UAB ready to secede from BAMA

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BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- The Faculty Senate of the University of Alabama at Birmingham on Thursday voted no-confidence in President Ray Watts following his decision to kill the school's football program, which had its best record in a decade last fall.

Watts has come under harsh criticism for shuttering the program. However, the vote is largely symbolic since only university trustees have the power to fire him. The group also approved a resolution supporting NCAA athletics on campus.

"Football is important to most universities. Football allows students, particularly undergraduate students, to get the full experience of what college life is like," Business school professor Philip Musa said after the meeting.

The move to disband the program in the college football-crazed South became a flashpoint for some UAB students and faculty who felt like they were being treated as a stepchild of the main Tuscaloosa campus, a national football powerhouse. Spectators wearing the school's green jerseys applauded and chanted "UAB" after the vote.

Former student Mitchell Miller, 27, carried a sign that read "(hash)FreeUAB -- It's not about the U or the A. It's about the B."

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