there any other sponsors --

A. Yes.

Q. -- in terms of -- okay.

MR. MANION: You're jumping in.

You're jumping in.

Q. Sponsors of that lecture? Who else were

the other sponsors?

A. I cannot remember, but Dr. Ferland still


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has a poster from that talk, and the bottom of the

poster it lists the sponsors. They were major campus

Christian groups, and I cannot remember all their names.

Q. And were you provided any information as

to what you needed -- what topic you were to cover and

what specifically you were to address?

A. It was assumed I was going to say exactly

what was in the lecture notes. And I did.

Q. And where did that lecture take place?

A. In a large room. A very nice room,

actually. Am I allowed to ask Mike Cavagnero what the

name of the room is?

MR. MANION: No. No. What you

recall.

THE WITNESS: Okay.

A. It was a large room. It seated four or

five, 600 people. It had a balcony at the back. I was

on a large stage. I believe there was a pipe organ in

there too.

Q. An auditorium of sorts?

A. Oh, yes. Yes.

Q. And were you one of a number of lecturers?

A. No, I was introduced by somebody and that

was it and...

Q. So you were the only person --


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A. I was the only person speaking, yes.

Q. Okay. And were there 5- or 600 people in

attendance?

A. The room was not completely full. I would

guess more the order of 3- or 400. The downstairs was

pretty full, of this room.

Q. And you said that you believe Dr. Ferland

probably still has a poster. How was this advertised or

communicated? The lecture.

A. Well, it was a very nice poster, nice

picture on it, and Gary wanted me to autograph it so he

could frame it. And -- it was a very nice picture.

And --

Q. Of you or --

A. No. No. It was -- it was -- it was of

the famous Michelangelo painting in the Sistine Chapel

where God is reaching down to Adam. It's a very, very

famous painting. It's used on many book covers. Very

nice poster. And it was also in the student newspaper

and --

Q. What was the title of the lecture?

A. Probably the same as the title of my

handout.

Q. Modern Astronomy --

A. I don't know.


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Q. Okay.

A. But it was something pretty close to the

title on the handout.

It was also advertised in the student

newspaper, which I remember well because the student

newspaper put in the wrong day of the lecture, which

caused the organizers a big panic.

Q. And you believe this was in 1996?

A. It might have been '98. I think it was an

even year.

Q. '96 or '98, okay.

Was there a particular format for this

lecture? Was it a question-and-answer session?

Strictly lecture?

A. The format of the lecture is after being

introduced I lecture for about an hour. The content of

the lecture follows the notes, which you should have,

and then at the end there's a question time. Now, the

ways in which it deviates from the notes are there are

slides that I show, and I also put up a few Bible verses

as well. I think the Bible references are in the notes,

but the actual lists themselves are not. So...

Q. Do you recall any controversy surrounding

that lecture?

A. The only thing that could be regarded as


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controversy was in the question time there was some

aggressive statements and questions by somebody who

identified himself as a biology faculty member who was

sitting at the back of the hall.

Q. And what do you recall those questions

being?

A. They were a mixture of questions and

statements. He was wanting a clarification of my views

on evolution, which if you notice in the lecture notes

is not a feature of the lecture. In fact, I say in the

lecture notes that I have no problem with the theory of

evolution. So I think I could say he wanted a

clarification of my views there and --

Q. So the questions were, in your opinion,

off topic?

A. Oh, no, no. It was a perfectly reasonable

question to ask, but he rather quickly got annoyed.

Q. Before we get in to that. Are there

things that were covered in that lecture that raised

questions about your position as it relates to the

theory of evolution?

A. There are things which could -- even if I

said nothing at all, it's a perfectly reasonable

question for somebody to ask and wonder about. And

other people have asked me about that on other


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occasions. You know, I say nothing about biology

whatsoever, and this is not a biology lecture. It's

very reasonable to ask somebody a question about

something else.

Q. Without going in to your -- the entirety

of your lecture, tell me what your seminal themes are in

this lecture and what information you're trying to

relate to your audience.

A. I want people to know that there is not a

major incompatibility between science and being a

scientist and doing scientist -- doing science and being

religious. That's the main thing. So I start off by

giving examples, a small number of examples, of famous

scientists of the past who were Christians. And that's

about a third of the lecture, actually, I'm talking

about that. Then how much I emphasize things depends on

the audience. Then another thing is I want people to

understand that in this interface between religion and

science there are a variety of views, and not just the

vocal extremes that one hears, but there are positions

in the middle and a range of positions, and that the

confessing, believing Christians hold to a range of

beliefs. So that's like the second thing. And the

third thing is I -- is really an astronomy lecture.

It's talking about what we know about from astronomy


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about the origin of the universe and how does that

compare with what's in the Bible. Then that's --

that's -- then I stop and I take questions.

Q. So the area -- you're trying to convey

information, first of all, about other famous scientists

or scientists that people are aware of in the past --

A. Right. Right.

Q. -- who had religious beliefs?

A. Yes.

Q. On a particular topic or just --

A. I just stick with astronomy, but if I

were -- if I were a biologist giving this to biologists,

I would throw in biology names, but I stick with

astronomists.

Q. Okay. And is there any particular beliefs

that you're focusing on? Is it relating to the origin

of the universe, or are there other religious topics

that you're discussing as it relates to these

astronomers?

A. It's -- the people I -- say again what I

said earlier. It's the compatibility of religious

beliefs with doing science, being a scientist. So I say

these people are famous scientists, names like Isaac

Newton, you've probably heard of. I say, okay, Isaac

Newton believed in God. And there are other names you


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might not recognize, but I say these people -- I don't

go in to their beliefs in detail. They're mostly

Christians, some -- some of other -- other beliefs.

Q. But the beliefs that you're addressing in

this -- in this lecture, is it more to do with the

origins of the universe? Is that the particular area

we're talking about?

A. To fair extent, yes. That's certainly

what people want to hear me talk about. So -- I'm going

to repeat myself, but the three parts of the lecture,

the first part is trying to make it plain that a lot of

scientists today and in the past have had strongly held

religious beliefs, myself included. Then I try to

explain that it's not just the two extremes in this,

that there's a range of opinions and these range of

opinions are held by believing Christians. That's the

middle part of the lecture. And the final part is the

astronomy lecture, saying this is how we think the

universe came about, let's compare this with what's in

the book of Genesis.

Q. How many times do you think you've given a

lecture on this topic?

A. I don't know. A few. Say a few. I could

go home and think about it and maybe find records, but

just say a few.


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Q. You said that when you gave the lecture at

the University of Kentucky, you had question-and-answer

session --

A. Yes.

Q. -- and had some rather aggressive

questions --

A. No, no. Only one -- only one aggressive.

Q. Okay. Okay. And do you recall who that

individual was, or did you know?

A. I did not know. He did identify himself

as a biology professor, and I think he might have been

with another colleague at the back of the hall.

Q. And in terms of publicity before the

lecture or any protests or anything like that, anything

like that that you recall going on at the time that you

gave your lecture?

A. No.

Q. You said that the aggressive question had

to do with your clarification of your views on

evolution.

A. Yes.

Q. In your lecture do you discuss topics of

evolution at all?

A. The only thing I said about evolution

was -- in the last part of the lecture I'm going through


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the book of Genesis in order. And the book of Genesis,

first chapter, describes God doing things on different

days, and then it gets to God creating life on the

earth. And if you look at my lecture notes there I kind

of joke about this and say at this point I say yuck,

biology, and -- and I say this is why students take my

classes because they want to avoid biology. They don't

like cutting up slimy things. So -- but the one

statement I sometimes make, and I did make this time, is

that -- I can't remember exactly what I said, but it

would have been something like evolution is not

explaining everything, and there's a lot about evolution

that is not understood. It was something on that level.

And so that was what he asked me about.

Q. Okay. And do you recall what you said in

response to his question?

A. Yes, I do. Because whenever anybody asks

me about evolution, the first thing I do is I clarify

the terminology, because the word "evolution" goes from

wide range of a lot of things. So -- so I make it very

clear that I had no trouble with the natural selection

process. I gave -- I mentioned a couple of concrete

examples. But it's just when it comes to trying to

explain everything, and particularly the origin of life

that I think I would have mentioned there, that we just


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don't have any satisfactory theory right now of that.

Q. And was he disagreeing with you, or was it

just a question he asked of you?

A. Well, I think that he was assuming that I

was coming from a young earth creationist viewpoint. He

got increasingly angry and stormed out, or tried to

storm out in the middle of me speaking -- in the middle

of me answering his question. And I think he was

muttering something like "creationist" or something like

that. That was the feeling I got. And he called it --

it might have been a colleague or graduate student or

somebody with him also walked out at that time. And I

spoke rather firmly, and I said, don't walk out, I'm

still answering your question. And so he stopped, and

this got the entire audience's attention, everybody

staring at him.

Q. Sure.

A. I definitely embarrassed him, or I should

say he embarrassed himself there, and so I finished my

question and then he stormed out.

Q. What is -- what is young earth

creationist? What does that term mean?

A. A young earth creationist is somebody who

believes the -- everything was made about 6,000 years

ago. 4004 BC is a popular date for that, but young


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earth creationists actually don't really pin it down to

a precise date. So they take the view -- a very literal

interpretation of Genesis.

Q. Is this a scientific concept or a

religious concept, creationism?

A. I would say it's a religious concept.

Somebody -- young earth creationist would disagree with

that, but I would say, in my opinion -- would say

religious view.

Q. Do you agree with the young earth

creationist theory?

A. No. No. And I make that clear in the

lecture. It's also clear in the lecture notes.

Q. What is your religion, Dr. Gaskell?

A. I'm a Christian.

Q. And are you a member of any particular

church or denomination?

A. Not all churches have formal membership,

so I'm still formally a card-carrying member of the

Church of England.

MR. MANION: They give out cards?

THE WITNESS: Yes.

A. But the -- we actually -- actually our

family attends two churches right now. We go to one on

Saturday nights and one Sunday mornings.


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Q. And what churches are those?

A. The church that meets on Saturday nights

is a house -- what's called a house church, and it is a

multicultural church.

Q. Is it affiliated with any particular

religion?

A. It's Christian.

Q. Now, Christian has a lot of different

meanings.

A. Yes.

Q. I know that there's a protestant church,

Disciples of Christ that is called Christian Church --

A. Oh, oh, sorry. Okay.

Q. -- as opposed to Christian, believer in

Christ.

MR. MANION: The denomination.

Q. -- more of a general --

MS. KRIZ: Right.

Q. So are these churches that you attend

affiliated with any particular denomination?

A. Okay. I'm using the word Christian in the

sense of follower of Jesus Christ.

Q. Okay.

A. Right. So ask your question again.

Q. Okay. What are the denominations of the


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churches you currently attend?

A. Okay. The multicultural church is not

part of a denomination. And actually neither is the one

we go to on Sunday mornings. It's what's called an

independent church. If you want a label for me, I would

give the label evangelical. We also participate in a

Presbyterian church as well, mostly to help with the

music.

Q. And have you -- have you been a Christian

since --

A. Age 12.

Q. Age 12. Okay. Did you ever attend any

type of religious educational institute?

A. No.

Q. Other than your side interests in topics

involving religious concepts, have you had any academic

training in religion?

A. No.

MS. KRIZ: We have to change the tape.


We're going off video. It's 11:07 a.m.

(Off the record.)


This is Tape 2. It's 11:24 a.m.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, you had told me that you had


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had a relationship or had known Dr. Gary Ferland for

some years --

A. Yes.

Q. -- before you were ever invited to come to

speak to the --

A. Yes.

Q. -- university or ever applied for the --

A. Yes.

Q. -- director position.

Did you have a relationship with anybody

else that's affiliated with the University of Kentucky?

A. Well, there are a couple of people who

work in my field there, which was, by the way, an

attraction of going to Kentucky. So the people who work

in my field there, the older people I knew best because

they'd been around longer, so there's -- blanking on

names now.

Q. Did you have a relationship with Tom

Troland? Did you know him at all?

A. No. No.

Q. Okay. What about --

A. It reminded me of the names of the other

astronomers. I'm sorry, just blanking out, I guess.

Q. Okay.

A. Isaac Schlossman, for example, is one in


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the same field. Isaac Shlossman, S-h-l-o --

Q. -- s-s-i-n.

A. Something, yes. Isaac Shlossman and Moshe

Elitzur. Okay. M-o-s-h-e E-l-i-t-z-u-r. And then Nancy

Leveson also works, does closely related work to me, but

actually the first time I met her was the job interview.

Q. Okay. So is it fair to say you were

familiar with Dr. Shlossman, Elitzur and Leveson by

their work, or did you know them personally before you

applied for this job?

A. Well, those lines get blurred in astronomy

so -- we meet at conferences. I served on a review

panel with Isaac Shlossman not too long ago.

Conferences is where you tend to meet people.

Q. Other than your professional contact at

conferences, would you say that you had a personal

relationship with anyone other than Dr. Ferland?

A. Gary and I have known each other longest,

so we're the ones that have closest relationship.

Everybody else -- well, Mike Cavagnero and the fellow

the observatory is named after came to visit in Nebraska

to look at the observatory, so I met them.

Q. And is that Keith MacAdam?

A. Keith. Thank you. Yes.

Q. When was that?


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A. That was --

MR. CAVAGNERO: Was it 2005?

MS. KRIZ: You can't answer that.

A. I seem to remember that it was 2005.

MR. MANION: Too much coffee. Let's

cut back.

Q. Do you remember what the purpose of their

visit to the University of Nebraska was for?

A. Well, there is something called a DAMOP

conference was going on. That's the Division of Atomic

and Molecular and Optical Physics, I think. And it's a

big national meeting, and it was hosted by the

University of Nebraska. And while they were there they

took advantage of that, to meet with me and to visit the

observatory which we had built there, which was very

similar to what they were hoping to build in Lexington.

Q. Was it your understanding based on your

contact with Cavagnero and MacAdam at that time that

they were in the beginning stages of restarting an

observatory at the University of Kentucky?

A. I'm not quite sure what stage they were at

there.

Q. And did you -- did they seek you out to

obtain some information from you?

A. Yes.


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Q. Okay. And what do you remember about your

conversations? I mean, did you just meet with them at

the conference and talk to them or --

A. We met at the observatory.

Q. Okay.

A. And so I showed them the observatory. I

discussed a lot of technical issues that they needed to

consider about the observatory. I discussed all the

things we were doing with the observatory in terms of

public outreach, education, student research.

Q. At that time were you director of the --

A. Yes.

Q. -- observatory?

A. My title was officially coordinator of the

observatory, but yes. My official title was coordinator

of the observatory. The word "director" sounded too

important to the university.

Q. What were your duties as it related to

that observatory at the University of Nebraska?

A. Oh. Everything.

Q. You did the -- technically ran the

observatory?

A. Yes.

Q. In terms of if a class wanted to utilize

it were you the person that would have taught the class?


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A. If it was my class, yes. There's a lot I

can say. How much do you want to know?

Q. Well, go ahead and I'll stop you if

there's too much.

MR. MANION: She'll stop you.

A. Okay. Okay. So let's try to divide up

what the observatory was used for.

Q. Okay.

A. So I mentioned three areas. There was

public outreach.

Q. And what did that involve?

A. Public outreach was I -- mostly I ran

public nights once a month, and depending on the

weather, we would have between a handful of people up to

about a thousand people who'd come, wanted to see

things. Also depended on what was going on in the sky.

So we got to around a thousand when Mars was at its

closest in human lifetime. So I ran those once a month,

and if you want, I can tell you more details about

those.

Q. No, that's adequate for my purposes.

A. And then there was the teaching side of

it. Now, the teaching side of the observatory, when I

started the observatory was when the University of

Nebraska had a fully-fledged astronomy program. By the


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time I left, things had changed. Sorry, I shouldn't

have done that. But if you talk about the middle period

there, then there were two main types of astronomy

class. There were introductory astronomy classes, and I

taught all these classes. There were introductory

astronomy classes, large enrollments, and those students

would come by, and depending on their interest they

would either do a lot or do the minimum they could get

away with. And we had the observatory scheduled two or

three nights a week for the classes. For all the

classes. Then, in addition, we had a specialized class

for the beginning astronomy majors, a lab class which

was based around that telescope, and I either taught

that or co-taught that or worked with other people and

teaching assistants teaching that class. They had to be

in a graduate class, but as I said, the graduate program

got closed -- nothing happened to the observatory. Is

that enough detail?

Q. Yes, uh-huh. And then what was the third

component?

A. Oh, sorry. Yes. Then there was student

research. So these are highly motivated students

possibly doing senior theses, had one master's thesis,

and they would go and use the observatory on their own

and do research.


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Q. You talked briefly about the public

outreach component of that --

A. Yes.

Q. -- appointment, and you spoke about the

public nights. Was there any particular outreach as it

related to primary schools, K through 12?

A. I was involved with -- hum, a lot of

things. I took part in teacher training workshops, but

they at most just casually visited the observatory, and

we said here's the observatory. There were various

other groups of the public who asked to use the

observatory. Anybody who wanted to could ask for a

special visit. So the SAC Museum -- that's S-A-C -- had

an astronaut camp, for example, in the summer, school

kids, and they came and used the observatory. The local

photography club wanted to learn about taking

astronomical photographs and so -- so they came. And

really anybody who wanted to come, I would let them

come, but in -- Lincoln was very fortunate in having a

city observatory, and the main focus of the city

observatory was public outreach, and I was on the board

of directors and also volunteer at the city observatory.

So when people would telephone me up and ask can I bring

my Boy Scout troop by or something, I would steer them

to the city observatory because the city observatory was


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much better set up for handling Boy Scout groups and

Girl Scout groups and those sorts of groups.

Q. What was the name of that?

A. That is called Hyde Observatory, H-y-d-e.

I'm actually still on the board of Hyde Observatory.

Q. And that has no affiliation with


A. No, it doesn't. We -- and I'm putting on

my Hyde Observatory hat -- I'm still on the board

there -- tried to have a close relationship with the

university. So, for example, we would coordinate

things. We might do joint publicity. If there was a

lunar eclipse, I would be opening the -- what we call

the student observatory on campus. My friends at Hyde

Observatory have Hyde Observatory open, and we might

have a joint press release that said in Lincoln the two

observatories are open if you want to see the eclipse.

MR. CAVAGNERO: Martin, one thing you

might want to clarify -- I'm sorry, did I interrupt?

One thing you might want to clarify is that when they

shut down the astronomy program in Nebraska. I think

you're referring to the graduate program. There was

still astronomy instruction and observatory events going

on after they shut down -- to my understanding.

THE WITNESS: Thanks.


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Q. Dr. Cavagnero just brought to my

attention --

A. Do I need to say that? Would you like me

to say that?

Q. No. Let me ask you. He brought this to

my attention. I want to ask you. You know, you told us

a little bit about the fact that it was the decision of

whoever at the University of Nebraska to eliminate the

astronomy department and --

A. It wasn't a department. It was a program.

Q. A program. Okay. But despite that

elimination, the university continued to teach astronomy

classes --

A. The large introductory courses, yes.

Q. Okay. What else has continued to be

taught in the field of astronomy --

A. I haven't been there --

Q. -- at the University of Nebraska at this

time to your knowledge?

A. I've not been there for a few years. At

the time I left, there was a major debate in the

department about what to do about the majors program.

And there was a second external review that took place.

There was a review about 2000, 2001 which recommended

closing down two of the programs in the department; one


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was astronomy, the other was science education. Science

education is totally gone. The -- and just

concentrating on three areas. These were -- happening

five or six years, and about five or six years later was

when the closing down of the astronomy program was

essentially a fait accompli.

