CHAPEL HILL (Sept. 17, 2020) – The UNC System Board of Governors voted Thursday to give UNC President Peter Hans new power to weigh in on choices of chancellors for the System’s 17 campuses.
Until now, each campus’s Board of Trustees has conducted a search and recommended at least two finalists to become chancellor. The System President would then nominate one of those finalists, and the Board of Governors would vote on that nominee.
After a spirited debate Thursday, the board voted 19-5 for a new policy that would allow the President to recommend as many as two candidates for any chancellor opening.1 After an amendment Thursday, at least one of the President’s candidates would have to be included among the finalists the campus board submits to the System Office.
The new policy also directs the President to develop a pool of candidates within the UNC System. Hans told the board the UNC System would be well-served by cultivating internal candidates to become campus leaders.
“I believe we can develop stronger, deeper pools of candidates,” he said. “I deeply value the important of campus search committees and all their constituencies. That won’t change.”
Board member Leo Daughtry tried unsuccessfully to have the policy sent back to committee for further refinement. Faculty groups, trustees and others had condemned the proposed policy.2
“These institutions could very easily become a dumping ground for worn-out politicians, for old and big donors,” Daughtry said.
“It frankly just puts too much power in the hands of our President. And I just don’t think it’s right,” he said. “It would weaken the (campus) trustees. It would discourage the trustees. And I know for a fact they don’t like it.”
The policy could “emasculate the Board of Trustees and the search committee,” said board member Terry Hutchens.
Potential applicants for chancellor positions will ask themselves: “‘Why am I getting in this race? It’s predetermined,’” Hutchens said.
“Even if it’s just one person nominated by the President, I think that chills the applicant pool,” said board member Art Pope. Though Pope said he thinks the Board of Governors should be more involved in budgeting matters, “I think this is a step too far.”
The board did vote to reduce the number of the President’s candidates that a campus board must forward to the System Office from two to one.
“It’s better than what we had, but it’s still a pig with lipstick on it,” said Daughtry. The move will decrease, rather than increase, the pool of applicants, he said.
Some have speculated that the new policy could be used in the chancellor search at East Carolina University. But board Chair Randy Ramsey clarified that because of its effective date, the policy will not apply to the searches already underway at ECU and Fayetteville State University.
“You have my absolute pledge for a collaborative search,” Hans told the board.
We’ll see. But the debate raised serious issues that bear scrutiny in the next search for a chancellor at a UNC System school.
1 https://www.northcarolina.edu/apps/bog/doc.php?id=64730&code=bog, pp. 7-11.
2 http://pulse.ncpolicywatch.org/2020/09/17/after-intense-debate-unc-board-of-governors-approve-changes-to-chancellor-search-process/.
James says
I agree: “It frankly just puts too much power in the hands of our President”.
Why would the trustees not be more aware of the needs and culture of the University in question? Seems like a power grab that against what we stand for.