UVa panel starts hunt for next president

The hunt is on for the University of Virginia’s next president.
UVa’s 19-member Special Committee on the Nomination of a President held its first meeting Monday as part of its process to find a successor to longtime UVa President John T. Casteen III.

Casteen, 65, who has led UVa since August 1990, announced in June that he will step down as president Aug. 1, 2010.
Members of the search committee said Monday they were honored to play a role in the selection of UVa’s eighth president.
“It might be the most important thing a lot of us have ever done in our lives,” said Gordon F. Rainey Jr., former rector of the university and a member of the search committee. “This is very important — and it’s important to get it done right.”
The search committee will listen to the public at a series of six open forums starting at 10 a.m. today in the Newcomb Hall ballroom and at 3:30 p.m. in the Zehmer Hall auditorium.

Attendees will be asked to answer three key questions:
—What opportunities and challenges do you expect will face UVa in the next decade?
—What qualifications and personal leadership characteristics should UVa’s next president possess to address these opportunities and challenges?
—What other considerations should the search committee bear in mind as it searches for UVa’s next president?
John O. “Dubby” Wynne, UVa’s rector and chairman of the search committee, said UVa is in an excellent position to find the best candidates.
“This is a pretty historic thing that we’re doing,” he said.
UVa, Wynne pointed out, recently tied with the University of California, Los Angeles, as the nation’s No.2 public university in U.S. News & World Report’s annual list of America’s Best Colleges. UVa’s top-tier ranking, Wynne added, comes despite declining state financial support.
UVa also has a widely respected leadership team that is recognized as one of the best in higher education, Wynne said.

And UVa is widely viewed as a special place because of its rich history and emphasis on academic excellence, he said.
“I’m quite confident that we’re going to have a successful search,” Wynne said. “Obviously, the university is in a great position, for a lot of reasons, to do this search.”
The search committee is made up of nine members of UVa’s Board of Visitors, six faculty members, a graduate student, an undergraduate student and two alumni.
Wynne said the presidential search committee is the biggest and broadest in the history of the university, going far beyond what is required by the policies of the Board of Visitors.
Assisting the committee will be consultant R. William Funk and Associates, a higher education search firm that aided in the search for the presidents of Cornell University, the University of Washington, Perdue University and many others.

Bill Funk said at Monday’s meeting that his firm has sent 600 letters to leaders in higher education about UVa’s presidency and will be approaching top candidates as the process moves forward. Ads have started running in several national publications, such as the Chronicle of Higher Education.
“There is no timeline on this search,” Wynne said. “It’ll take as long as it takes to get it right.”
Rumors have already started about possible leading contenders for the job, committee members said, but those rumors are untrue.
“There are no leading candidates,” Wynne said. “There are no candidates. We’re just starting our process.”

A series of forums has been scheduled to allow the public to weigh in on the University of Virginia’s search for a new president.
The forums will be held:
—Today, 10 a.m. to noon, Newcomb Hall ballroom
—Today, 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., Zehmer Hall auditorium
—Sept. 1, 7:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m., McLeod Hall auditorium
—Sept. 1, 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., Newcomb Hall ballroom
—Sept. 12, 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Alumni Hall ballroom
—Sept. 29, 2 to 4 p.m., College at Wise Slemp Center, Dogwood Room