There was another -- another review, and a

point that this second review made -- and this is in a

written report that I can give my attorneys to give to

you -- made was that the department could not pretend to

have an astronomy program when they did not. And this

was an issue they had to face up to. They either had to

turn around and hire some real astronomers or they had

to not pretend they had an astronomy major program.

Q. So if somebody goes to the University of

Nebraska now, or based on when you --

A. Right.

Q. -- were there last, they cannot get a

degree in astronomy?

A. They never could get a degree in

astronomy.

Q. Okay.

A. The degree is in physics. But in physics

there are -- now, when I left there were different

tracks, and astronomy was one of five or so tracks


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there. And the education of an astronomer is mostly the

education of a physicist. This was true when I was a

student, still true almost every place I know of. So

mostly when I was an undergraduate I took lectures in

mathematics, physics; but some areas of physics instead

of nuclear physics, let's say, I had lectures and

courses in astronomy. Instead of an advanced physics

lab, I had advanced astronomy lab. And that's pretty

much the case nationwide. And that's probably the case

at the University of Kentucky as well.

Q. So I guess I'm not understanding. What

exactly was eliminated? What was the change?

A. Okay. The change was people.

Q. Okay.

MR. CAVAGNERO: And the graduate...

A. So -- and the graduate program -- and the

graduate program, yes.

Q. So they eliminated any graduate program in

the field of astronomy --

A. Yes.

Q. -- with a physics major with an emphasis

on astronomy?

A. Right. Now, graduate students who were in

the program at the time it was -- were grandfathered in.

I think one of them is still there, actually. But no


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new graduate students were admitted in to astronomy.

Q. Do they still have the observatory there

at Nebraska?

A. Oh, yes. I haven't checked. I think so.

Q. Okay. So this meeting that Dr. Cavagnero

and Dr. MacAdam had with you was essentially to take a

look at the University of Nebraska Observatory --

A. Yes.

Q. -- and see how that was run --

A. Yes.

Q. -- as you understood they were beginning

the processes of opening up an observatory --

A. Right.

Q. -- at the university.

A. Right.

Q. Had you ever met either Dr. Cavagnero --

A. No.

Q. -- or Dr. MacAdam before?

A. No.

Q. That was your first. At that point --

A. No.

Q. -- was there any discussion with

Dr. Cavagnero or with Dr. MacAdam about any positions

that may arise as a result of them opening up an

observatory?


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A. No. No.

Q. So this was strictly a conversation about

the observatory?

A. Technical issues.

Q. Okay.

A. Programmatic and technical issues.

Q. When did you first learn that the

University of Kentucky was interested in hiring a

coordinator/director of their observatory?

A. I learned two ways. About the same month

the department, as all departments do, advertised in the

Job Register of the American Astronomical Society.

Also, Gary Ferland sent out an e-mail to various parties

who had provided advice and assistance with the

observatory asking for help in locating possible

candidates.

Q. And do you recall the year or month that

would have occurred?

A. I can give you -- the e-mail to my

attorneys to give to you.

Q. Okay.

A. I think.

Q. And you would have been one of the

recipients of that general e-mail?

A. I can't remember who else got it, but it


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was a -- it was a generic e-mail. This is, again, a

normal thing that departments do. I get these e-mails

all the time saying we have a position, do you have

someone for it.

Q. And were you provided in that e-mail any

specifics as to what they were looking for in a

director?

A. The e-mail might have had -- I haven't

looked at it for a long time. The e-mail might have had

the same wording that the job ad had.

Q. I'm sorry, you have to say it again.

A. Okay. The e-mail might have had the same

wording that the job ad had in it.

Q. Okay. And you said that you saw also a

job posting --

A. Yes.

Q. -- on the Job Register for the --

A. Right.

Q. What was the association?

A. It's the Job Register of the American

Astronomical Society.

Q. In response either to you seeing the job

posting or receiving Gary Ferland's e-mail, did you have

a follow-up conversation with Dr. Ferland about the

position?


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A. Yes. The first thing was I was not sure

of the level they were looking at and...

Q. What do you mean not sure of the level?

A. Well, did they want someone with a Ph.D.

or not? And --

Q. The job posting or the Job Register did

not include that information?

A. Well, I got the e-mail before the Job

Register would have come out. So I -- what did I do

there? I think I e-mailed Gary back and said no, I

don't have any students suitable for doing this, or

maybe I've got one but he's too young or something like

that. And then I believe I did ask Gary if the

department was interested in a more senior applicant

like myself, and he replied yes.

Q. What was your understanding of Gary's role

with the observatory?

A. Gary seemed to me to have been the

instigator of the observatory. He and I had talked

about this a long time, so when Keith MacAdam and Mike

came, that was quite late in the process. So I don't

know how Gary -- or maybe when Gary came to -- Gary came

to Lincoln to give the colloquium, that might have been

about the time we were finishing the observatory or

building it, and he was very interested in this project.


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Somehow through me, he found out about the project,

possibly when he came to visit, whatever year that was.

And this got him thinking, and he realized that there

was a need for that sort of observatory in Kentucky. So

he asked me for a number of things. He asked me for a

copy of my National Science Foundation proposal, for the

funding for it, which I gave him, and he also asked for

a copy of the plans of the observatory, I think, which

again I think I gave him. And we had a number of

e-mails talking about the issues of it, and I was very

positive in this because building an observatory was a

very positive experience for me, just personally and

also it was one of those rare occasions where you get to

do everything in the grand -- that you say you're going

to do and more, and so it was a very good experience

so -- so I taught Gary that and really encouraged him

that yes this was a worthwhile thing to do and go ahead

and do.

Q. Now, you said your first inquiry back to

Gary after he e-mailed you about the possible job

position was whether it was -- a Ph.D. was appropriate?

A. Well, the first thing, I interpreted it as

he was looking for some finishing graduate student or

somebody to take the position, so I asked if -- job

market myself, and obviously this is something I'm


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interested in, would a senior applicant be considered,

somebody with a Ph.D.

Q. And he assured you --

A. Yeah.

Q. -- that -- did he provide you any other

information as to what they were looking for in a

candidate?

A. No. I don't think so.

Q. Okay.

A. I don't think so. There might be

something in the e-mail, but I don't remember anything.

Q. Then the next step would have been your

review of the actual job posting?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay.

A. Which was quite likely already in the

first e-mail he sent me.

Q. And --

A. I know, I also checked the website for the

observatory, because the job was advertised on the

website observatory as well.

Q. And did the posting advise you as to how

to go about actually filing the application for the

position?

A. Yes, it did.


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Q. And --

A. You had to fill in an annoying on-line

form. That's a-n-n-o-y-i-n-g.

MR. MANION: I think she got that one.

A. Which went like all the way to about the

first time in my life I've been asked what high school I

went to.

Q. For the record, what was that high school?

A. You've got it already.

MR. MANION: Wolverhampton or

something.

A. It was Wolverhampton Municipal Grammar

School.

MR. MANION: There you go.

MR. CAVAGNERO: That was my fault, by

the way. I didn't know I had the privilege of changing

those forms.

THE WITNESS: And I did -- and I did

get -- did get a -- get several F's in French.

Q. Did the job posting tell you whether this

was a staff as opposed to faculty appointment or

position?

A. I think it did. I was under no illusion

it was a faculty position. I certainly knew it was not

a tenure-track faculty position.


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Q. In making the decision to file an

application for the job, was it of importance to you

whether this position was either staff or faculty?

A. I would have liked it to have been a

faculty position, of course. I would liked -- I would

have liked it to been tenured and paying enormous

salary. The university administration in Kentucky had

other views. The University of Kentucky administration

had other views on the salary level for the position.

Q. But when you decided to apply for the

position, you fully understood that it was a non-faculty

position?

A. Yes. I think so. Let me clarify that

again. I knew it was not a tenure-track faculty

position, but it involved teaching now. So if a

position involves teaching, do you call it a faculty

position? Right? So that's why I'm hedging on that

question.

Q. Did you make any inquiry as to the

possibility of, although as advertised it was a staff

position, that there may be --

A. No.

Q. -- a potential for --

A. I did not. Because I know the way --

Q. You have to wait.


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MR. MANION: You're not letting her

finish.

A. Sorry.

Q. Did you have any information that there

was a possibility that it could evolve in to something

more --

A. No.

Q. -- than a staff? Okay.

Did you understand from that job posting

that this position as advertised had any research

component to it?

A. The undergraduate research was certainly

an intended aim of the observatory and at that point

most of my research was undergraduate research. So it

was a very natural fit for me, therefore, there.

Q. Did the advertisement lead you to conclude

that research was a substantial component of this

position?

A. No. No.

Q. Did you have any conversations with anyone

at the university regarding if you were hired for that

position, bringing any of the soft money that you've

told us about that you obtained through grant

applications would accompany you?

A. If I had been offered the position, then


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that money would have come with me, and that actually

would have been very valuable to the University of

Kentucky because they could use that money for hiring

undergraduate research assistants and graduate students

and sending students to conferences. It would have been

very valuable money for the University of Kentucky.

Q. And that was the Nassau [sic] grant?

A. I had two grants at that stage.

Q. Okay. What was the other --

A. The other was the National Science

Foundation Grant. And that had money in it specifically

for student research.

Q. Now, when you say you could bring that

money with you --

A. Yes.

Q. -- I would infer from that that you would

continue to do work on the research associated with

those grants.

A. Yes. That's right.

Q. So, I mean, how would you have balanced

that with a -- the director position? Would that be

just extra time that you would have spent on your own to

pursue the research funded by that grant, or would that

be part of your, you know, daily work as a director of

the observatory?


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A. Well, during the in-person interview one

of the things that Mike asked me, Mike Cavagnero asked

me about was what did I foresee the workload of the

observatory director being. And so we sat down with

pencil and paper or something, one of us had a piece of

paper, and came up with just based on my experiences how

much time various things would take, and I think I

allocated on that something like two or five hours per

week for student research on that.

Now, university faculty do not just work

40 hours a week. Surveys of this show the average

university faculty member works 60 hours a week. There

were times in Nebraska where my day job duties, as it

were, were entirely -- almost entirely teaching and yet,

after hours I was still getting research done, papers

published. So my expectation was to continue the same

way in Kentucky.

Q. You anticipated that the work you would do

fulfilling the grant requirements would not interfere

with your primary responsibilities as --

A. That's right. Now, if it had, then

there's a procedure for handling that. One contacts

one's program director and explains a change in

circumstances, change in scope of project. So it would

affect it how the money was spent, that money rather


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than being spent on my salary and my time would be spent

on paying graduate students or undergraduate assistants.

Q. But the money that could be shared with

the graduate students or whatever, that would be work

pursuant to the grant?

A. Yes, it would. Yes, the undergraduates

working on this -- all the graduate students working on

this would be doing research related to the grant.

Q. And you'd just be overseeing their work?

A. I would be overseeing it, yes.

Q. Okay. Did you in your -- either your

conversations with Dr. Ferland or later in your

conservations with anyone at the university, was it ever

discussed that there may be a problem with time

allocation in terms of your grant work as opposed to the

observatory duties?

A. I can't remember, I think is the short

answer to that. I don't think so, but I can't remember.

Q. Now, you told me that you had to fill out

an online application for the job.

A. Yes.

Q. You told me you talked to Dr. Ferland and

saw the job posting. What other steps did you take or

individuals did you discuss this job with before you

actually filed your application?


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A. Nobody. I looked at the website. There

was no discussion with Gary Ferland before submitting it

once he -- once he said you ought to apply for it. I

don't think there is any discussion there. And I looked

at the website, looked at the vision statement of the

observatory, what type telescope it was, a lot of

technical things which I was very familiar with, and

then I sent off my application.

Q. Was there anything on the job posting that

informed you as to the process by which the selection

would be done?

A. No.

Q. Did Dr. Ferland or anyone at the

university provide you any information as to how that

process would work?

A. No, and especially not Gary Ferland

because he was on leave right about that time.

Q. After you submitted an online application

did you subsequently follow up with any contact with

anyone in the department, forwarding them any additional

information?

A. The next thing was Mike Cavagnero sent me

an e-mail requesting me to send a proper application in,

rather the online form.

Q. And did you forward --


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A. Of course.

Q. Okay. An application -- did you forward

an application or was that just your CV and...

A. It was my CV and -- my CV and a

description of my relevant experience. It might also

have said something about my vision of the observatory,

but I think it was mostly my relevant experience.

Q. I have some documents here. Since we're

here we'll...

A. I can make sure you have the right one,

yes.

Q. I'll have to take that -- okay.

MS. KRIZ: Mark that.

(Defendant's Exhibit No. 1 marked.)

MR. MANION: Don't say anything till

she asks you a question about it.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, I just handed you a document

that the court reporter has marked as Exhibit 1, and

that appears to be a posting of the job position. I'm

going to ask you if that's the job posting that you

reviewed that we've been talking about?

A. I think it's one of them. I think there's

more than one on the website. But this was certainly

one of them, yes. I recognize the words "Founding

Director."


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MS. KRIZ: Mark this as 2.


Q. Dr. Gaskell, I'm showing you a document

that the court reporter marked as Exhibit 2, and it

appears to be an online application. If you could take

a look at that and advise whether that is, in fact, a

true and accurate copy of the online application that

you filed.

A. You have just given me multiple documents.

Let's redo that, separate things out.

Q. Okay. Looks like maybe that's the -- I

wasn't sure what was attached to your online

application.

A. It sure looks like it.

MS. KRIZ: All right. We'll move that

in to evidence as Exhibit 2.

(Defendant's Exhibit No. 2 attached.)

Q. Now, the application -- the online

application, was there any additional documentation that

you submitted with that other than answering the

questions online?

A. As far as I can remember, it was just

answering the questions.

Q. Now, I have an e-mail -- before I mark

this, maybe you can look through this and sort out from


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here what -- and what I'm asking you now is if you can

identify from those documents --

THE WITNESS: Do you want to label

these?

MR. MANION: Just listen. That's her

job.

Q. -- what you can -- what you would have

submitted to Dr. Cavagnero after you had filed your

online application.

A. Well, this is the cover e-mail --

Q. Okay.

A. -- and it describes two documents, and

that is document number one, which is my CV, and that is

a description of my relevant experience.

Q. Okay.

A. So two documents there.

Q. So the cover sheet e-mail --

A. Yes.

Q. -- plus the CV, plus relevant

experience --

A. Yes.

Q. -- explanation, that would have been what

you would have submitted to Dr. Cavagnero?

A. That's all I submitted, yes.

MS. KRIZ: And we'll move -- mark


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those as cumulative Exhibit 3.


Q. I have other documents that I think your

attorney supplied to me along with your Rule 26

disclosures, or maybe I obtained some other way. If you

look through those remaining documents, can you tell me

whether you submitted any of those documents to the

university along with --

A. None of these were submitted.

MR. MANION: Let her finish the

question.

Q. -- along with any of the applications or

in response to any inquiry from anyone with the

department at the university?

A. These were not submitted.

Q. Okay. Thank you. I'll take those back.

After you submitted the e-mail or

responded to Dr. Cavagnero's e-mail to submit a proper

application, what was the next step in terms of your

contact with the university about this position?

A. I think my next step was scheduling a

telephone interview.

Q. Prior to being contacted about that

telephone interview, did you talk to Dr. Ferland or

anyone else at the university about the process and how


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it was going to work and what the next steps would be?

A. At most, I might have told him that I'd

been chosen for telephone interview. Beyond that I

can't remember.

Q. Who did you have your telephone interview

with?

A. Okay. The telephone interview was with

the chairman of the department, Mike Cavagnero; the

chairman of the search committee.

Q. And that would have been?

A. Tom Troland. And I cannot remember

whether there's a third person or not.

Q. Okay. If I understand correctly, between

the point that you submitted your online application and

your telephone interview, you actually made the physical

move --

A. I did, yes.

Q. -- from the University of Nebraska to the

University of Texas?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. At the time that you had filed your

application or had made the initial inquiries or

discussions with Dr. Ferland, had you already

anticipated leaving the university?

A. I had anticipated leaving, but I had not


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decided where to go to.

Q. When did you make the decision to leave

and go to University of Texas?

A. About the time the application was sent

off. So when I sent it off, I might have known. I'd

have to check my records on that.

Q. It looks like your application was filed

around April -- I mean August 16th. That sounds like

the beginning of the academic year.

A. That's odd. Can I recheck that?

Q. That may have been your response to

Dr. Cavagnero.

A. Oh, that one. Okay, yes. August 16th I

certainly knew, yes.

Q. Okay. Okay. At the time you filed this,

and I think the date on this one was July 9, 2007 --

A. Right. I did not know.

Q. -- did you know --

A. I don't think I knew for certain at that

stage there. I was already talking with Texas at that

point, though.

Q. So at the time you filed the online

application, you knew you were leaving Nebraska --

A. Yes.

Q. -- but you didn't know where you were


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going?

A. The online application didn't ask you

where are you going to leave to. It's the little boxes

you got to check.

Q. Okay.

A. And the box said where are you employed

right now.

Q. And then by August 16th you would have

already made the arrangements?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. In terms of the difference in your

positions at the University of Nebraska and University

of Texas, was there a difference in the pay that you

would have gotten?

A. My -- the 12-month salary in Texas is

formally higher than my Nebraska one.

Q. So it was a better paying job for you?

A. No. I said my 12-month formal salary was

higher. So -- in academia there are complicating

factors. The average academic is paid nine months out

of 12. So that's why I said 12 months rather than -- it

was 12 months there. And then my appointment fraction

at the University of Texas was not a hundred percent.

And the reason it wasn't a hundred percent was so that I

had the possibility of increasing my salary by getting


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more soft money.

Q. Okay. Did you -- in terms of how you

viewed the move from Nebraska to Texas, was this a

lateral move from a financial standpoint, or was this

going to increase your pay or decrease it?

A. I think if you looked at our tax returns

you'd find we actually made more money in Texas but --

but -- okay. Yeah.

Q. How did the -- I presume with the posting

there was some information as to the salary range for

this director of the MacAdam Observatory?

A. Yes.

Q. And how did that pay compare with what you

were earning both at Nebraska and at the University of

Texas?

A. It was higher. Assuming -- assuming that

I was paid at the upper end of the range.

Q. Was the pay a critical factor in your

decision to apply for the observatory?

A. If the salary range had been much lower, I

would not have applied.

Q. You -- we're talking now about the

telephone interview, and you do recall specifically Mike

Cavagnero and Tom Troland participating in that?

A. Yes.


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Q. My estimation is that somewhere -- that's

somewhere between September 10th and 14th, 15th?

A. I have the date on my calendar somewhere.

Q. Does that sound about accurate?

A. It's probably on their records as well.

Q. Tell me about that phone interview. What

information was related to you by Dr. Cavagnero and

Dr. Troland?

A. It was more them asking me questions about

things rather than telling -- it was a little

information was told, but nothing stands out there. I

assume that -- I assumed -- I still assume that they had

a standard list of questions they were asking all

candidates. This is normal during telephone interviews.

So, for example, they asked me about my experience with

working with teachers, and I explained my experience

working with teachers and my views on what teachers

needed and wanted.

Q. Was there any question that was posed to

you by Dr. Cavagnero or Dr. Troland that you felt was

inappropriate --

A. Yes.

Q. -- for that setting?

A. There was.

Q. Okay. Tell me what questions were asked


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of you?

A. This came at the end of the interview

where Dr. Cavagnero said: There's a question that I

shouldn't ask or -- "shouldn't" might not be quite the

right wording, but it was something along that, but then

he said: But the dean will kill me if I don't ask it.

"Kill" again might be not quite the right wording.

