In the next week or two, students at semester schools across the country will finish up exams and head out to enjoy summer vacation. Here at Ohio University, students and faculty members must toil for another five weeks before the end of Spring Quarter. Some might think this unfortunate, but one group is lucky to have that extra time: the Presidential Search and Screening Committee. Although the committee said in November its goal was to name a new president in April, the month of May has arrived without any candidates setting foot on campus -even for interviews, which are all taking place in Columbus.
While getting a few weeks behind schedule might be hard to avoid, the fact that the committee has not yet released the names on the short list is unacceptable. The news release from the last meeting -which took place in Columbus, again -revealed that the committee was conducting follow-up interviews. Follow-up means the list of applicants has been considerably shortened, so no reason exists not to share those names. When accepting applications, the committee said it would not release names to protect the candidates, whose home schools might react unfavorably to their job shopping. While shaky, that argument at least holds a few drops of water. But at this point, with candidates participating in second interviews, they no longer have the right to secrecy. They are now in the running for the top office at a state university, which should subject them to public scrutiny. In addition, it is downright disrespectful for these candidates not to give their current employers at least some notice that they might soon jump ship.
Most schools in the United States finish up soon, so OU's next president likely will announce his or her departure after everyone leaves campus. That hardly seems fair. It would be just as unfair if the OU committee did not meet its goal of presenting candidates to the Board of Trustees before finals week -forcing students to leave campus without an inkling as to the identity of their new president. Students have a right to know at least that.
One rumored presidential candidate, Utah State University President Kermit L. Hall, will have already missed his chance to tell his own students he is leaving if picked to head OU. Utah State finished up commencement exercises this weekend. Luckily, if Hall is a candidate, his bosses already know he is shopping around. Hall recently came in second place for the presidency of the five-campus University of Tennessee system -a post that comes with a $380,000 salary and command of a college system with a budget of more than $1 billion. While Tennessee's system is significantly larger than OU, the presidential search committee should take note of the outstandingly open search procedure in Tennessee. The reason Hall's employers know he applied in Tennessee is because, from the very beginning, all candidates' names were public record.
During the Tennessee search, the university set up a Web site that listed every candidate being considered, and 12 finalists were selected during an open meeting. All interviews were open to the public, in addition to being broadcast on the Web. Most refreshingly, even the committee's votes were public. The remarkably open search was designed because of scandals with past presidents, but it should serve as a model for all university presidential searches. Being frank and honest with students and faculty members is important, and any candidate who wouldn't enter a search because his or her name will be known has no business leading a public institution.
The Tennessee search, which began in the fall, was expensive at $252,000. But OU is also facing a fairly significant expense, especially considering it operates on a budget of $525 million -about half the size of Tennessee's. The university likely will pay search firm A.T. Kearney about $100,000, assuming the new president's salary is about $250,000. (OU President Robert Glidden earns $256,420 per year.) The headhunters get one-third of the incoming president's salary, plus $15,000 for expenses and reimbursement for other costs. Then the committee's expenses will have to be added in: transportation to Columbus for the 13 Athens-based committee members every few weeks for interviews and the candidates' hotel stays and meals, etc. At least Tennessee taxpayers and students could see what was being done with their dollars. Here, students must trust blindly not only that a satisfactory person will be chosen for the job, but also that committee members are not operating carte blanche with public money.
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