Kean University, a public university in New Jersey, is in an uproar after the governing board decided to support the president despite finding mistakes on his resumes.

Students walked out of their classes this afternoon in protest of the decision. The 1:30 p.m. walk-out was organized by the Occupy Kean group, which students began last semester as an off-shoot of Occupy Wall Street.

This was just a prelude to a march planned for 3:30 p.m., the start of what’s known as “college hour,” the time when student clubs typically meet. Organizers wanted to accommodate students who could not skip class.

The students were appalled by the trustees’ announcement Wednesday night expressing confidence in president Dawood Farahi’s leadership, in spite of discovering instances— most decades old, they said— where Farahi showed “carelessness” with his resumes.  

The divided board voted 7-4, with one abstention, in favor of the statement. In response, Farahi issued a statement apologizing for the negative attention he brought on the university and took full responsibility for the errors.

Farahi allegedly falsified his academic credentials in a series of deliberate misrepresentations prior to being hired in 2003, according to a recent letter sent to the Kean University Board of Trustees.

In addition, the letter goes on to say that multiple journals, societies and publishing houses Farahi previously claimed had published or presented his manuscripts do not appear to exist.

In various resumes over the years, according to the letter, the university president also claimed he served as Acting Academic Dean at Avila college, but no evidence of his claim could be found.

The federation points out that a number of individuals conducted detailed academic searches of the scholarly literature and found nothing attributable to Farahi.

The Kean Federation of Teachers, which is calling for an independent investigation by the university board of trustees, supplied the information in a letter dated Nov. 29 to the board president.