Q. Okay. And what was that question?

A. Well, so he proceeded to ask the question.

Q. And what was the question?

A. The question was, did I have anything

which could interfere with the performance of my duties

as the observatory director. And since he had sort of

said this was an awkward question to ask because it

might not be an appropriate question to ask, I assumed

that he was asking did I have any physical disability.

So I sort of laughed and said, oh, do you mean do I have

any physical disability interfere, and I said the answer

is no, and that was all that was on the subject there.

But it registered very strongly on my memory.

Q. So the question was, did you have anything

which would interfere with your duties --

A. With the performance of the duties or some

wording like that. Now, my interpretation of that

question was, you know, did I have a sleep disorder so I


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couldn't work at night, or was I physically handicapped

and couldn't climb a ladder. That's how I interpreted

the question. But the fact that Mike Cavagnero

recognized that was an inappropriate question to ask was

interesting, the fact that he said this was a question

the dean wanted him to ask.

Q. And did you know who the dean was at that

point?

A. I didn't learn that till much later. But

this gave me a distinct impression about the dean.

Q. And what was that impression?

A. Not very positive. He gave me the

impression the dean was a man who felt he could break

the rules.

Q. Did you have some outside knowledge that

questions regarding your physical condition were

inappropriate in the context of an interview?

A. I'm not an expert on these things, but I

do know there are some questions that shouldn't be asked

during job interviews, and I think with the American

Disabilities Act and so on, those kind of things that if

it's not specifically job related that one shouldn't ask

about it.

So Mike was getting in to a -- he

recognized at least what was a gray area, and he said


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so. And I think he was -- I sensed that he didn't want

to ask the question and was being made to ask it by the

dean.

Q. Anything else that you can remember

specifically about what -- that telephone interview in

terms of the questions that were asked of you of

Dr. Cavagnero or Dr. Troland?

A. They were all very straightforward

questions about running observatory. And, of course, I

had been doing that for many years, so easy to answer,

and working with teachers, working with the public, lots

of things.

Q. Were there any questions posed of you by

either of these gentlemen as it related to your outside

interests other than astronomy?

A. Absolutely not. Unless that question

about -- anything about me which could interfere with

performing my duties could be construed that way, which

in hindsight it would be construed that way.

Q. At the time did you construe that?

A. No, I didn't.

Q. You construed it in terms of asking you

about a disability as opposed to --

A. I did, yes, as a -- was I a schizophrenic

or an epileptic or whatever, I don't know, but something


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like that.

Q. Okay. Okay. Did you make any comment to

them, that --

A. No, I just laughed.


Q. Did you make any comment to them

registering your feeling that this question was not

appropriate?

A. No. I laughed at it and, as I said, I

said do you mean do I have a physical disability -- I

think they laughed at that too -- and the answer was no.

And particularly as the question being blamed on the

dean, I knew that it was not a question that Mike

Cavagnero wanted to ask.

Q. How long would you estimate that phone

interview went?

A. It was about half an hour, 45 minutes,

maybe an hour, something in that range. Very standard

for a phone interview.

Q. Had you undergone telephone interviews for

prior applications for employment?

A. Yes.

Q. And was this consistent with your prior

experience?

A. Yes.


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Q. Did either Dr. Cavagnero or Dr. Troland at

that point take the opportunity to tell you what would

be the next step in the search process?

A. They probably said that short list of

candidates, a smaller short list of candidates would be

invited in person. They probably said that because

people always do say that.

Q. Did you have a feeling in terms of your

prospect for the position after that phone interview?

A. No.

Q. Whether it was good or bad?

A. Well, no, from my point of view we had a

nice chat about everything, and I could comfortably

answer all their questions, in my own opinion, well.

Q. Did they provide you any more information

that expanded on the written description of the job in

terms of what your understanding was of the job duties

and what they were looking for in a candidate?

A. There might have been a few things,

probably were, but I cannot remember what they were.

They had no effect on me.

Q. Did you understand that this was sort of a

position that would evolve because it was a new --

A. Yes, I did.

Q. -- newly created? Okay.


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A. Yes. And that was very clear later when I

had my final exit interview with Mike Cavagnero because

he phrased questions in that term then.

Q. Okay. What was the next contact you had

with the university regarding the job position?

A. Probably a secretary e-mailing me and

asking me if I could come on some day.

Q. And that was an on-campus interview you

were invited for?

A. Right. Right.

Q. And did you have any discussions with

anyone at the university between your phone interview

and your on-campus interview about the position?

A. No, except I probably e-mailed Gary

Ferland in Cambridge to tell him that I had been invited

for an interview, because he was not on the search

committee and he was not part of the process, he

explained to me.

Q. Did Dr. Ferland share with you any

information he had obtained from the members of the

search committee about --

A. Don't think so. Sorry.

Q. -- about, you know, what their

deliberations were after these phone interviews?

A. No.


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Q. So you receive an e-mail inviting you for

an on-campus interview. I believe that that -- your

on-campus interview was October 10th of 2007?

A. That sounds right.

Q. Does that sound right? Okay.

In terms of your application at the

university, was there any reference that you had asked

them not to contact?

A. Yes, there was.

Q. Who was that?

A. It's right on this form right here.

It's -- it says can we contact your current supervisor

or some question like that. It was -- it was could I

contact my chairman, my boss, at the University of

Nebraska, and I put no down for that.

Q. Why?

A. Because I didn't trust the guy.

Q. And was this at that time Kirby or --

A. Kirby. This was Kirby, yes.

Q. Had he done something to break your trust

in him?

A. He and I had a -- well, he and I had --

the -- he was a strong advocate of closing down the

astronomy program, I was not, and that was our main

point of difference.


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Q. Were you concerned that he may relay

information about you that was inaccurate?

A. Yes, I was.

Q. Had he related information to your

knowledge to other persons about you that was not

accurate?

A. Yes.

Q. Tell me what that experience was.

A. Well, it's -- for -- for example -- for

example, my last semester at the University of Nebraska,

he sent out an e-mail to the department advisory

committee, which I knew -- criticizing me for using the

observatory for public outreach.

Q. Why was he critical of you using the

observatory for public outreach?

A. I don't know.

Q. Okay.

A. The time had been officially scheduled for

me for that, and I sent a long formal reply to him about

this, which I can give to my attorneys so they can give

to you if you want it.

Q. So I guess what was the inaccuracy,

that -- just that his opinion was that you shouldn't be

using it as extensively for public outreach, or was

there some misstatement made about you in that e-mail


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communication?

A. I can't remember without reading it, but I

can give my attorneys a copy to give to you.

Q. Okay. Okay. But you recall that he

criticized you and you felt there was some inaccuracy in

what he said?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. Did you -- and you said that you

did file some kind of response to everybody he had sent

the e-mail to?

A. That's right. And to himself and

concerned parties.

Q. So based on that experience you had some

doubt as to whether he would be accurate in his

reference --

A. Yes.

Q. -- if the university contacted him?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. Any other -- anything else about

your relationship with Dr. Kirby that raised some

concerns as to using him as a contact reference?

A. There were, and you're going to ask me if

I can give explicit examples, and I'm -- my brain just

doesn't currently have specific examples in there. So

they certainly are there. That's the kind of question I


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would need an advanced notice of. I can give you a

rather long list, I think.

Q. All right.

A. Let's see what's a good example about

that.

Q. Let me ask you this way. Had you used him

as a reference before in your -- in an application for

another job?

A. No. Never.

Q. Okay. Is there -- are there professional

affiliates at the University of Nebraska who you did

identify as a contact reference?

A. Mike Cavagnero e-mailed me in, I think,

September saying that he noted that I checked the box he

should not contact Dr. Kirby. He asked me now that I

had changed institutions would it be okay for him to

contact Dr. Kirby, and I said no. And I offered to give

him the names of other people he could contact at the

University of Nebraska if he wanted to. And also to

make it clear what Dr. Kirby's views of me -- I was not

doing this because Dr. Kirby had a low view of me -- I

sent one or two copies of my most recent annual

evaluations by Dr. Kirby, which were extremely glowing.

So it was very clear that Dr. Kirby had a very high

opinion of my teaching, my outreach, my research and


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everything. This was reflected in my annual

evaluations.

Q. Did you -- were you aware of any

relationship between Dr. Kirby and Dr. Cavagnero?

A. They probably had met each other. I

believe that Dr. Cavagnero was a postdoc of Tony

Starace, Roger Kirby's predecessor. So Dr. Cavagnero

was quite familiar with the Nebraska department. But

anyhow, Mike Cavagnero said in that -- promised in that

e-mail that he would not contact Dr. Kirby, and I took

him at his word.

Q. He sent you an e-mail to that effect?

A. Yes. He replied to my e-mail which had

the evaluations and explained if he wanted to contact

someone in Nebraska, I'd give him other names, and he

said that he would not contact Dr. Kirby.

Q. Okay. What references did you provide the

University of Kentucky?

A. I didn't. He didn't ask for them. I

would have given the names of a couple of colleagues.

Q. Had you been asked for references, who

would you have identified?

A. I would have -- I would have identified --

I would have identified Dr. Kaam-Ching Leung.

Q. You're going to have to spell that for me.


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A. Okay. K-a-a-m - C-h-i-n-g L-e-u-n-g.

Q. And was he affiliated with the University

of Nebraska?

A. Yes. He was a tenured professor there.

Like me he was also an opponent of closing down the

astronomy program.

Q. Who else would you have identified?

A. I would have put down Jack Dunn, that's

D-u-n-n, who is the director of the planetarium there,

because I did a huge amount of outreach activity with

him.

Q. And would that have been the university --

A. That's at the University of Nebraska.

Q. The university planetarium as opposed

to --

A. Yes.

Q. -- the Hyde?

A. It's actually -- it's actually -- no, Hyde

is an observatory.

Q. Okay. Okay.

A. So those two people could halfway talk

about my teaching/research side and my outreach side.

Q. When Dr. Cavagnero -- well, he obviously

contacted you to ask you whether now that you've gone to

University of Texas whether you could contact Dr. Kirby,


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you told him no. Did you have any discussions with him

about --

A. No.

MR. MANION: She didn't finish the

question.

Q. Did you have any further discussions with

him about references or people that he had talked to or

had planned to talk to about you?

A. No.

Q. After -- and how long do you think that

this contact with Dr. Cavagnero about not contacting

Dr. Kirby occurred as it relates to your in-person,

on-campus interview? Was it before that, after that?

A. This -- I think this e-mail exchange was

in September. Again, I could find e-mails on that and

give to my attorney to give to you.

Q. Okay. We'll follow up with a specific

request for that.

A. If you haven't done it already.

Q. Okay. Okay. So you were invited to the

university for an in-person interview. Were you advised

as to how many candidates had actually been invited --

THE WITNESS: Can I call a time-out

here?

MS. KRIZ: Sure.


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THE WITNESS: Because my water just

ran out.

MS. KRIZ: Let's take a break here.

Let's go off.

VIDEOGRAPHER: Stand by. We're going

off video. It's 12:25 p.m.

(Off the record.)


It's 12:43 p.m.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, before we broke we were

talking about -- we were getting ready to talk about

your on-campus interview which occurred sometime in

middle October or early, middle October of 2007. Now,

before you actually came for the interview were you

provided an itinerary of what your day was going to be

like?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. My understanding is that you

interviewed individually with the search committee

members rather than --

A. Yes.

Q. -- as a group; is that correct?

A. Yes.

Q. I have that you would have interviewed

that day with Sally Shafer, Keith MacAdam, Nancy


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Leveson, John Pica, Mike Kovash, Kristin Thomas, a

Professor Ghosh and Uddin?

A. Who is Mike Kovash?

Q. I think he was the director of

undergraduate studies within --

A. Okay. I met with somebody else with John

Pica, but I did not meet with John Pica.

Q. Okay.

A. I think I met with two other people there.

Q. And I have Carol Cottrill, Tom Troland,

and then Mike Cavagnero would have been the last person

you spoke to that day.

A. And I also met with the students.

Q. Okay.

MR. CAVAGNERO: Two of those people

you mentioned were...

Q. Right. It looks like that maybe

Professors Ghosh and Uddin --

A. I also went out for lunch with students.

Q. Okay. And did you -- you also visited the

observatory, did you not?

A. Yes.

Q. And you were accompanied for that visit by

some of the faculty?

A. No, by Mike Cavagnero.


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Q. Okay. Okay.

A. That was the very first thing we did.

Q. Okay.

A. There were two visits to the observatory.

That was the first one.

Q. Was it an all-day process?

A. Very much so, yes.

Q. Okay. Each -- did you go to the

professor's office to meet with them for the interview

or were they -- did they -- tell me about the logistics.

A. I spoke with each person in their own

office except for one of the people, we took a stroll

outside to talk.

Q. Okay. Did any of the interviewers have

what appeared to be a script or a list of questions that

they were asking you?

A. No. They -- the questions were all very

similar, actually, that everybody asked with few

exceptions.

Q. You told me you met with some of the

students.

A. Yes.

Q. Was that an interview or was it just --

tell me about that.

A. There were two meetings with students, I


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think. The first one was Dr. Cavagnero took me out to

lunch with, I think, those students, and then there was

a more formal meeting with the teaching assistants who

were going to be or -- going to be or already were

operating the observatory. And then after dinner in the

evening I requested on my own to visit the observatory

at night just to see how well things really worked. And

one or two -- two, I think, of the graduate student

teaching assistants were there for that as well, and

Keith MacAdam was also there for that.

Q. In any of these in-person interviews with

any of these people we've identified, were you

questioned about your personal religious beliefs?

A. Only with Mike Cavagnero.

Q. Okay. The topic never came up in any of

the other --

A. No.

Q. -- interviews?

A. No.

Q. Did any of the other candidates ask you

about any of your publications outside of the astronomy

field?

A. Nobody asked about any of my publications

whatsoever.

Q. Did anyone bring up the lecture that you


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had given at the university --

A. No.

Q. -- several years prior?

A. No.

MR. MANION: You've got to let her

finish.

THE WITNESS: Sorry.

Q. Up unto the point of these on-campus

interviews, in any of the information that had been

solicited from you by the university for the director

position of the observatory, had there been any

inquiries regarding your personal religious beliefs or

your religious affiliations?

A. No.

Q. Now, you said that the in-campus

interviews, the only person who mentioned anything on

the religious topic would have been Mike Cavagnero --

A. Yes.

Q. -- is that correct?

Now, you told me that you met with him

first thing --

A. And last.

Q. -- in the morning and last. In what

contact was the religious topic raised?

A. Okay.


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MR. MANION: The first or the last, I

think is the question.

Q. Yeah. Was it --

A. Oh, oh, oh, second.

Q. -- the early part of the day or the very

last?

A. The end. The end.

Q. At the end?

A. Yeah.

Q. Okay. Prior to these on-campus interviews

had you been apprised by anyone that worked for the

university that there had been any discussions about

your religion or your religious affiliations or anything

in the area of religion?

A. No.

Q. Tell me about the interview with Mike

Cavagnero and how this topic was raised.

A. Okay. Mike and I have exchanged e-mails

about this, which you should have, so I think we're in

rough agreement on this. So to the best of my

recollection, Mike began -- we had talked about other

things first, I think, such as the job description, what

the person would do. He then said something like I

check up on candidates very closely or carefully,

something like that, and he then said that he had


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Googled me and one of the things which came up on Google

was the notes for my lecture on astronomy and the Bible.

And he then also -- in parallel with this he also said

that the dean would be doing similar checking and that

the dean would also be concerned about this.

Q. He's told you the dean would be checking

about your online information?

A. Yes, the dean had or would be also

Googling me, would be looking at this, and would -- it

would be of concern to him as well.

Q. These lecture notes that we've talked

about -- well, I guess for the record let's go ahead

and...


Q. Dr. Gaskell, I'm showing you what we've

marked as Exhibit No. 4, and it appears to be a --

A. There are more things here.

MR. MANION: Let her.

Q. It appears to be an article or -- that's

titled Modern Astronomy, The Bible, and Creation, and

under that it has your name and the Department of

Physics & Astronomy, University of Nebraska. Is this

the -- is this a publication that you made?

A. I'm going to not answer that question yet

because you have given me multiple documents.


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Q. Okay.

(Documents handed to counsel.)

MR. MANION: Barbara, I think you only

have four of the 12 pages of the lecture notes there,

and then the rest is what? Your CV?

THE WITNESS: Yes.

MS. KRIZ: Oh, this is -- okay. Put a

sticker on this one. This one looks to be the...

How many pages is that?

THE WITNESS: Let me check it for you.

MS. KRIZ: Is that -- is that --

THE WITNESS: This is certainly

missing pages.

MR. MANION: It says 4 of 12 on the --

on page 4, and page 1 of 12 on the first page.

MS. KRIZ: Oh, this is...

I guess I don't have all of them,

then.

MR. MANION: In what you sent us, you

had the whole thing, because this is what we got from

you in initial disclosures, and the entire thing is

there.

MS. KRIZ: Did you give me the whole

thing in your --

MR. SURTEES: Yeah. I'm looking at


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the Bates numbers here and we go -- they ended --

MS. KRIZ: Here we are. I think I've

got a good copy now. Put that as 4.

THE WITNESS: Let me check it first

before you staple it.

MS. KRIZ: Yeah, before we put more

stickers on it.

(Documents handed to counsel.)

(Defendant's Exhibit No. 4 remarked.)

THE WITNESS: So now we've agreed on

the document, what is the question?

Q. I'm showing you now what we've remarked as

another Exhibit No. 4 and ask you if this is a copy of

a -- lecture notes that you would have prepared?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. And were these lecture notes posted

on a website that was available to the general public --

A. Yes.

Q. -- one that you had access? Okay. And

how would one go about accessing those lecture notes?

A. They were on my personal website, and you

click on a thing that's there and a pdf file appeared,

which was this (indicating.)

Q. Did you have a link to your --

A. By the way, the website is on the bottom


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down there. You can see my personal website right

there.

Q. Okay. Did you have a link to this

personal website on your University of Nebraska

professional website?

A. Yes. Most faculty have links to their

personal websites on their professional websites.

Q. When did you establish a personal website?

How long have you had that?

A. I think the answer is I don't know. It

would have been when we had a change in service

providers at some stage in the '90s. Somewhere in the

1990s, '95, '96, somewhere around there.

Q. And has that website been in continuing

operation since you've started it?

A. I'm a person that's rather slow at

updating websites. I know that my professional website

by the time I left the University of Nebraska, it was

way out of date. My personal website is also pretty out

of date as well. So things -- it doesn't change much.

If you're asking how long was that on the website, I'm

not sure.

Q. Okay. That was my next question. Do you

know when you first would have posted these lecture

notes on your personal website?


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A. I can't remember.

Q. Okay. But certainly in 2007 when you had

filed an application for the observatory position this

was a -- these lecture notes were available to the

general public through your personal website?

A. Yes.

Q. Now, you told me that Dr. Cavagnero -- and

we were talking about your on-campus interview with him,

and there was some conversation about this article,

these lecture notes.

A. Yes.

Q. Is that correct?

Okay. First of all, before we go in to

that, did you ever keep any kind of personal notes about

your interviews --

A. I did not.

Q. -- that day?

A. No.

Q. So is it fair to say that any information

you relate to me about those on-campus interviews would

just be based on your recollection as opposed to --

A. Yes, except as I mentioned, Mike Cavagnero

and I have exchanged e-mails about this, where I think

we agree what we talked about.

Q. Okay. Okay. All right. Now, tell me how


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this topic came up in your on-campus interview with

Mike.

A. I just did.

Q. Oh, I'm sorry.

MR. MANION: Well, say it again.

A. Okay. I'll say it again. Okay.

Q. He told you that they had Googled you.

A. Okay. I'll say it all again. Okay. He

said that he checked up on candidates carefully, and

that he had Googled me and through Google he had

discovered this article here, and he also said that the

Dean would be or had been doing similar things.

Q. And what did he say about the lecture

notes?

A. Well, the thing he drew attention to, and

I do not remember everything he said about these, but

the thing he drew attention to was that it identified me

as being with the Department of Physics & Astronomy at

the University of Nebraska.

Q. And was this a concern for him in your --

A. He -- the explicit question he asked me,

he made a statement that at the University of Kentucky

there were restrictions on what one could say and do

being associated with the University of Kentucky, and I

believe he asked me if I came to the University of


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Kentucky would I abide by such regulations, and the

answer is of course I would, because every university

has regulations you can and can't do, and you take

workshops on these things and we have to sign

statements. So that was nothing unusual there.

Q. Did the University of Nebraska have rules

about what you could publish with your affiliation with

the University of Nebraska?

A. I cannot remember what they -- what they

were, but merely identifying somebody -- see, this

wasn't published yet. I think -- this is not a

scholarly publication, but if it were a scholarly

publication, as far as I know I could publish anything.

Now, what I couldn't do is use my affiliation with the

University of Nebraska to make money. I couldn't say

I've got some great deal, send me a check to Martin

Gaskell, University of Nebraska and I'll do wonders for

you. I couldn't do things like that. But publishing in

any area -- this is not a publication -- but if it were,

publishing in any area is just fine. If I published

neo-Nazi propaganda, I think I'd have some people

talking to me, but if I --

Q. But you were not aware of any rules,

university rules, that prohibited that?

A. No. And freedom of speech is a pretty


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important thing at a university, freedom of research.

There are people at the University of Nebraska, I'm sure

University of Kentucky as well, there's a -- there are

religious studies departments, the philosophy

departments, philosophy of science, people publishing

these things all the time. But again, I'm saying this

is not a publication. These are notes on my private

website.

Q. Now, you said this is not a scholarly

publication.

A. Right.

Q. Why is it that you under your name, under

the title, you list your affiliation with the Department

of Physics & Astronomy at the University of Nebraska?

A. That's who I am and where I'm at. So to

take an example, Francis Collins, the head of the

National Institute of Health, has published a book on

religion and science, and at the time he published it --

it was actually before he was director of NIH -- he was

the head of the Human Genome Project. On the book it

identifies him as with the Human Genome Project, and

probably somewhere in there is his institution

affiliation and address. So this is identifying

somebody -- if they want to contact me, contact me at

the University of Nebraska here, look me up, telephone


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me and so on.

Q. Is there a reason that you didn't put your

personal home address and contact information?

A. This not only tells you how to contact me.

It also tells you who I am as well. It says I'm an

astronomer, I'm at a university department. Just like

with Francis Collins, it says that he's now the head of

the NIH.

Q. You told me that these lecture notes had

been developed over a period of time.

A. Yes.

Q. Had you developed these lecture notes

prior to coming to work at the University of Nebraska?

A. Yes.

Q. And at that time did you publish your

lecture notes?

A. No, they've never been published. No.

Q. Or listed on your -- were they listed on a

personal website?

A. They would have first --

Q. Listen -- listen to my question. Were

these lecture notes regarding the topic of Modern

Astronomy, The Bible, and Creation, were these lecture

notes published on your personal website before you came

to work for the University of Nebraska?


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A. No, because I didn't have a personal

website before then, because I came to the University of

Nebraska in 1992, and that's relatively early days in

the development of the Internet. Web browsers did not

exist in those days.

Q. Okay. Had you ever, even though you did

not have this posted, did you have lecture notes prior

to your association with the University of Nebraska?

A. Yes.

Q. Did you hand those out at any time that

you gave lectures?

A. Not usually at lectures. They -- I made

them available to anybody who asked. And if there was,

say, a Christian group that was sponsoring a lecture, I

would tell them it was available and anybody in that

group who wanted a copy could have a copy.

Q. And would you have listed your employer at

the time?

A. Whatever it was, yes.

Q. Okay. So any time you had provided copies

of these lecture notes on Modern Astronomy, The Bible,

and Creation, regardless of where you were working, you

would always list your employer under your name as the

author?

A. Yes. Yes. It says who I am. And this is


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done with many books outside people's areas, little

blurb in the book and it says who they are, where

they're from, what they work in, what do they do.

Q. Did you have any consideration of the fact

that listing your employer under your name would

communicate to the general public that this is lecture

notes that you prepared as part of your job with the


A. The -- it says on the top here, "These

notes are based on public talks I've given at a number

of universities." All right? So this doesn't say they

are talks at universities. The one in Kentucky was

invited by the physics department. I'm not claiming

this was an official connection with the physics

department in Kentucky or for Michigan State or anywhere

else. So -- but I think the answer to your question is

a simple no.

Q. Did you have any concern that by listing

the University of Nebraska that you were somehow

communicating that the University of Nebraska endorsed

or agreed with your lecture notes?

A. No. No. We -- nobody assumes that the

university endorses our research. And if I publish the

value of the Hubble constant is 72.3, everyone knows

that does not reflect the opinions of my colleagues.


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Q. Okay. So you were telling me that

Dr. Cavagnero brought up to you the university

regulation. Did he actually show you a copy?

A. He might have done -- he might have, and I

can't remember.

Q. Okay.

A. He might have done.

Q. But either whether he showed you a copy of

the regulation or in his description of the regulation

you had been familiar with --

A. That kind of regulation.

Q. Okay.

MR. MANION: You're finishing her

questions.

THE WITNESS: I know. I looked to

Ann.

MR. MANION: She may have a completely

different ending in mind.

MS. KRIZ: I'll change it when you're

wrong, but I'll let you go when you're right.

Q. And was there any kind of regulation that

is similar to this at the University of Nebraska that

you're familiar with?

A. I have read through most of the regents'

bylaws, and they're mostly concerned about people making


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money, not about -- not about freedom of speech. And

I'm not sure exactly what the -- now I'm not sure what

the University of Kentucky regulations are. I've not

bothered to go and look them up after the fact.

Q. All right. So after he'd informed you

about that regulation, then what happened next?

A. Well, then we talked about this, about

what it was, and I explained how I gave lectures on this

and --

Q. You mean what these notes are?

A. Yes, this Exhibit 4, Exhibit 4. Yes.

Q. And you told him that it was lecture

notes. Go ahead.

A. And I explained to him that I was a

Christian, and I gave lectures on these things. And --

Q. Did he ask you what your religious

affiliation was, or did you volunteer that?

A. I can't remember. We certainly -- it was

not a major deal, the conversation. He seemed to

already know -- well, he would have known because of the

talk 10 years earlier. The talk a decade earlier was

advertised as I was a Christian and an astronomer, so he

certainly knew that.

Q. Okay.

A. Now, I didn't quite finish your question.


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You had something else.

Q. I'm asking you to describe the remainder

of that conversation.

A. Yes. So he then talked about why there

was concern of this. He expected there would be --

would be concern.

MS. KRIZ: We're going to have to

change the tape here a minute.

MR. MANION: Hold that thought.


We're going off video. It's 1:06 p.m.

(Off the record.)


This is Tape 3. It's 1:07 p.m.

Q. Before you proceed, just so that I'm

understanding -- this is a very critical part of the

deposition today.

A. Yes.

Q. He brought up the regulation at the

university and then he asked you what these -- what this

publication or what this -- these notes were, and you

explained to him that these were lecture notes that you

used in lectures that you'd given at various

universities, then you told me that you told him that

you were a Christian.


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A. Yes.

Q. And you were not sure whether that was

something you volunteered or whether he had specifically

asked you a question about what your religion was.

A. He probably didn't ask me about my

religion explicitly here. He -- except, of course,

we're talking about my beliefs now.

Q. Right.

A. So I think -- I think Dr. Cavagnero

already knew I was a Christian at that point.

Q. And what makes you --

A. Well, the fact that I had given a

lecture -- I had been invited by the physics department

to give a lecture which was billed as being by an

astronomer who's a Christian.

Q. And what knowledge do you have that

Dr. Cavagnero was even aware of that prior lecture?

A. I don't. But people usually know what's

going on in their department, particularly when it's a

major public lecture.

Q. Okay. So you just assumed that he was

aware of your prior lecture?

A. Yes. And, in fact, I mentioned that once

this lecture had been given at the University of

Kentucky.


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Q. And did he comment that he was familiar

with that?

A. He told me he had not attended it.

Q. Okay. So then you offered that you were a

Christian scientist or --

A. We keep the words separate there.

Q. You were a scientist who was a Christian.

A. Right. Yes.

Q. And what else did you communicate?

A. We had a discussion of a few minutes back

and forth on this.

Q. And what do you recall specifically about

this discussion, is what I want you to tell me about.

A. Well, I know -- but what I wanted to do

was to clear up any confusion that he and obviously

others, like the dean, had about me here. So

Dr. Cavagnero brought up some organization, something or

other nearby that I had never heard of -- in fact, I

still can't remember the name of it -- which apparently

was some young earth exhibit museum or something that

was nearby, and he said that because of this, science

and religion was a hot button issue, should we say, in

the community. And I told him that I had never heard of

this place, and then I very explicitly said -- I really

got this clear -- I very explicitly said, those are not


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my views, that I don't believe in a young earth creation

or anything like that. And that my views are very

mainstream, that I -- that I think evolution is how God

did things. And that also is, by the way, stated inside

this document here too.

Q. Okay.

A. Now, at that point --

Q. Before you move on, do you recall him

mentioning to you that in the state of Kentucky we have

a creationism museum?

A. That was what I'm talking about, yes.

Q. Okay. So that's the --

A. What's it called?

MR. MANION: She asks the questions.

Q. It's -- I'm not sure of it's formal title,

but it's referred to colloquially as the creation

museum. That's the organization that he specifically

asked you about?

A. I assume so, yes.

Q. The reason I'm asking you is that in your

complaint, and specifically -- in your complaint -- and

I don't know --

MS. KRIZ: I don't have an extra copy.

Do you have a copy of that? Let me pull it out of here.

I've got multiple copies.


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(Document handed to witness.)

Q. And I want to focus your attention to

paragraphs 22, 23, 24. Paragraph 21, let's start with

that one. You make a specific allegation that, "At the

conclusion of the personal interview, Mike Cavagnero

discussed Gaskell's religious beliefs and the exercise

of them."

A. Right. That's what we're talking about.

Q. Tell me in -- you told me that he

mentioned the regulation. Tell me what he did in

talking about your personal religious beliefs and the

exercise of them.

A. The precise language here was written by

my attorneys.

Q. Right.

A. So I'll say that. So the exercise --

let's see the wording here -- religious beliefs.

Religious beliefs, do I -- do I believe that the

evolution is a load of bunk and we're all made 6,000

years ago? No.

Q. Did he ask you that?

A. No, he didn't ask that. But I wanted to

make it clear that was not my view.

Q. Well, what I want -- and we'll get in to

that, but what I want to know for today's purposes is


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specifically what Dr. Cavagnero said to you in that.

A. Yes.

Q. Okay?

A. That's going to be hard to remember word

for word what he said.

Q. Right. And I understand that.

A. Yes.

Q. But what -- obviously something led you to

tell your attorneys that religion was discussed there --

A. Right.

Q. -- and this is what they included in the

complaint. Did you have an opportunity to review the

complaint before it was filed?

A. I did, yes.

Q. Did you feel that there was any inaccuracy

in terms of how they described that --

A. It was not language I would use myself,

but I understand it's standard legalese, yes.

Q. Okay. So tell me specifically how

Dr. Cavagnero asked you about your religious beliefs and

the exercise of those beliefs.

A. Okay. So he's asking what is this, what

it's about. And --

MR. MANION: This meaning Exhibit 4.

Q. Meaning the lecture notes.


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A. Exhibit No. 4. Exhibit No. 4, yes.

Q. Okay.

A. And I told him, and I can't remember

everything I told him, of course, but I told him that I

gave lectures on this, and that this was something that

I made available to students who asked me about that

question. So -- and so the exercise of them, I assume

the legal phrase there, this is -- means something one

does because of one's religious beliefs, and so if I

were not a Christian, then I would not be doing and

saying this.

Q. Okay.

A. So does that answer your question?

Q. I presume you did to the best of your

ability.

Did Dr. Cavagnero actually ask you about

the content of those lecture notes or --

A. No.

Q. -- just what are these notes?

A. I don't think we got down to the contents

of them, no, I don't think so.

Q. And did he ask you whether you had drawn

the conclusions and lecture on these issues because of

your personally held religious beliefs?

A. That was not necessary for him to ask it


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specifically. He would never -- I would not have

thought of asking that explicit question. So he did

not, no.

Q. Okay. Okay. Did -- after you told him

that you were a Christian were there any follow-up

questions about what that means, what are your personal

beliefs as it relates to modern astronomy, science and

the Bible?

A. We discussed that, and again, I cannot

remember what information I volunteered and what he

asked me about. I'm afraid it's going to be a problem

with all those questions, what did he say.

Q. Okay. Other than you mentioning your

Christian faith, what other comments were made about

that faith and your beliefs?

A. It was -- it was -- it was all about the

religion and science issue. He did not ask me what kind

of church I went to or my view on any theological

question or anything like that.

Q. Did he ask you whether you have believed

in evolution or the theory of creationism or anything

like that?

A. I made it -- as you can tell --

Q. Listen to my question.

A. Okay.


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Q. Did he ask? Okay? I know you want to

communicate to me what you told him, but I'm asking

specifically did he ask you questions about this. Okay?

A. Ask that question again.

Q. Okay. You mentioned that you were a

Christian.

A. Yes.

Q. Did he follow up with a question about

what it means to be a Christian and how your Christian

faith relates to the topic that is covered in these

lecture notes?

A. We did talk about that a little, and I'm

not sure whether he explicitly asked me about that, but

I was going to say, as you've noticed with this

deposition, I have a bad habit of jumping in on

statements and answering the question before it's asked.

Q. Right.

A. So I bet I did that there.

Q. Okay. That's -- that's a good answer,

Dr. Gaskell.

A. Somehow I think you believe that

statement.

Q. When he asked you about this article

did -- was this -- did this surprise you?

A. It did. Very much. Yes.


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Q. Okay. Why?

A. Because asking about somebody's religious

beliefs and exercise of them, the phrase is, is a no-no

during a job search.

Q. But you told me he asked you what the

article was. Did you feel it was inappropriate for him

to ask you what this -- what these lecture notes were?

A. I think that any discussion of it was

inappropriate.

Q. Do you have an opinion as to whether it is

appropriate for an employer to research a candidate on

the World Wide Web who is applying for a job at the

university?

A. I -- see, I have no opinion on that.

Q. Have you ever been a part of a search

committee or someone in a position to hire?

A. I have hired individual research

assistants.

Q. Have you ever gone -- been involved in a

process similar to the process that you --

A. Not as a voting --

Q. Listen. Have you ever been part of a

process in which you were part of a committee that

solicited applications for an academic or -- position

and served on any kind of committee that reviewed


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applicants and interviewed applicants?

A. Yes.

Q. Were you provided some type of parameters

by the institution that you were working for as to what

you could and could not cover in the context of those

interviews?

A. I've been to a training workshop on that.

Q. And where would that have been?

A. That was at the University of Nebraska.

Q. And what did you learn as it related to

the topic of religion?

A. Well, the workshop didn't cover religion.

The bottom line is, don't ask questions about things

non-job related, was the bottom line.

Q. When you have -- had the -- been involved

in hiring research assistants --

A. Yeah.

Q. -- or have you -- when you have an

applicant, have you ever Googled them?

A. I don't think I have, no. After the

fact -- things about them, but wasn't a factor in hiring

them.

Q. Do you know how the -- these lecture notes

came to the attention of anyone at the university?

A. Well, after the fact I do. As a result of


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things in the disclosures, yes.

Q. Okay. But up to the point that you filed

the lawsuit, did you have any information as to how the

university came to learn of these lecture notes?

A. Up till the time we filed the lawsuit, I

think I assumed that, as Mike Cavagnero had said, he had

Googled me and the dean had Googled me maybe

independently and found them. I think that's all I knew

at that point.

Q. Do you believe that there's anything

inappropriate about an employer Googling a potential job

candidate for a position with the employer?

A. It depends what they're looking for and

what they do with the information they find.

Q. Okay. But simply looking for the

information on the World Wide Web, do you see any

problem with that?

A. It's going to happen. And information --

information on certain protected categories should not

be used in -- or discussed, even, in a job search

process.

Q. And what forms that statement?

A. Well, for example, the training workshop

that I had to take at the University of Nebraska.

Q. But you said religion wasn't mentioned


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there.

A. No, no, I'm sorry. I did not say religion

was not mentioned there.

Q. Okay.

A. There was a broad category of things that

one should not take in to account, like race and gender

and disabilities and things.

Q. Do you have any reason to doubt that the

way that Dr. Cavagnero came across these lecture notes

was simply by going to your professional website which

was linked to your personal website which contained --

A. I do now as a result of things that were

disclosed.

Q. You do have a doubt? You have doubt --

A. I have a doubt now, but not at the time of

the filing of the lawsuit.

Q. Okay. Okay. How do you think these

lecture notes came to the attention of Dr. Cavagnero?

A. Are you asking me about the documents

which have been disclosed and we have now?

Q. I'm asking you about the lecture notes

that were -- Dr. Cavagnero asked you about on your in-

campus interview, how do you believe he came to access

that information?

A. Well, according to the internal e-mails


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that have been released, it was actually Sally Shafer

who first seemed to have done the Googling and found

these.

Q. Do you have any doubt that the way that

anyone at the university accessed this information was

simply by obtaining it off the World Wide Web?

A. Sally Shafer herself said she Googled it,

or looked on the web, or went to my home website,

something. I have no reason to doubt that.

Q. You told me that you had posted these

lecture notes on your personal website and that you had

provided a link to that personal website on your

professional website at the University of Nebraska.

A. Yes.

Q. By doing that, I assume that you had some

expectation that if somebody saw your professional

website, had an interest in this, they can go to your

personal website and obtain your lecture notes on this

topic?

A. If you went to any university department

you'd find almost all the faculty have links to personal

websites with pictures of their children, things about

hobbies, those kind of things. So yes, I expect that.

Q. Okay. So you didn't have any expectation

that this would -- these lecture notes would not be


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available to anyone searching your name on the World

Wide Web?

A. Ask the question again.

MS. KRIZ: Maybe you need to... I'm

not sure I can repeat that question.

(Last question read.)

A. Okay. I did -- it was the "not" that was

confusing. I did not have any expectation. It's got a

double negative. Sorry. The negative is confusing me

there.

Q. All right. Let me see if I -- let me ask

it again.

A. Rephrase the question, please, yes.

Q. By placing these lecture notes on your

personal website and linking your personal website to

your professional website, did you have some expectation

that the public would be able to access this

information?

A. The public can access anything on the

world wide web, and with or without a link to my

professional website.

Q. In the context of how this was brought up

by Dr. Cavagnero, you've told me that he explained that

there's a university regulation and his concern was you

listing your professional affiliation with University of


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Nebraska on these lecture notes --

A. Yes.

Q. -- and whether you would be able to

conform to the university regulation --

A. Right.

Q. -- which may prohibit something like this.

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. After you mentioned to him that you

were a Christian --

A. Yes.

Q. -- tell me what happened at that point in

terms of the discussion about these lecture notes or

your religious beliefs or your religious faith.

A. Well, I clarified that I thought the

mechanism of evolution was how God did things, and that

I was definitely not a young earth creationist or

anything like that, and with this institute that he

mentioned I had no connection with it, I never even

heard of it at that point there. He might have told me

a little about it since I didn't know about it.

Q. Okay. And then what else was discussed

about your religion or your religious beliefs?

A. At that stage I am trying to change the

topic of conversation with him.

Q. Did you say anything to him that you felt


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that this line of inquiry was not appropriate?

A. I did, yes.

Q. And what did you say exactly?

A. The standard response for inappropriate

questions is either you answer the question or you evade

the question, change the subject -- I tried to do

that -- and -- or you flat out tell them this is

inappropriate line of questioning. And what I -- what I

told Mike, since I was thinking that this was something

he was being told to do by the dean, was I said if the

Dean wants to ask these questions, tell the dean this is

not an appropriate line of questioning for a job

interview, something to that effect. So I was saying to

Mike Cavagnero -- his boss is the dean -- he wrote the

dean's name in -- there, and I said tell the dean he

can't ask about this. And then we did change the topic.

Q. My understanding is that he told you that

he had Googled you and that it was likely that the dean

would Google you.

A. Yes.

Q. Did he make any other statements to you

that the dean had Googled you, found this article and

had some concerns about it?

A. The dean having concerns was mentioned,

not what the dean's concerns were. So I was left with


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the impression that, as with the other odd question

during the telephone interview, that Mike Cavagnero had

been told by the dean to ask about this.

Q. What impression were you left with?

A. I was left with an impression that Mike

Cavagnero had been told by the dean to ask about this.

And again, remember during the telephone interview this

question which he said that the dean would kill him or

something if he didn't ask.

Q. Did you feel it was inappropriate to ask

you whether you would have any difficulty conforming

with university regulations in terms of the publication?

A. I didn't think it was inappropriate. I

think to -- there are regulations and you obey them.

And will I obey the regulations? Well, of course, I

would. Yes. It's not a question you'd normally ask

somebody because if you accept -- when you sign up on

the job, you sign a piece of paper and you sign I will

obey the regents' regulations.

Q. Was there any comments made by Mike

Cavagnero in that interview that indicated that he had

some disagreement with contents of your lecture notes?

A. No. No. For all I know, these -- my

lecture note views could have been exactly his views.

Q. Did he make any statements that led you to


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believe that he was critical of the fact that you had

published these lecture notes?

A. "Critical" might be a too strong word.

"Had concerns" is better.

Q. And his concerns were about the

publication as opposed to the contents of the lecture

notes? Do you understand that distinction?

A. I do. Yes, I do. That makes it a little

harder question to answer because if -- it was the

content which made him concerned. I'm just waiting to

see if you were going to ask me another question on

that.

Q. You know, was his statement -- did his

statements lead you to believe that his concern was more

about the publication of the lecture notes as opposed to

the content of what you were discussing in the lecture

notes?

A. I think both.

Q. And what did he say that led you to

believe that he had some concerns about the contents?

A. Because he had mentioned this being a hot

button issue because of this creationist institute.

Q. And when you used the term "hot

button," --

A. Yes.


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Q. -- was that a term he used?

A. No, it wasn't. It was my term for that.

Q. Okay.

A. I think we know what we mean by that.

Q. Well, you tell me what you thought he

meant by that.

A. No, he did not use that phrase.

Q. Okay.

A. I'm using it right now. So the discussion

was that this issue of origins is an issue in this area

of Kentucky and, in fact, elsewhere in the country which

there are strong feelings about, you get letters to the

editor of the newspaper, columns about it, sermons

preached about it.

Q. So you would not dispute that this is a

topic that generates a fair amount of --

A. Controversy.

Q. -- conversation?

A. Yes, it does. Yes.

Q. Okay.

A. Yes.

Q. So that was not inaccurate in terms of him

communicating that to you --

A. No. No.

Q. -- that this is a -- somewhat of a


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controversial topic?

A. I thought he believed -- I believed him

when he said that, yes.

Q. Okay. And had that been your experience

before that these topics tended to have some degree of

controversy surrounding them when you have brought them

up in a university setting?

A. My experience is that it is not

controversial. And I believe I -- now you're reminding

me. I believe I actually said that to him, that my

experience was it was not controversial, my talks were

not controversial, my views were not controversial until

I showed up in Lexington. Because my views are, those

are the majority of scientists.

Q. Something led you to conclude that your

religious beliefs were taken in to consideration by

Dr. Cavagnero in the context of this --

A. Yes.

Q. -- on-campus interview?

A. Right.

Q. Okay. Tell me what led you to conclude

that.

A. Well, I was uncertain when I was asked the

questions as to what he was doing and why he was asking

these questions, but things were made very explicit when


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I had a conversation with Gary Ferland.

Q. Now, if I understand correctly, on the

date that you came for your on-campus interviews Gary

Ferland was not one of the individuals you spoke with?

A. Right. Right.

Q. In fact, Gary Ferland was in England --

A. Yes.

Q. -- at the time; is that correct?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. Do you have any knowledge of what

Gary Ferland's role was with respect to this job

posting, job search, and the search process?

A. Do you mean what did I think then or what

do I know now?

Q. What did you think at the -- during the --

I'm asking your -- based on your knowledge now.

A. My knowledge now, of course I've read all

the e-mails released by the university, so I realize

that Gary was very actively involved in discussions

there. That was not what he told me at the time.

Q. So during the period of time that you

were -- that you had the phone interview and the

on-campus interview, I've asked you specifically whether

you were getting information from Gary Ferland about the

process and what was going on --


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A. Right. And I answered that --

Q. -- and you told me you were not getting --

A. Right.

Q. -- that information from him?

A. Right. So the -- what I gathered from

Gary at the time was Gary was on sabbatical in

Cambridge, Gary was not worrying about these things, the

decision was being made in Lexington, and he didn't know

what was going on there. But that turns out not to be

the case.

Q. Now, before we leave the on-campus

interview is there anything else that you can recall

that you and Dr. Cavagnero discussed at that on-campus

interview as it relates to your religious beliefs, your

religious faith?

A. No. I think we've mostly covered that.

Q. When you told him that you felt that the

questions were not appropriate --

A. Right.

Q. -- what was his response?

A. We -- that more or less ended the

conversation on this topic, and I was already trying to

change the topic so we switched over -- I think the next

question I asked I said, was, oh, by the way, did you

also Google my musical compositions. And so we finished


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up talking about that.

Q. Okay. Okay.

MR. CAVAGNERO: Which I have.

THE WITNESS: WHICH HE HAD.

MR. MANION: So have I.

THE WITNESS: Apparently they're not

as controversial.

Q. And to be clear, you have no recollection

of Mike specifically asking you what your religion or

religious beliefs were as it related to the topic of

creation?

A. He might have asked me what my views were

on this. I certainly told him what my views were

because I've noted I have a way of answering questions

before they're asked.

Q. How long was your interview with Mike?

A. Maybe 45 minutes. This was not the only

thing we talked about. We -- a number of other things

and I can't -- there was a schedule. I cannot remember

whether we started on time. It was the last thing of

the day. So I'd say at least 15 minutes, maybe 45,

probably not an hour.

Q. In any of your other interviews with any

of the other search committee members were there topics

that -- or questions asked of you that you found


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difficult to respond to?

A. No, I don't think so. And as I've said

before, they were not about religion.

Q. At the conclusion of this day, did you

have a sense of your prospects for getting this

position?

A. That's a question I just don't ask myself

with job interviews. I know that -- I was not told how

many other candidates there were. I assumed there were

a few. I assumed a few people would be interviewed,

because that's normal. I assumed they got quite a

number of applications.

Q. Did you receive any contact from anybody

at the university telling you, you know, you did well

with your interviews or giving you any feedback in terms

of the process?

A. Well, the formal notification was an

e-mail from Mike Cavagnero.

Q. That was not till January.

A. In January, with profuse apologies for not

having sent it earlier, by which time I had already

heard indirectly from other people in the process that

somebody else had been chosen.

Q. Now, you told me at the time that you

interviewed you had no idea who the other applicants


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were.

A. I did not, no.

Q. Okay.

A. And I didn't even try to find out. It was

not my business.

Q. After the interview, after the on-campus

interview --

A. Yes.

Q. -- you obviously received some

communication from somebody affiliated with the

university about the search process.

A. I think --

Q. What was the first contact you received

after your on-campus interview?

A. Probably sending a travel claim to a

secretary. It was probably sending a travel expense

claim to the secretary.

Q. Okay. What's your next contact with

anyone that was affiliated with either the search

committee or the department?

A. Right. My next contact is with Gary

Ferland.

Q. And when was that?

A. That is in December. I think. Late

December, perhaps.


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Q. And he is still in England --

A. Still in England but was about to come

back to Kentucky. And --

Q. Did you contact him? Did he contact you?

A. Gary and I exchange e-mails about research

things from time to time anyhow, and I might have

mentioned, oh, I've not heard anything from Kentucky or

something like that, which generated some strong

response from him like: Why not? They decided months

ago or -- there was some strong response on that.

Q. So until you mentioned you hadn't heard

anything, he didn't bring up what he knew about the

hiring decisions?

A. We'd have to go back to the e-mails and

check, but I think it was -- he and I were talking about

other things, and I mentioned I had not heard anything

from Kentucky, and he was surprised, annoyed about that

since a candidate had been chosen for that.

Q. And did he inform you in that

communication that the university -- who they had hired?

A. I don't think so, but what he -- what he

said was let's talk about this. So we talked over Skype

about this. Actually, he --

Q. Skype, is that -- that's a --

A. S-k-y-p-e.


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Q. That's a computer -- where you can talk

over a computer with someone in real time?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay.

A. Like telephone.

Q. And do you remember when that Skype

session was scheduled?

A. Gary suggested first that we talk in

person at the American Astronomical Society meeting in

Austin, where I was at the time. He was serving on the

council of the American Astronomical Society, and he was

going to be there for that meeting. Unfortunately, he

had to leave the meeting early because he was time

constrained and we ended up missing each other at the

meeting. And I think --

Q. When was that?

A. The meeting was the second week in

January. And he came into the council meeting and left

straight away, and we did not visually see each other

there. And we spoke over Skype, I think a few days

later.

Q. So in terms of -- I have January 16th as

the date that Dr. Cavagnero officially e-mailed.

A. Yes. It's before that. Yes.

Q. A few weeks before that, you think, is


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when you had the Skype --

A. No, it's within --


Q. When was the Skype session vis-à-vis that

official notification?

A. I'm going to guess it was late in the week

of the American Astronomical Society meeting.

Q. And was Dr. Ferland at work or at home

when he --

A. Well, let's see. He was in the U.S.

because we talked in the evening, and that would have

been in the middle of the night if he was back in

Cambridge.

Q. Was he in his office at the university or

at home?

A. Don't know.

Q. Do you recall?

Okay. And what do you recall of that

Skype session?

A. It was a fairly long, long discussion.

Q. And what -- did you bring up the -- I

mean, was the whole purpose of the session to discuss

the observatory selection director?

A. Yes, it was. Gary wanted to express to me

his concerns about the process.


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Q. And what did Gary express to you?

A. Gary very bluntly said that I did not get

the job because of the biologists. And I go --

biologists? There was a question mark there.

Q. Okay. What else did he tell you?

A. And so, of course, I wanted to know what

this is about, and he then told me that there had been a

very strong e-mail from the biology department which had

said that if the physics department hired a Christian,

it was like hiring a flat earther. You got the e-mail

so you can read the precise word yourself.

MR. MANION: She's asking for your

recollection.

MS. KRIZ: Right. Right.

A. My recollection agrees with what's in the

e-mail.

Q. And that he communicated to you that the

biologists were concerned about hiring a Christian?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. What else did he say?

A. That one of the biologists was the person

who had stormed out of my talk a decade earlier.

Q. Okay.

A. And then, like everybody, he wanted to

know what did Mike Cavagnero and I talk about.


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Q. And what did you tell him?

A. The same I've told you.

Q. What other --

A. He did not ask quite the same questions.

Q. Okay. What -- what else did you -- did

Gary relate to you about the process? Besides the

information about the biologists.

A. Let's see.

Q. Did he specifically tell you that there

had been an internal complaint filed about the process?

A. No. No. I did not learn that till about

six months later.

Q. Okay.

A. That was in a separate e-mail six months

later. He recommended that I talk with Tom Troland

about this. He recommended I call Tom Troland. He said

Tom Troland -- he said that he and Tom had talked a lot

about things here. Tom knew what was going on, and Tom

would tell me what was going on.

Q. Did he identify by name the biologists

that he indicated had been consulted?

THE WITNESS: Hey. That's good. Got

a good system.

A. He probably did not. He did identify him

as the person who stormed out of the talk.


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Q. Did you know the name of the guy who

stormed out of your talk?

A. Not at the time, no. I didn't then. With

the documents that are now being disclosed by you folks,

I know now. At least in theory. I can't remember it.

Q. And who is that?

A. I can't remember. But it's in there

somewhere. In theory, I know. Show me the e-mail; I'll

read the name.

Q. Is it Dr. Krupas? Does that ring any

bells?

A. Yes, it does. That sounds -- from what

I've heard, that sounds like the name.

Q. Any discussion about Jeff Osborne or

Sheldon Steiner?

A. Sheldon Steiner's name came up because

either Gary or Tom Troland -- now, this is all in

e-mails, everything now is in e-mails -- somebody

mentioned Steiner, and it was -- maybe I heard the name

Shelly Steiner mentioned verbally first because I was

wondering whether Shelly was male or female. So that

came up there, but really now we're in to e-mails, which

you should all have between people and --

Q. Before we move on to the e-mails, I still

want to focus on the Skype --


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A. Right.

Q. -- session with Gary Ferland. Anything

else that you can recall being discussed other than him

telling you that the biologists had gotten involved and

they didn't want to hire a Christian, suggested that you

contact Tom Troland as he had more information about

this?

A. Yes.

Q. Anything else that Gary related to you in

that session?

A. The other thing he thought was that this

issue had been brought up by the person -- is there a

Steve somebody or other in here? There's a Steve

somebody or other who is a staff employee.

Q. Steve Ellis?

A. Yes. He thought that bringing up this

with -- Steve Ellis was behind this, because Steve Ellis

wanted an internal candidate. Gary also told me, by the

way, that the job went to an internal candidate.

Q. So was your inference from what Gary was

telling you that Steve Ellis brought the topic of these

lecture notes up in order to sabotage your efforts in

favor of an internal candidate that he favored?

A. Yes. That was my impression, yes. That

turns out to be I think an incorrect impression, but it


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was my impression at the time, yes.

Q. What else do you recall?

A. He thought the internal candidate was

vastly underqualified.

Q. Did he tell you who it was?

A. He did and I promptly forgot the name.

Q. Tim Knauer?

A. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Q. He did mention that Tim Knauer --

A. I went and looked it up on the Internet

months later. Yeah.

Q. And Gary's representation to you was that

Tim Knauer's qualifications were --

A. Were substantially less than mine.

Q. Substantially less than yours. Okay.

A. He probably had stronger language for it

than that.

Q. And what else do you recall about that

conversation?

A. That was pretty much it. The number one

thing was you didn't get this job because of the

biologists and your religious beliefs, because you're a

Christian. That was number one thing he came up and

said very bluntly.

Q. And had you reached any similar


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conclusions prior to Dr. Ferland telling you that in his

opinion that's what happened?

A. No, because I did not know at that point I

had not got the job until Gary let me know. I was --

Q. Did he make any suggestions to you other

than contacting Tom Troland about what steps you needed

to take if you wanted to register some type of

complaint?

A. No, he didn't. No.

Q. Did he inform you that he had done

anything because he felt that this had not been handled

appropriately?

A. He did not, no.

Q. So it was just sort of information here --

A. Yes.

Q. -- is why I think you didn't get the job?

A. This is what I think happened. Yes.

Q. And did you ask him since he was in

Cambridge how he drew his conclusions?

A. Well, he said that he and Mike Troland

talked.

Q. Tom Troland?

A. Sorry, Tom Troland -- Skyped and talked a

lot about things.

Q. So based on what Ferland communicated to


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you was it your opinion that he had -- Gary Ferland had

drawn his conclusions based pretty much exclusively on

what Tom Troland related to him?

A. He didn't say he had not spoken to other

people, but the one he particularly mentioned was Tom

Troland because he said talk to Tom Troland. I talked

to Tom Troland at the time. Tom is a good guy and Tom

will be honest and forthright and tell you what's going

on.

Q. And did Gary Ferland make any comments

about the other search committee members in terms of his

opinions about them and --

A. No, he did not. No. The only one

mentioned was this fellow Steve Ellis.

Q. And did you know --

THE WITNESS: I ran out of water

again. So time out. And where's lunch too?



(Off the record.)


It's 2:21 p.m.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, when we last broke we were

discussing your Skype sessions with Gary Ferland which

would have occurred --


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A. Yes.

Q. -- sometime in January of 2008. You had

indicated that in that session that Gary had recommended

that you personally contact Tom Troland?

A. Yes.

Q. Prior to Gary making that recommendation

is it fair to say that your only contact with

Dr. Troland was in the phone interview and then in your

on-campus interview?

A. Yes. Now, let me interrupt you here and

say that the question you asked me before lunch, over

lunch, I thought of a further answer to it.

Q. Okay.

A. You were asking was there anything else

that Gary Ferland said --

Q. Right.

A. -- during his conversation about the

search process, and I remembered there was another

thing. And that was he said that the people in the

department -- I'm not sure whom -- were annoyed that I

had pointed out certain defects in the construction of

the observatory.

Q. Did he identify who those people were?

A. No. It just -- I don't think so. It just

annoyed people. If you want, I can elaborate on what


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that was.

Q. Did it touch on the topic of religion in

any way?

A. I have deeply held religious beliefs about

compliance with safety codes. No.

Q. I presume you're being facetious.

A. I was being facetious, yes.

MR. MANION: Laughter.

Q. But -- so I don't need any further --

A. I don't think so. I just mentioned

that -- obviously Gary Ferland is going to be asked

about this, and I want to make sure our accounts agree.

Q. Right. I understand.

Anything else that you recall during the

break about that Skype session?

A. That was the only thing.

Q. Okay. Did you, in fact, follow up with

contacting Dr. Troland?

A. Yes, I did.

Q. Was that via --

A. It was all in e-mails, which you have.

All e-mail. Everything is now e-mails.

Q. Okay.

MR. MANION: But she can still ask you

about what you remember.


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THE WITNESS: Right.

Q. Now, how soon after this conversation with

Gary did you e-mail Tom?

A. Fairly soon. It might have been the next

day, or two days. Pretty quickly.

Q. And what do you recall the inquiry was?

Just, you know, summarize what your e-mail would have

said.

A. Probably began Gary told me that. Let's

see. I asked him about the role of biologists. But it

all is in the e-mail so we probably don't need to talk

about this.

Q. And did you ask, then, for input from him

as to what role the biologist played in this selection

process?

A. I did, yes.

Q. Okay.

A. I think. Again, it's in the e-mails.

Q. Okay. And what did he say to you in

response?

A. He said we confirmed the biologists were

consulted. He expressed his own personal disapproval of

that. He said the excuse for doing that was that my

scholarship in biology had to be explored. He thought

that was ridiculous because I have no scholarship in


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biology. He also said that he has no scholarship in

biology either. He suggested I contact Sheldon Steiner

about this. He felt he was not at liberty to reveal

what the biologists had actually said. He also told me

not to expect Sheldon Steiner to be very forthcoming.

And he confirmed that in a later e-mail. Sheldon

Steiner was not forthcoming, although he did not deny he

had written the e-mail. Either Gary or Tom also

recommended I have discussions with Mike Cavagnero, and

also there was an e-mail exchange with Mike Cavagnero

about this.

Q. Did Tom Troland, other than relating to

you that he felt that consulting the biologist was

inappropriate, did he offer you any other opinions as to

his assessment of this process and how it -- how you

were treated in the process?

A. He made it very clear that he felt I was

by far the best qualified candidate and would have liked

to seen me come in the department. But again, this is

in the e-mails.

Q. Okay. Did he give you any information

about the candidate who was selected?

A. I'm not even sure that he mentioned his

name. But my view was that Tim now was none of my

business. In fact, even though I had been given a copy


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of his CV, I have not read it on the grounds I don't

think it's any of my business.

Q. Okay. Any other conversations or

communications with Tom Troland?

A. All communications from now on you should

have a copy of. They're all by e-mail. No telephone

conversations, no Skyping. You have them all.

Q. How long would you estimate this Skype

session with Gary Ferland lasted?

A. I thought you already asked that question.

Maybe 45 minutes, half an hour, something of that order.

Again, it was more than 15 and probably less than an

hour.

Q. Did you just -- was the sole topic of that

the observatory search process -- or director of search

process or...

A. Pretty much, yes. I can't guarantee we

didn't talk about astronomy in there as well. But Gary

was not happy with things.

Q. Okay. After you had this initial e-mail

exchange with Tom Troland, I presume he would have

responded to you either the same day or --

A. Oh, yes, he responded very openly and he

felt that candidates were entitled to some feedback, and

I think Mike Cavagnero felt the same way and they both


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gave me some feedback on things.

Q. Okay. What was your next contact?

Either -- did you contact someone at the university or

did someone contact you after you had this e-mail

exchange with Tom?

A. Well, the e-mails went on for a few pages,

and again, you have all of them. So I --

Q. You did contact -- you did e-mail

Dr. Steiner to ask for his --

A. Yes, I did. And I did not know that he

was not the person who came to my talk. I didn't know

that. And I also e-mailed dean Hoch, who admitted that

the biologists had been consulted but refused to give me

any information.

Q. And were you specific advised in what way

the biologists were consulted about you or...

A. People admitted that this had taken place

because they knew that I knew. Nobody provided any

details. All I knew is this verbal statement by Gary

Ferland that they had said hiring me would be worse than

hiring a flat earther. That was the only thing about

the content that I knew.

Q. And Dr. Steiner declined to provide you

any information?

A. Right. Right.


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Q. Who else did you contact to --

A. Steve Hock, I mentioned.

Q. Okay. And he merely told you in an e-mail

that he had contact -- that the biologist had been

consulted about your --

A. He did not deny it.

Q. Okay.

A. If you look at the -- you have got the

wording of this so you can see what we said.

Q. Okay. What do -- just based on your

recollection, what else did dean Hock tell you other

than the verifying that the biologist --

A. He said the decision -- something like the

decision was made at the departmental level. He evaded

my question, didn't answer it, but didn't deny it

happened either. He was a typical dean.

Q. And who else did you contact other than

Steiner, Hock and --

A. Mike Cavagnero.

Q. -- Mike Cavagnero, and Tom Troland?

A. That, I think, is it.

Q. Okay.

A. But again, you have all the e-mails so you

can check.

Q. So you had an exchange with Mike in terms


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of what you recalled of the interview and what he

recalled of the interview?

A. Yes, we did actually, yes.

Q. And did you recall having any disagreement

with his description of what had occurred?

A. No. No, two people can have slightly

different perspectives on a conversation, and my view of

things was, well, I'm being asked questions about my

religion here, what's going on here, while Mike was

emphasizing the -- more the reasons why he was asking

that. He did tell me that the conversation had been

cleared with the dean beforehand. Again, that's all in

the e-mails.

Q. You have mentioned on numerous occasions

today that you felt some of the questions were not

appropriate --

A. Right.

Q. -- based on what you knew about what could

be asked in the context of an interview.

A. Yes.

Q. Up until this -- the point we're talking

about, and I'm presuming this is sometime around January

of 2008, had you consulted an attorney to inquire as to

the legality of the treatment you received in this

search process?


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A. Could you break that down to a shorter

question, please.

Q. By January of two thousand --

A. Of which year?

Q. -- of 2008, which should have been when

you were formally advised that you did not get the

position.

A. Right.

Q. Okay? You told me it was sometime in

January that you had this Skype session and that you

then thereafter exchanged e-mails with Dr. Steiner --

A. Yes.

Q. -- Dean Hock --

A. Yes.

Q. -- Mike Cavagnero. This time frame had

you consulted an attorney to inquire in to the legality

of the treatment you received in the search process?

A. The -- my first -- I mentioned this to a

friend from our old church, who is an attorney, who

immediately referred me to these guys (indicating). So

the --

Q. Okay. When you say these guys --

A. Sorry.

Q. -- did they refer you specifically to

Mr. Manion --


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A. Yes. Yes.

Q. -- and Mr. Surtees, or did they refer you

to the American Center of Law & Justice?

A. They referred me to one or both of them

because this particular lawyer had done a case jointly

with them, a First Amendment case, in Nebraska.

Q. And --

A. So it was a personal recommendation of

particular people.

Q. And prior to this referral had you had any

prior contact with the American Center for Law &

Justice?

A. We get junk mail from them.

MR. MANION: So do we.

Q. Had you ever worked with them in any way?

A. No.

Q. Had you ever participated in any fund

raising or made --

A. No.

Q. -- contributions to them or anything like

that?

A. No.

Q. Okay. And who is the friend that made the

referral?

A. Jefferson Downing.


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Q. And was he someone that -- a colleague in

Texas?

A. No, I mentioned he was -- he was a member

of our church.

Q. Okay. In Texas?

A. No. In Lincoln.

Q. Oh, okay. But you did not contact anyone

immediately after your interview with Mike Cavagnero?

A. I was in touch with Frank and Geoff pretty

quickly after this.

Q. After this meaning what?

A. That would --

Q. After your interview with Mike?

A. No, this is -- no, no. This is where you

had your question.

Q. I'm trying to figure out whether you had

made some steps toward consulting an attorney prior to

the time that Gary Ferland and you had this Skype

session.

A. No. No.

Q. So it was only after --

A. I was unaware of the depth of what was

going on. My only intent -- only thought after the job

interview was that if I had gotten the job there is no

issue. If I don't get the job, then I've got a few


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questions I want to ask Mike Cavagnero about why he was

asking me questions. That was the stage I was at when I

suddenly learned from Gary Ferland there's a lot more to

this going on behind the scenes than I know about.

Q. Did additional information come to your

attention through your e-mail communications with either

the dean, Dr. Steiner, or Mike Cavagnero that were

different than what Gary Ferland had related to you?

A. No. It was very consistent.

Q. Did you at some point learn that there had

been an internal complaint filed?

A. I learned about that in an e-mail from

Gary Ferland in July. I also learned that Dean Hock had

left.

Q. You told me about this series of e-mail

exchanges after your meeting with Gary -- or your Skype

session with Gary Ferland.

A. Yes.

Q. When did that sort of taper off or stop?

A. Oh, it lasted a few days.

Q. Okay. So still January, we're still

talking about?

A. I think all those e-mails are probably in

January, but again, you got the e-mails.

Q. Okay. Okay. And then after -- starting


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in like February of 2008, did you have any further

contact with anyone at the University of Kentucky?

A. Not that I'm aware of. Except Gary

Ferland and I do work in the same field, and we might

have exchanged e-mails about research. But the only two

e-mails that came out of that from Gary which related to

things, one was he forwarded me a copy of Steve Hock's

resignation e-mail to the faculty before he went off to

have adventures in Washington state, and then a little

bit later Gary mentioned there being two internal

complaints or investigations.

Q. When do you think you got that

notification from Gary?

A. I think that was July of that year. And

again, you've got a copy of that.

Q. And was this -- did he just bring this up

on his own, or did you have some questions from him

or -- how do you recall?

A. I didn't ask about it. I would have to go

back to the e-mail and see what he said. We could have

been talking about astronomy.

Now, at some stage in this process the

requirements were that I filed a complaint with the

Kentucky Commission of Human Rights.

Q. Right.


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A. And when that happened I believe I

e-mailed Gary to tell him I had done that. Yes, I'm

sure I did. So that was why he told me there had

already been two internal complaints. And I did that

really as a courtesy to a colleague that this was going

on so that he was not surprised when the Kentucky

Commission of Human Rights investigated things.

Q. Did you have any discussions with anyone

at the university about any processes available

internally at the university about pursuing a complaint

of discrimination or mistreatment?

A. No, because those -- I know from other

universities those processes are only available to

people within the university. They're also, I'm told,

very ineffective as well.

Q. Had you ever filed an internal complaint?

A. Had I filed an internal complaint. I

don't think so.

Q. With any employer?

A. No.

Q. So when you said they were very

ineffective, is that just based on --

A. Yes.

Q. -- anecdotal information that was shared

to you by colleagues?


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A. Yes.

Q. Okay. Now, the Kentucky Commission on

Human Rights complaint --

A. Yes.

Q. -- was filed after you had retained

counsel?

A. Yes.

Q. Or was that filed on your own?

A. Well, if I retained counsel, you mean we

signed the formal -- may I ask my counsel about this?

When I signed the formal agreement. If you define it by

that point, it was before that.

Q. Okay. But you had consulted an attorney

before you filed --

A. But we consulted, yes. So I want to

clarify what you mean by retained.

Q. I guess --

MR. MANION: It takes us a while to

get around to the retainer. So don't be too hung up on

that. Okay? Don't make us look bad.

Q. What I want to ask you is did you consult

an attorney at the time you filed your Kentucky

Commission on Human Rights complaint?

A. Yes. Prior to that. They told me it had

to be done and by what date.


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Q. Dr. Gaskell, I'm showing you what we've

marked as Exhibit 5 --

A. Right.

Q. -- and it appears to be an affidavit that

contains your signature on the third page.

A. Yeah. Yeah.

Q. Could you identify that document as an

affidavit that you supplied along with your charge of

discrimination --

A. Yes, I can.

Q. -- with the Kentucky Commission on Human

Rights?

A. Yeah.

Q. I wanted to focus on paragraph 3 of that

affidavit, the first page -- page 2 of 4.

A. 2 of 4.

Q. It begins in October 2007.

A. This is 2 of 4, the big paragraph.

Q. Yes. In that second sentence, it says,

"At the end of the day, the chairman of the department,

Professor Michael Cavagnero, asked me extensive and

explicit questions about my" --

A. Right.

Q. -- "religious beliefs."


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A. This is all -- we've discussed earlier,

yes.

MR. MANION: Let her ask a question.

Q. "He began by saying that my religious

beliefs and my expression of them would be a matter of

concern to the dean and the College -- of the College of

Arts and Sciences." He specifically told you that the

expression of your religious beliefs was a matter of

concern to the dean?

A. Yes.

Q. He said that?

A. Right. Would be a matter of concern to

the dean. Now, they didn't say it had been or was or...

Q. And was it merely the -- your expression

of your religious beliefs as opposed to what your actual

religious beliefs were?

A. This is an expression of my religious

beliefs.

MR. MANION: Indicating Exhibit 4?

THE WITNESS: I'm sorry, I'm

indicating Exhibit 4 over here, yes.

Q. So your inference from the statement was

that Dr. Cavagnero was referencing your lecture notes

when he mentioned that Dr. -- that dean Hock had some

concerns about your religious beliefs?


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A. It was -- it was the lecture notes and the

fact that I would give talks on this topic.

Q. You make the next statement, "The line of

questioning was therefore not accidental, inappropriate

small talk, but a premeditated line of questioning."

A. Uh-huh.

Q. What did you mean by that?

A. Well, any discussion that can be small

talk, we could have talked about my children or

something like that but -- and actually asking questions

about somebody's family is not a thing to bring into the

job interview either, but often we talk about our kids

and things. So, I mean, it wasn't like that. It wasn't

that Mike Cavagnero just said, oh, I happened to find

this, this is interesting, I found your article really

interesting or something like that. No, he's saying

this is a matter of concern, it's going to be a matter

of concern to the dean. And that's why I say -- I got a

clear impression, that -- this is verified later -- that

this was a conversation that the dean knew about.

Q. So you're -- what I'm understanding you to

say is that your belief was Dr. Cavagnero was asking you

these questions because he had been directed by the dean

to --

A. That was my main impression, yes.


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Q. Okay. Okay.

A. And he confirms in later documents

released that he had indeed discussed this with the

dean.

Q. What e-mail are you referencing and what

specifically did it say that it...

A. Let's see. He -- an e-mail in -- one of

the e-mails in January, again which you have, he

verified that the conversation had been cleared with the

dean. He said the dean was -- Mike Cavagnero himself

felt that what he was doing was okay because he had

cleared this with the dean.

Q. You -- the second to the last sentence,

"The chairman gave the impression that there had been

considerable investigation already of my religious

beliefs and my expression of them."

What did the chairman say to you which led

you to that conclusion, that there had been a

considerable investigation regarding your religious

beliefs and your expression of them?

A. Right. This is an impression. This is

not hard evidence of this. So it's hard to say what

gave an impression there. It turns out to have been a

correct impression, by the way, from what we know. It's

a little hard to say what gave an impression about


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something. The mere fact it was being asked, the way it

was being asked, things were brought up, why it was a

concern. These were not things that one person on his

own would probably have come up with. That's probably a

good answer to that question. I thought that the range

of things mentioned was nothing that one person would

necessarily on his own would have come up with.

Q. In your mind was Dr. Cavagnero asking you

what these lecture notes were the same as asking you

what your religious beliefs were?

A. I have to think about that. These lecture

notes are about my religious beliefs, and so again, I

told him what my beliefs were and this was not

necessarily because of an explicit question that he

asked.

Q. In your lecture notes, and I'm quoting,

you make a statement that it is true that there are

significant scientific problems in evolutionary theory.

A. Yes.

Q. Is that a religious belief?

A. No, that's a scientific statement.

Q. And you go on further to say, "that these

problems are bigger than is usually made out in

introductory geology/biology courses, but the real

problem with humanistic evolution is in the unwarranted


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atheistic assumptions and extrapolations.

A. Right.

Q. Is that a statement that you make?

A. Yes. Can you show me what page we're on

because that's --

Q. You know, I don't know what page that's

on. I just wrote the note down. But I can locate it

for you.

A. I can probably find it. There are really

two statements there, and you might be missing a comma

between them or something.

MR. MANION: Let's try page 5 of 12.

In the last big -- about the third paragraph up from the

bottom, the middle of the paragraph, "It is true." Is

that what we were just -- it is true that there are

significant scientific problems?

MS. KRIZ: Uh-huh.

THE WITNESS: Yes.

MR. MANION: That's where she's

reading from.

THE WITNESS: Okay.

Q. Would you agree that that statement is

drawing a scientific conclusion?

A. There are two statements there. There's a

comma in the middle of the sentence and a but. And so


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there are two things in there. So you can't say that

statement because there are two things there.

So the first one is, "scientific problems

in evolutionary theory (a good thing or else many

biologists and geologists would be out of a job)," that

is a scientific statement. There are actually about

three statements here. There should be a comma there.

"And these problems are bigger than is usually made out

in introductory biology and geology courses." That is

true as well. That is true just about every subject

toward the university. The issues are always bigger

than they are made out to be in the introductory course.

We gloss over, we simplify things in the introductory

courses. And what's really going on is always a little

bit more complicated and sometimes wrong too. Okay.

And then I say, "but the real problem of

humanistic evolution is the unwarranted atheistic

assumptions and extrapolations." Now, that is talking

about people drawing religious conclusions from the

science. Now --

Q. When you use the term "humanistic

evolution," is that a scientific or religious statement?

A. The use of the word "humanistic" here is a

religious statement, religious category. The word is

also used to mean someone who studies the humanities,


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but that's not the way I'm using it here. The word

"humanistic" is also used to mean someone who studies

the humanities. But that's -- and a few other

dictionary meanings as well, but that is not the usage

I'm using here.

Q. Would you agree that contained within

these lecture notes are scientific comments?

A. Yes.

Q. And do you believe that when you make as a

scientist a scientific comment that it is fair game by

other scientists to review that comment and to question

and research its validity?

A. Yes.

Q. Do you think the fact that because your

scientific comments were included in lecture notes that

also reference religious beliefs that that somehow made

them outside the limits of appropriate comment or

research by other scientists?

A. It could have been okay for somebody to go

very slightly through this and only read the scientific

bits.

In a search I witnessed at the University

of Nebraska, I saw a secretary one afternoon with a

black pen, and she was going over with a black pen

through people's applications and she was blacking out


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all such things that were not scientific and not

relevant to the applications, using -- blocking out what

people mentioned their hobbies and things like that,

anything that mentioned their families, their kids,

anything that was inappropriate to ask about, she was

blacking it out.

So if somebody had done that and blacked

this out and given only the scientific statements to the

search committee, that would have been fine.

Q. But you think that because -- that they

should have picked and chosen out from your lecture

notes what was scientific to read and then disregard

anything that was --

A. Yes.

Q. -- premised on your religious beliefs?

A. Yes. I think it would be rather silly,

but yes.

Q. Okay. Did Dr. Cavagnero ask you

specifically about any of the statements that are

contained within your notes?

A. No. We talked only in general terms about

it.

Q. Now, you -- would you agree that this

article does talk -- touch on issues relating to

biology, the field of biology?


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A. Very slightly. And let's try to find

where it does. Just say, yes, it does. You can ask

further questions. In a very small way.

Q. Do you -- the fact that you have signed

this as a member of the astronomy department at the

University of Texas, you're referencing concepts of

religion, biology and astronomy --

A. Uh-huh.

Q. -- what is it about the university's

reading this and considering this in the context of

considering your application that you feel is

inappropriate?

A. Because this conveys my religious beliefs.

I think that if I had a document like this and I was

advocating atheism, which people do have things like

this, I don't think it would be an issue.

Q. Are you advocating some position in these

lecture notes?

A. I say what I'm doing right here in the

summary at the beginning here, and I state that this is

intended for Christians who are interested in these

questions here. And this morning when you were asking

me questions, I said in the lecture -- this is from the

lecture notes -- there are three things that I'm doing,

and one thing is getting people to understand that there


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are many famous scientists who are religious. So that

is advocating a religious, okay, point of view. I

also --

Q. But it doesn't sound like you're talking

about any specific religion. You're just -- you're just

informing people that there are scientists who also are

religious people --

A. Yes, I am.

Q. -- regardless of what their beliefs are?

A. That's right. Yes.

Q. Okay. All right. Go ahead and finish

your answer.

A. Well, let's see, there were three things.

Then --

Q. My question is, you know, when you're

talking about science and biology and religion all in

one article, why is it inappropriate for an academic

employer to take a look at what you wrote in considering

your application for employment?

A. If they only look at the science part of

it, that might be okay. Now, I say might be okay

because what was being of concern here was the biology.

I do not teach biology. One little thing I can probably

add to your question do I remember things of my

conversation with Mike Cavagnero, one little thing we


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discussed was what I teach, and I said I teach

biology -- I'm sorry. Cancel that one. Astronomy is

what I teach, not biology. That's in the e-mails and

things. So in physics and astronomy, which I'm familiar

with, we do not ask about people's interests and beliefs

in Germanic languages or things like that. Germanic

language scholarship, their theory the origin of

languages could be totally crackpot. We don't care

about that. It has nothing to do with the job at hand,

which is teaching astronomy and physics.

Q. You've referenced a number of times that

since you filed the lawsuit --

A. Right.

Q. -- you've had an opportunity to review

some of the --

A. Yes.

Q. -- documents that the university supplied.

A. Yes.

Q. Did you specifically have a chance to

review the e-mail in which the biologists were

consulted?

A. I did, yes.

Q. And do you recall that the referral was

to -- for the biologists to review your lecture notes

and to comment on the scientific integrity of your


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lecture notes?

A. What was the question?

Q. Do you recall that in -- about the e-mail?

What specifically -- what issue was framed to the

biologists that they were consulted about?

A. It's been too long since I have read them

and there are 300 pages of e-mail so I can't remember

that.

Q. But from your testimony, my inference is

that you feel that your statements in your complaint

have been verified or supported by the documentation

that has subsequently been supplied to you.

A. And greatly augmented, yes.

Q. So my question is now that you've had an

opportunity to actually review the e-mail that referred

this matter to the biologists, what was inappropriate

about that?

A. That the issue really is not my beliefs in

biology, which the biologist got totally wrong here.

It's the religious aspect of it. They are assuming that

my religious views are antiscience, antibiology. They

did not read this thing closely. They did not read

where I very clearly, explicitly state in here that I

have no trouble with the theory of evolution. None of

the e-mails mentioned that. They also couldn't get my


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name right either.

Q. You indicate that these are notes or

lecture notes that you've kind of -- that have kind of

evolved over time. Now, do you actually hand these out

to students on any occasion?

A. I make them available to -- within limits,

anybody who wants one.

Q. And when you have provided this

information to students, do you specifically tell them

that this -- this has nothing to do with my affiliation

with the university? It is only my personal religious

beliefs?

A. I do emphasize these are my personal views

and beliefs. I don't bother saying it's not those of

the university. Everyone knows these are not the views

of the university.

Q. Do you believe that it's appropriate for a

department chair to review any information that one of

their faculty or staff members would be disseminating to

the student body to determine whether it's appropriate?

A. Not in the area of religious expression,

no.

Q. Have you ever in the context of any of the

prior job applications that you filed, have you ever

been questioned by anyone regarding these lecture notes?


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A. No.

Q. Other than these lecture notes, are there

any other publications that are contained within your

personal website that reference religious topics?

A. Some of my musical compositions have

sacred texts. But nobody has talked about this.

Q. Do you continue to have a personal

website?

A. I do, yes.

Q. And is it the same website that you had

when you were at the University of Nebraska?

A. No, because -- and one important -- I have

removed this from the website.

Q. Okay. Why did you remove this from the

website?

A. Well, because of -- I was intimidated.

Q. What do you mean you were intimidated?

A. Well, intimidated means I felt threatened

that this would hurt my job prospects if I had it up

there.

Q. Now, we were talking about the human

rights complaint that you filed, and we specifically

talked about the affidavit that you supplied along with

that. You told me that after you filed your complaint

you made a courtesy communication to Dr. Ferland --


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A. Yes.

Q. -- to tell him that you had filed the

complaint --

A. I think so, yes.

Q. -- and give him sort of a heads up.

A. Yes.

Q. Was it at that point that he told you

about an internal investigation?

A. I think that was what prompted him to say

that. I believe that the language is Gary Ferland said

maybe they anticipated your complaint, or something like

that. Again, you've got the e-mails. You can read

that.

Q. And did he tell you about the -- what

conclusions were drawn as a result of that?

A. Yes. He said that he thought -- he said

he thought it'd been reviewed by the university lawyers

who had decided in favor of the department.

Q. And did he tell you what his source of

information was?

A. No.

Q. Did you question him?

A. No.

Q. Did you infer from his statement that

somehow he had personal knowledge about the


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investigation and what the conclusion was?

A. Well, people talk about things in

departments, and so he heard it from somebody.

Q. Did he tell you who had actually pursued

that complaint?

A. He did not, no. He said -- I think he

said there was only -- I can't remember if he said there

was one or two complaints. I think he only mentioned

one complaint. I think it was only with the discovery

process we found there to be two complaints.

Q. What was the second complaint?

A. No, there was two people.

Q. Oh.

A. Right. So the two names were I believe

that Tom Troland was the author of one complaint and the

undergraduate director of studies was the other, I

think.

Q. Michael Kovash.

A. Yes.

Q. And just for the record, there was one

complaint and then Troland was interviewed as part of

that investigation. So...

A. Okay. So what was the role of --

MR. MANION: We're not saying that

there were two complaint processes.


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MS. KRIZ: Okay. Okay.

MR. MANION: Two complainants I guess

in one process.

MS. KRIZ: Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.

Okay.

MR. MANION: If that's the question.

Q. And Gary Ferland specifically told you

that the university attorneys had reviewed this?

A. Yes. He said university lawyers.

Q. And when he -- did he specifically mention

Mike Kovash and Tom Troland in that conversation?

A. No, no names were mentioned there. Just

that there had been a complaint.

Q. Now, in terms of Mike Kovash --

A. Yes.

Q. -- you did interview -- have an interview

with him when you were on campus.

A. Apparently I did, yes.

Q. You have no recollection of that?

A. It was obviously an unmemorable interview.

Q. And other than that, which you can't

really recall, do you have any recollection of any other

contact whatsoever with Mike Kovash?

A. No. I can't even remember talking with

him.


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Q. And specifically he was not present or

privy to any of the conversation between you and Mike

Cavagnero?

A. No.

Q. On campus?

A. It was alone in his office.

MS. KRIZ: We need to change the tape.

THE WITNESS: I think we have a

time-out.



(Off the record.)


This is Tape 4. It's 3:04 p.m.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, you told me that you did not

have any idea as to the other applicants for the

observatory director position at the University of

Kentucky; is that correct?

A. Not until the discovery process.

Q. Are you aware of the applications, CVs,

that were submitted by any other candidates?

A. I received a copy of Tim Knauer's one. I

considered it to be confidential information and did not

read it.

Q. And that was in the context of the


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lawsuit; is that correct?

A. That was with the -- with the information

you provided.

Q. Rule 26 disclosures. Right. No, I'm --

and I'm talking before this.

A. Right.

Q. Okay? Were you aware of any of the

information that was submitted by any of the other

candidates for the position?

A. No.

Q. Specifically do you know whether any other

candidate had provided a professional website which

linked to an article similar to the lecture notes that

we've discussed today?

A. It's unlikely that -- of that. I did not

check. Most unlikely because this was the only such

article on the Internet (indicating.)

Q. Do you know whether there was any

information that was uncovered in the evaluation of

other candidates that included a consideration of any

religious articles, lecture notes --

A. I have no knowledge of that.

Q. -- public comments?

So you're not able to testify that your

treatment in terms of how the search committee reviewed


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your application and interviewed you was any different

than any of the other candidates?

A. Right. As far as I know, Mike Cavagnero

could have sat down with each candidate and could have

sent a copy of their resumes, anything from their

website, to the biology department, of every single one

of them. I'm sure if he was properly following

university procedures, he would have done that.

Q. But my question is, you have -- do you

have any information that the university reviewed your

application any differently than any other applicant for

that position?

A. No. As I said, it's quite possible that

Mike Cavagnero, following the university guide in an

effort to treat all of his candidates equally, he went

to every web site he found, everything there, and sent

it off to the biology department. I'm sure he did.

Q. What other universities did you give this

lecture at?

A. Okay. The -- I can't remember all the

groups. I remember the locations. So I gave it at

least once at the University of Michigan. I gave it at

Michigan State University, to two groups there.

Q. And who were those groups if you recall?

A. One group was a large lecture very similar


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to the one in Lexington. I also gave it to a smaller

group of Christian faculty members there. I gave it at

Central Michigan University.

Going back to the University of Michigan,

one group I gave it to was the Christian graduate

student group at the University of Michigan. I remember

that. I also gave it to the University of Michigan.

There was a more public one. I can't -- this is now

over 20 years ago. I can't remember the group. I can

remember the details of that. I also gave it to a

student group there. Let's see. I gave it to the

University of Nebraska. I gave it in a public lecture

there. I also gave it -- I say it, because I varied it

slightly according to context of the audience, because

different audiences have different interests and designs

and things. I gave it to -- it or some version of it to

the Christian graduate student group there at the

University of Nebraska. I might have forgotten somebody

in there. But as I said, it's given -- it's given a

number of times.

Q. It sounds like when you were asked to give

this lecture, it was sort of an extracurricular. It

wasn't in the context of a course or a class, actual

class.

A. Right. Oh, no, no. It was never in the


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context of a class. Now, the --

Q. Have you ever been invited to address this

topic in a classroom at a public university?

A. I was invited but I did not accept the

invitation.

Q. And where was that?

A. That was at the University of Michigan.

Q. And what class invited you?

A. It was environmental studies class. And

the professor of the class invited me to come and give a

guest lecture. It wasn't exactly on this. It was a

guest lecture on sort of religion, astronomy and the

environment. But I was -- but I left the University of

Michigan there so that's why I had to decline that.

Q. Oh, you declined that because you were

leaving?

A. I was leaving.

Q. Okay. Were you the only lecturer, or was

this a panel?

A. No, it was a class where most of the

lectures were given by guest lecturers. The reason she

asked me was I was invited as a guest lecturer on

astronomy and environmental issues. It was a class

about 200 students. And afterwards during the question

time one of the students asked me about the religious


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aspects of things, and the professor noted that the

students were extremely interested in that, and so she

asked me to come back next semester and talk about that.

But I couldn't because I was leaving town.

Q. So is it fair to say that you have never

given this lecture --

A. In a classroom --

Q. -- in a classroom --

A. -- at a university class.

Q. -- in a course --

A. That's correct.

Q. -- at a public university?

A. Yes.

Q. Have you been invited by any educational

institutions that have religious affiliations to lecture

on this topic?

A. Curiously, no.

And churches by the way, churches.

Q. Okay. After you learned from Gary Ferland

that there had been an internal investigation, did you

take any steps to further investigate what that

investigation included, how it originated, and what the

results were?

A. I did not because at that stage I think

the complaint through the Kentucky Human Rights


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Commission had already been filed.

Q. And if I understand the process with the

Human Rights Commission, and unfortunately we all

appreciate that this is somewhat the rule rather than

the exception.

MR. MANION: We lost the file six

investigators ago.

Q. You filed it and they did nothing?

A. Absolutely nothing happened.

Q. Okay.

A. Yes. As we expected.

Q. There was a request for mediation, or did

you recall that?


Q. Do you have any recollection of anything

about that?


MR. MANION: That's a good answer if

you can't remember.

THE WITNESS: Right.

Q. As far as you know, you filed your charge

with the Human Rights Commission, they sat on it, did

nothing, and when the requisite time period passed then

you requested to either withdraw the complaint?

A. Right to sue letter, yes. Yes.


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Q. Have you --

A. Which they were happy to give without

doing anything.

Q. Have you communicated to any other agency

your complaint that you were treated in a discriminatory

fashion by the university?

A. I believe that the Kentucky Human Rights

Commission in parallel sends it to some federal thing.

I think.

Q. Right. Right. And we're --

MR. MANION: That's good. That's all

you need to say.

THE WITNESS: Right.

Q. -- a dual filing state, right. But other

than your complaint, you did not initiate anything --

A. No.

Q. -- independently with the EEOC. Right.

And that was your only actual formal

complaint before filing your lawsuit.

A. Right. Because these guys told me that's

what I had to do.

MR. MANION: Remember, you don't say

what we told you.

THE WITNESS: I'm sorry.

MS. KRIZ: I wasn't going to tell him


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that.

THE WITNESS: That was privileged

information. Delete that.

MR. MANION: Just kidding. When it's

like that.

Q. Do you believe that but for your beliefs

or viewpoints that are articulated in your lecture notes

that you would have been chosen as the observatory

director?

A. Yes, I do.

Q. And what leads you to believe that?

A. Well, the job or application was not

written with me in mind, but it essentially -- if it had

been written with me in mind, that's how it would have

been written. Because I had done everything on the job

description with supervising the building construction

of the observatory, doing all the things that Kentucky

was hoping to do, and there was -- there is probably not

a single person in the country with those sorts of

qualifications for doing that.

Q. You have made the allegation that Tim

Knauer had substantially less qualifications --

A. Right.

Q. -- and experience than you do.

A. Yes.


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Q. Do you know what Tim Knauer's

qualifications and experience are?

A. Yes. What we do in astronomy is people's

research records are readily accessible on the Internet

so I entered his name in to what's called the ADS and

came up with almost nothing. So what I learned was he

had been a graduate student in the department sometime

in the past and had not -- he had not finished -- not

finished a degree. That's what I learned.

Q. Were you ever provided prior to the filing

of your lawsuit any explanation as to why Tim Knauer was

chosen or recommended by the majority of the search

committee?

A. There were some general statement in an

e-mail from Mike Cavagnero, which you have, and I cannot

remember exactly, but it was a general sort of

boilerplate statement saying that the search committee

took in to account a variety of considerations and chose

another candidate.

Q. And did you believe that that was not

true?

A. Given that by the time I got that e-mail,

I had heard from Gary Ferland what had happened, I did

not believe it, no.

Q. Now, you knew that Gary Ferland was away.


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A. Yes.

Q. I'm curious as to why you've put such

reliance on what Gary Ferland has told you when he

wasn't a participant in this process.

A. Well, because he was in close contact, he

said so, with the chairman of the search committee. And

Gary, remember, was one of, if not the person who

instigated this observatory. And he just happened to

arrange a sabbatical the year it was coming to

completion, and the sabbatical had been arranged many

years in advance and that was just bad timing that he

was out of the loop on this.

Q. You're aware at this point that the

recommendation that came out of the search committee, I

think you had two votes and Mr. Knauer had four votes?

A. Right.

Q. Were you aware of that?

A. I was told -- I learned that later.

Q. Right. Did Gary Ferland ever tell you

that he had personally spoken with any of the four

candidates who had voted against you as to the reasons

why that?

A. No, he did not.

Q. But yet you took his conclusion that the

biologists were the -- their opinions influenced these


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four cand -- these four search committee members?

A. I do agree with that, yes.

Q. And on what basis did you conclude that?

A. Well, it's very odd to chose a less

qualified candidate over a clearly very well qualified

candidate. Now, one thing I remember from the disclosed

internal discussions was there was a ranking on a scale

of 0 to 10, and on that scale of 0 to 10 I was ranked 8

and Mr. Knauer now was ranked 5 in there. And as I

said, I don't think there was anybody in the country who

had such a good match to the desired qualifications in

the areas of outreach and teaching and so on.

Q. Have you ever applied and been not hired

for observatory coordinator or director position before?

A. I was not hired for an observatory

position a year or two ago, but this was not a small

observatory like this.

Q. Where was that?

A. That was the Keck Observatories in Hawaii.

Actually -- actually, no, sorry, make that two

positions. I was interviewed for two positions like

this. One position was with the Keck Observatory,

extremely different from the Kentucky Observatory. Both

were. And neither really had this complete match of

interests of outreach and teaching and working with


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students.

Q. What was -- Keck?

A. There are two places; one was the Keck

Observatory.

Q. And how do you spell that?

A. K-e-c-k.

Q. And what's the other one?

A. The other one was the University of Hawaii

in Hilo.

Q. And was that an observatory more similar

to the observatory at University of Nebraska than the

Keck Observatory?

A. Little bit. The best way to describe it

is in terms of the size of the telescope. The Keck

telescope is huge. It's one of the world's biggest

telescopes. It's totally a research telescope. No

teaching component in that at all. No public outreach

component, just pure research with telescope.

The University of Hawaii telescope was for

undergraduate research but not for public education and

outreach, and it was not on campus. Now, the similarity

with the Nebraska telescope and the Kentucky telescope

is they're both on campus.

Q. What -- who was hired for the director

position for the Keck Observatory and --


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A. It wasn't director. It was a staff

position. I never bothered to check.

Q. Okay. And do you know how your

qualifications matched that selected candidate?

A. Well, I made the final cut, and they did a

telephone interview with me and they summoned me out

there for an in-person interview, and I bet a lot of

people applied for the position, so both I and whoever

they chose were highly ranked there.

What I said about the Kentucky position is

I would have been one of very few people with a

combination of skills that were wanted. So the Keck

Observatory is wanting somebody with instrumentation

skills with equipment. And that's focusing on that

area. And they obviously thought I had enough

experience in that area to put me in the final short

list. But I'm aware there are lots of other people who

have really specialized in that area while I'm also

involved in student research and teaching.

Q. Do you have any personal knowledge as you

sit here today why you were not chosen for either of the

positions in Hawaii that you've just described for me?

Did anybody tell you we didn't select you because of

this?

A. No. I don't normally ask. I didn't ask.


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Q. So I infer from the fact that you didn't

ask that you don't know?

A. I don't know because I didn't ask, yes.

Q. When you questioned Mike Cavagnero as to

whether the selection was based on your religious

beliefs or your communication of those beliefs, how did

he respond to that?

A. That wasn't the question I asked him.

Q. Did you ever ask him that?

A. No, I don't think I did. What I asked

about was the process and what the biologists had said,

which he said he was not at liberty to divulge. But

again, it's all in the e-mails.

Q. Okay. Other than Gary Ferland's

explanation as to why you didn't get chosen, do you have

any other information as to why you were not chosen for

the position at U.K.?

A. Only -- in the discovery documents there's

a tiny bit of discussion of other things.

Q. Okay. And what -- but that's only been

learned since the lawsuit has been filed?

A. It has, yes. There's a tiny bit of

discussion of other things in there. Minor things.

Q. But the motivation for pursuing your Human

Rights complaint and subsequently your litigation was


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based on information related to you by Gary Ferland?

A. No. And the e-mails from Tom Troland and

Mike Cavagnero.

Q. Okay.

A. And really primarily based on those

e-mails. They're right there in writing, bits --

e-mails are in.

Q. Other than this e-mail communication that

you alerted Gary to the fact that you had filed the

Human Rights complaint, did you have any other further

communications with Gary Ferland regarding the search

process and the selected candidate?

A. No, I don't think so. He did express

dissatisfaction with the way the observatory was being

run by the person. I did not ask about that. I felt

like that was none of my business and I was not with the

university and I didn't need -- made some comment about

that. I did not follow up on that.

Q. Do you continue to have regular contact

with Dr. Ferland?

A. Oh, yes, because we work in the same

field. But this correspondence is being monitored by my

attorneys and -- and they're laughing. So we agreed

that all discussion between Gary Ferland and I until

this lawsuit is settled is going to be strictly on


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research. So we do not mention anything about this. He

doesn't know I'm here in Kentucky, for example.

Q. Since you e-mailed him regarding your

Human Rights complaint --

A. Yes.

Q. -- have you had any discussions verbally,

via e-mail, through an intermediary regarding the search

process?

A. No. In fact, I'm very carefully avoiding

having any discussion or contact with him. That's why

we're communicating by e-mails and what we're e-mailing

about is being approved by my attorneys.

Q. Were you ever informed by anyone at the

University of Nebraska that they had been contacted by

anyone at U.K. regarding your application?

A. No, I did not.

Q. Had you ever discussed with anyone at the

University of Nebraska regarding your concerns that the

decision not to select you was motivated by religious

considerations?

A. Not people in my department. Certainly in

our church there were a number of university faculty

people, and I told them what had happened in Kentucky,

but they were in no way involved with the administration

or my department. Completely separate. They did happen


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to be university employees.

Q. And I neglected to tell you, what church

were you affiliated with when you were in Nebraska?

A. That was -- that was Zion Presbyterian

Church. PCA Church, if that means anything to you.

Presbyterian Church of America is the denomination.

Q. Do you have other -- I guess any comment

that you would have made about this would have been just

with your personal friends or family.

A. Uh-huh. Exactly, yes.

Q. Do you -- your attorneys have provided me

a preliminary list of witnesses that you believe may

have some knowledge regarding this -- the lawsuit and

your allegations and what occurred when you came to the

university to apply for this position. Are there any

other individuals who may have knowledge either about

the allegations in your complaint, your experience at

the University of Kentucky?

A. We reviewed these things yesterday, and I

did notice one or two names that were missing, like

Sally Shafer's name, I believe, was missing on the list,

and they will rectify this.

Q. And Sally Shafer, she was one of the

search committee members.

A. Yes.


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Q. And if I understand correctly, the only

time you would have had any communication with

Ms. Shafer would have been in your in-person interview?

A. Yes.

Q. Okay. And that --

A. It was the first one in the morning.

Q. Okay. Have you had any discussions with

Keith MacAdam about --

A. No.

Q. -- the selection process?

A. No.

Q. What about Dr. Shlossman?

A. Shlossman. If I run in to him, and

remember we work in the same field, if I run in to

him -- I have not run in to him, I don't think, since

then. We have certainly not talked about this, and I

would not.

Q. What about Nancy Leveson? Have you had

any conversations?

A. My only encounter with Nancy Leveson was

the interview in her office when I came for the

interview in Lexington, even though we do work on

somewhat related areas.

Q. And Steve Ellis, any communications --

A. No, he's not somebody I would have any


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contact with because he's a physicist. He does physics

teaching.

Q. So your expectation of getting hired was,

in your opinion, the job description fit exactly --

A. Yes.

Q. -- with your prior experience?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. Had you been hired for this position --

you told us that in the fall of 2007 you had gone to the

University of Texas.

A. Right.

Q. Would you have had to quit a certain

position there in order to come take this job?

A. I would have had -- by -- well, yes.

Q. Okay. Now, I think you told me, and your

attorneys have provided me in the Rule 26 disclosures --

I want to talk to you about your damages at this point.

A. Right. Right.

Q. In terms of, you know, your pay

differential, I think you told me that you believed that

this director position would have paid you more than

what you were earning at the University of Texas

currently.

A. Yes.

Q. Would it have paid you more than you were


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earning at the University of Nebraska?

A. Yes.

Q. In your position with the University of

Texas --

A. Yes.

Q. -- are you provided any benefits of

employment other than salary?

A. I was for the first year, and I am

provided this year as well, up till May something or

other.

Q. And what happens in May?

A. What happens in May. I don't know.

Q. Is it -- I mean is that the end of your

appointment or --

A. No, that's -- that's the end -- end of --

current expected end of the benefits.

Q. And will your job change at that time --

A. No. No.

Q. -- that your benefits will be eliminated?

A. The reason -- the reason for this -- it's

complicated. The reason for this is that if we go back

a long way in our questioning, I was talking about the

various funding sources, and I'm independently funded

through a NASA grant, and the University of Texas would

not contribute benefits through that. You have to be a


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50 percent or 51 percent employee of the university in

order to -- and to contribute benefits through that.

But --

Q. What is your percentage? University --

A. At University of Texas right now zero

percent because I'm on this NASA grant. Right. But in

the spring I was a hundred percent, I think. All these

figures are on a spreadsheet calculation. But the --

Q. So in May your NASA money runs out --

A. No. No.

Q. -- that's why your benefits run out?

A. There is something called COBRA, and

Congress as part of the stimulus package has extended

COBRA. So for us COBRA runs for nine months. I think

it was going from like September 1st or August 1st or

something like that until sometime in May. So that's

what's paying the benefits right now. So thank you

stimulus money.

Q. Okay. Now, COBRA payments, what that

means is that your employer-funded benefits ended and

you are given an opportunity to pay for these benefits

on your own through COBRA.

A. I think so. My wife handles all of that,

so I'm not sure.

Q. So are you paying right now for your --


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any kind of insurance coverage, those kinds of things?

A. Paying a rather lot for it actually.

Q. I mean, that's coming out of your

pocket --

A. It is.

Q. -- as opposed to the university paying any

of it?

A. Yes, it is.

Q. Okay. So when did your university-paid or

employer-paid benefits end?

A. Either August -- July 31st or August 15th.

Q. Of --

A. The last --

Q. -- 29th?

A. Wait a minute. No, wait a minute. The --

my full benefits my first year there --

Q. At University of Texas?

A. At University of Texas. I'm now in my

third year. I had full benefits my first year. The

second year I had --

Q. So for '07 -- '07, '08 you had full

benefits?

A. '07, '08 I had full benefits.

Q. Okay.

A. Or close thereto. The next year I had


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benefits for half the year, and the first half of the

year we had to pay some stuff ourselves. And now is a

worrying time because my wife was declared uninsurable

too.

Q. And currently you have coverage for you

and your family?

A. Through COBRA.

Q. But through COBRA.

A. Yes.

Q. Other than insurance coverage, are there

any other benefits of employment that you've had

since -- with your University of Texas appointment?

A. During my first year there were retirement

contributions as well, and during half of the second

year as well of some degree. But all these are

substantially less than would be paid at the University

of Kentucky.

Q. At this point, I mean, do you anticipate

being at the university in Texas for an indefinite

period of time, or do you see a point where you'll be

leaving?

A. I'm on the job market right now, and I

would therefore -- unfortunately -- I say

unfortunately -- I like being in Texas, I would

fortunately hope to go to a more permanent job starting


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sometime this year.

Q. At your phase of your career --

A. Yes.

Q. -- is it likely that you will be able to

obtain a tenure-track position at this point?

A. I have the disadvantage of being what is

called senior, which mostly means being old, and so if

one looked at the Job Register of the American

Astronomical Society -- you can do it online -- you

would find that the vast majority of positions will only

consider junior people. And sometimes I've actually

asked some of these interesting places would you be

willing to consider a senior applicant, and the answer

is no because the level of the position has to be

approved by the administration and there are rules about

what one can and cannot do here, and so there are some

places -- I've applied to all of them which are saying

we will consider senior people.

Q. Well, now, when you use the term "senior"

is that years of involvement in your profession, your

field, or is that an age criteria?

A. Well, the two are correlated quite

tightly.

MR. CAVAGNERO: Does it apply to

non-tenure -- non-tenure track? I'm sorry.


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Q. Does senior -- does senior --

A. What senior -- what senior means is -- it

doesn't have a precise meaning, but it means years from

the Ph.D., how much experience, how much teaching

experience, how much research we've done, how famous you

are, those sorts of things.

Q. Is it your expectation that you -- well,

not expectation. Strike that.

A. That's a good --

Q. Do you hope to -- are you primarily

interested in a faculty position as opposed to staff or

a non-tenure track position at this time?

A. Since I need a job I have to be broad in

what I'm applying for. My preference would be to have a

university faculty position, preferably tenured, or at

least some decent job security, as I thought I had in

Nebraska, where I could carry on a combination of

teaching, research with the students and other service

activities, public outreach and so on. I really enjoy

public outreach.

Q. Are all your applications in an academic

setting or are you applying for private industry --

A. I'm not applying for private industry. I

might be forced to do that. No, they're all astronomy

related.


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Q. In an academic setting?

A. Well, we talked about that this morning,

and I already answered that question.

Q. Okay. You have alleged that you've lost

income and I presume --

A. Right.

Q. -- that's the difference in what you would

have earned at --

A. Yes.

Q. -- U.K. and what you've earned in either

at the university -- well, just University of Texas.

A. Yes.

Q. You've also alleged that you've suffered

emotional stress and anguish --

A. Yes.

Q. -- as a result of that. Tell me about

that. What do you -- how has that manifested itself?

A. Well, would you define what an emotion is?

It's a consequence of the uncertainty in income and the

low level of income. So it causes distress in what we

can do. It really restricts us. We're having a very

hard time sending our oldest kid to college, for

example, because of this. We worry that we might have

to pull him out of college next year because of lack of

income. Worrying, I think, would count as emotional


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distress. We have had to move to a much smaller house

with our family, which is very cramped. We were forced

to do that. There are things we can't do because we

either can't afford them or don't know that we can

afford them. There are --

Q. Let me ask you this. Would you have been

in the same financial circumstances had you never

applied for the position at the University of Kentucky?

A. I am in these financial circumstances

because I was not given the job at the University of

Kentucky.

Q. My question to you is, would your

financial situation have been any different now had you

never applied -- pursued the job at the University of

Kentucky?

A. I -- it is a hard question to answer

because one doesn't know these what-if things. It could

have been. Let's say it could have been.

Q. I mean, you made the decision to go to

University of Texas --

A. Right.

Q. -- before you ever even -- or had pursued

this --

A. I was in the process of deciding that,

yes.


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Q. And your position at the University of

Nebraska was older --

A. Yes.

Q. -- over before -- so you would have had to

move regardless?

A. Yes, that's right.

Q. Okay. Have you had to seek any type of

professional treatment or intervention for --

A. What do you mean?

Q. -- mental anguish or --

A. No. No. No. No.

Q. Have you ever suffered a financial change

in your circumstances before this -- since you've left


A. Say that question again.

Q. You've told me -- and maybe that was not a

well-stated question. You've told me -- you know, I've

asked you questions about the damages that you've

alleged in this lawsuit. Two of those elements of

damages are emotional distress and anguish, and I asked

you to describe for me how those symptoms have

manifested themselves, and you've told me primarily that

they've surfaced because of a change in your financial

circumstances.

A. Yes, that's right.


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Q. Okay. Is there any other way that

these -- the mental anguish and emotional distress have

manifested?

A. It's not just the actual financial

circumstances right now. It's the uncertainty about the

future. So if I were at the University of Kentucky, I

would have a stable job doing what I enjoy doing in

presumably a department I enjoy being in, in a town I

enjoy being in. Nice town here. So instead, there's a

large amount of uncertainty, and uncertainty produces

worry and worry is anguish, anxiety.

Q. Since you filed the application at the

University of Kentucky, how many other applications for

employment have you -- you think you filed? Just

roughly.

A. I'm going to guess about 30.

Q. And have you been -- are you still in

consideration for any of those positions at this time?

A. Yes, I'm still in consideration for maybe

a dozen positions. The number of positions a senior

person like myself can apply for is unfortunately rather

limited.

Q. So my inference is at least, you know,

maybe 18 or so of those are possibilities that are no

longer available to you?


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A. Right. Right.

Q. Assuming that you were rejected as an

applicant for those 18 other employers with whom you

filed an application, what makes them different than

your application at the University of Kentucky?

A. I have no evidence that my religious

beliefs were a factor in any of those decisions.

Q. Have you ever suffered what in your

opinion was mistreatment or discrimination on the basis

of your religion in any other context other than the

employment context?

A. Not that I have any direct evidence of. I

don't think. I might have to think about that one.

Q. Do you personally know the religious

beliefs of the search committee members at the -- for

the position?

A. No, I don't.

Q. Have you made some assumptions about what

their religious beliefs are?

A. No, I haven't. No. I can tell you

statistically what they probably are, but that's all.

Q. Is the topic of religion one that you

discuss frequently with Dr. Ferland?

A. A little bit. We did -- probably the only

time we did was the discussion which stimulated him


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getting the ball rolling and me coming and giving that

lecture.

Q. Do you know what religion Dr. Ferland is?

A. Well, at that time he said that he was

taking his kids to a Presbyterian church on the grounds

it was good for them. I think his wife is a Unitarian

or has Unitarian background.

Q. Do you know whether he's Christian or not?

A. I think he would not self-identify as a

Christian.

Q. What about Dr. Troland? Do you know --

A. I have no idea.

Q. -- what his beliefs are?

A. I believe his wife is Roman Catholic, I

think. I think.

MS. KRIZ: We can take a break here.

VIDEOGRAPHER: Stand by, please. The

time is 3:44 p.m.

(Off the record.)


It's 3:57 p.m.

Q. Dr. Gaskell, we're winding up here, but

before we end I want to ask you about some of the

specific allegations in your complaint. You know, you

make some very specific allegations about Dean Steve


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Hock. And I guess generally --

A. Which item are you talking about here?

MR. MANION: Let her -- she's giving

you the general background.

MS. KRIZ: Yeah.

Q. Let me refer to Paragraph 22. "Cavagnero

told Gaskell that Gaskell's religious beliefs and

Gaskell's expression of them would be a matter of

concern to Dr. Steven Hock."

A. Uh-huh.

Q. And I think we've already discussed that

those were not Mike Cavagnero's words. He didn't tell

you that the dean had --

A. No.

Q. -- concerns about your religious

beliefs --

A. Those were my attorneys' words.

Q. -- but he had concerns about the lecture

notes.

A. Yeah.

Q. Right?

Okay. I guess it was your affidavit

that -- you know, you suggest that the questions as it

related to the lecture notes, the questions that Mike

Cavagnero asked you regarding the lecture notes in the


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context of your on-campus interview, that somehow those

were motivated by recommendations or suggestions by the

dean. And I want to know, you know, what is your

knowledge of the dean's involvement in this whole

process?

A. My initial knowledge of involvement came

in the telephone interview where Mike Cavagnero said

he'd be in trouble with the dean if he didn't ask me

this question he was reluctant to ask me. The next

mention of the dean was in the much asked about

conversation with Mike Cavagnero, where I was told the

dean also would be interested in looking in to these

things.

Q. Dean would be interested in looking in --

would be interested in your lecture notes, or was there

something specific that he said the dean was interested

in?

A. Well, if I recap what I said earlier

today, Mike Cavagnero began by saying that he was

investigating candidates, he was Googling me, Dean Hock

was presumably -- had to -- whatever, doing the same

thing.

Q. Okay.

A. Which struck me as quite unusual, by the

way.


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Q. Other than comments that were made to you

by Mike Cavagnero referencing the dean --

A. Yes.

Q. -- do you have any other knowledge of any

other involvement that the dean had in this process?

A. Not until the -- we got the documents

through the discovery process.

Q. Okay. And what documents there led you to

believe that the dean had a -- played a different role?

A. Oh, sorry. I forgot one thing. One thing

was the statement in an e-mail in January in response to

a question of mine to Mike Cavagnero where he said the

questioning had been cleared by the dean. So -- e-mail.

Q. Did Gary Ferland specifically relate to

you that he had knowledge of any involvement by the dean

in this?

A. No. Gary Ferland did not. Remember, Gary

Ferland wasn't in the country at the time.

Q. Gary did forward to you the dean's

announcement that he was resigning from the University

of Kentucky?

A. Yes. Yes.

Q. I'm curious why that would have occurred.

Do you know why he sent you that?

A. That's a good question. Why did Gary send


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me that. I must have mentioned -- I must have mentioned

somewhere, maybe in that Skype conversation, about the

dean -- after all, I said that Gary Ferland was very

interested in asking about my conversation with Mike

Cavagnero, what did Mike ask, what did Mike do and so

on, which we now learn after the fact it was something

Gary had suggested he should do. And I told him there

about how the dean's name was evoked. So that's why he

knew I had an interest in the dean. That's probably the

answer to that question.

Q. Had Gary ever communicated to you his

personal feelings about the dean? Did he like him or

not like him?

A. I can't remember on that. Gary would

express occasional comments. I think there are more

complaints about the provost than there were about the

dean. The current provost I've heard complaints about.

Q. You told me that Gary specifically told

you that you were not selected because of the

biologists.

A. Right.

Q. Did he mention any committee member that

he thought was primarily responsible for the decision

not to hire you?

A. Well, yes. I told you that. It was -- he


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thought that Steve Ellis had --

Q. Steve Ellis. Okay.

A. -- played a -- basically a role in that.

Q. Just Steve Ellis was the only one --

A. The only name he mentioned, yes.

Q. Okay. All right.

MS. KRIZ: I think that's all the

questions I have for you. Thank you very much,

Dr. Gaskell.

THE WITNESS: Okay.

MR. MANION: There you go.

THE WITNESS: Thank you very much.

MR. MANION: I have no questions.

VIDEOGRAPHER: Stand by, please. This

concludes the deposition. It's 4:03 p.m.

(DEPOSITION CONCLUDED.)


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STATE OF KENTUCKY )

COUNTY OF FAYETTE )

I, ANN HUTCHISON, Registered Professional

Reporter and Notary Public, State of Kentucky at Large,

whose commission as such will expire May 3, 2012, do

hereby certify that the foregoing deposition was taken

by me at the time, place, for the purpose and with the

appearances set forth herein; that the same was taken

down by me in stenotype in the presence of the witness

and thereafter correctly transcribed by me upon

computer; and that the witness was duly placed under

oath by me prior to giving testimony.

I further certify that I am not related to nor

employed by any of the parties to this action or their

respective counsel and have no interest in this

litigation.

Given under my hand, this 2nd day of February,

2010.

_______________________________ANN HUTCHISON, RPRRegistered Professional ReporterNotary Public, State-at-Large


DireClor search hll p:111 ighlni ng .pa.uky.edu/ukobserl'alory/di recloLhlm

Home

Founding DirectorCommonwealth Observatory, The University

of Kentucky

The University of Kentucky is establishing an observatory with a combinationof state and private support. Its mission is undergraduate education andpublic outreach. Our Department has large introductory astronomy coursesfor non-majors, with typically 1000 students per semester, and smallercourses for Physics and Astronomy majors and students who are especiallyinterested in astronomy. Introductory students will use the observatory tosee the moon and brighter planets, and advanced students will buildinstruments and conduct observations.

We are looking for a leader who will become the founding director of ourobservatory. The construction of the observatory should be complete by theFall Semester, 2007. It will be located on central campus, so that studentshave easy and safe access to it. It will have modern facilities including apermanently mounted 20" Celestron telescope on a Mathis mounting, an AshDome, adjoining lab space as well as a number of small portable telescopes.Among the first duties of the new Director will be to provide guidance inmaking the facility fully functional. This may include working with Celestronand Mathis to make the telescope and its computer controls fully operational.After the telescope is set up we will develop the ability to do both CCDimaging and spectroscopy with advanced students.

The duties will include supervising several observatory Teaching Assistants,who will work with the Director in using the observatory with undergraduates

lof2

; DEFENDANT'SEXHIBIT

I NO. )PL000001

Case: 5:09-cv-00244-KSF-REW Doc #: 21-1 Filed: 09/28/10 Page: 1 of 2 - Page ID#: 338

Director search http://lightning.pa.uky.edu/ukobservatory/director.htm

and the public. The Director will teach some sections of introductoryastronomy. The successful candidate should be able to set up and operate amodern 20" telescope, have a good working knowledge of the night time sky,be able to supervise graduate teaching assistants, have good communicationskills when interacting with students, staff,' and the public, and be able tomanage the facility's budget. Evening work will be reqUired.

Minimum qualifications are a Masters Degree in astronomy or an astronomy-related area and 2 years of related or the equivalent. The salarywill be in the range $45,040-$74,316/yr. The applications are due by August15 2007 but the position will remain open until filled.

To apply for this position, job # SM517360, submit a UK OnlineApplication at http://www.uky.edu/HR/UKjobs/.Click on the link, then selectthe link "online employment for job seekers" in the upper left corner of thepage. Next click on "search postings" in the upper left corner of the page.Enter "SM517360" in the "Requisition No." line and click on the "search ff

button. The resulting page should say "observatory manager" on the leftunder job title. Click on the "view" link, which will take you to job detailspage. There is a button towards the bottom of the page that says f1apply forthis posting" - that goes to the application form. Our application process istotally electronic. If you have any questions, contact HR/Employment, phone(859) 257-9555 press 2, or email [email protected]. The University ofKentucky is an equal opportunity employer and encourages applications fromminorities and women.

For questions about the observatory director position please contact theDepartment Chair, Prof. Mike Cavagnero. For problems or questionsregarding this web site contact Gary Ferland.

Copyright 2001-2006 Gary J. FerlandFor problems or questions regarding this web contact Gary Ferland.Last updated: July 13, 2007.

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