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General Ohio University Discussion/Alumni Events

Topic: Presidential search

Topic: Presidential search

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Alan Swank
General User

Member Since: 12/11/2004
Location: Athens, OH
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Presidential search

Posted: 2/28/2023 11:55:16 AM

It looks like three candidates will be coming to campus in the next week for a series of community forums. Last week it was announced that four people would be coming so someone has dropped out. Here's a link to what's going on.

https://www.ohio.edu/president/presidential-search

rpbobcat
General User

Member Since: 4/28/2006
Location: Rochelle Park, NJ
Post Count: 3,503

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 2/28/2023 1:39:37 PM

From reading the article in The Post, based on their backgrounds , none of the candidates seem like they'll be a big supporter, let alone an advocate for athletics.

From reading their bio's on their current school's web site, my preference, not that it matters, would be Mr. Mukherjee.

Guy has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering.
That's the toughest of all Engineering degrees.

Also can't believe O.U. limits the Open Forum for each candidate to 1 hour.

Last Edited: 2/28/2023 1:59:05 PM by rpbobcat

OhioCatFan
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 14,016

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 2/28/2023 3:37:40 PM

rpbobcat wrote:

I agree the dude from Marshall appears the best of the lot, and seems more academically oriented. The gal from Louisville would be my second choice, because it looks like she would understand our area and its culture.

The only BLSS Certified Hypocrite on BA

"It is better to be an optimist and be proven a fool than to be a pessimist and be proven right."

Note: My avatar is the national colors of the 78th Ohio Veteran Volunteer Infantry, which are now preserved in a climate controlled vault at the Ohio History Connection. Learn more about the old 78th at: http://www.78ohio.org

Alan Swank
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Member Since: 12/11/2004
Location: Athens, OH
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/3/2023 1:19:34 PM

So any reports from the first forum? I wasn't able to go and did not have OU credentials to watch.

Campus Flow
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Alexandria, VA
Post Count: 4,952

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/3/2023 8:35:48 PM

Susana seems a lot like a McDavis clone with a higher education leadership clone. Younger (55?) and the university would be getting her in her prime. From the west coast might offer new perspective.

Avi is late 50's has diverse experience in business education and likely have thoughts on how to market the school better. He hasn't been a provost particularly long though.

Lori is in her 60's and most part a career provost though briefly interim provost at Louisville. Backround reminds me of Nellis going for the cashout before retirement. Louisville passed over her once before.

https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/education/2022... /

Most Memorable Bobcat Events Attended
2010 97-83 win over Georgetown in NCAA 1st round
2012 45-13 victory over ULM in the Independence Bowl
2015 34-3 drubbing of Miami @ Peden front of 25,086

Alan Swank
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Member Since: 12/11/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 7,022

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/3/2023 10:12:10 PM

Campus Flow wrote:

Not what I asked. Did anyone actually attend the first forum and get a feel for the candidate?

Campus Flow
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/4/2023 12:30:29 PM

Alan Swank wrote:

Campus Flow wrote:

Not what I asked. Did anyone actually attend the first forum and get a feel for the candidate?

I wasn't responding to you only giving my opinion about the candidates in general.

Most Memorable Bobcat Events Attended
2010 97-83 win over Georgetown in NCAA 1st round
2012 45-13 victory over ULM in the Independence Bowl
2015 34-3 drubbing of Miami @ Peden front of 25,086

OhioCatFan
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 14,016

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/4/2023 3:17:22 PM

Alan Swank wrote:

Campus Flow wrote:

Not what I asked. Did anyone actually attend the first forum and get a feel for the candidate?

Disagree on the Louisville gal. She would be my second choice. Guy from Marshall still first choice. Ball State lady a distant third, IMHO. I think she'd be kind of clone of our AD and more into platitudes than actual problem solving and advancing the institution. She's the one, I think, who would be more of the Nellis type hire -- says the right things but is very shallow and doesn't really look into issues in depth.

Campus Flow
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/4/2023 5:00:51 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

Alan Swank wrote:

Campus Flow wrote:

Not what I asked. Did anyone actually attend the first forum and get a feel for the candidate?

I can kind of see a clone of our AD too in Susana. But she has only worked at college towns her whole career. Job would be a challenge from her career level to date but that might mean she'll work harder to make it work. Was at two institutions with nice football stadiums (Oregon St, Ball St) so maybe she'll be ticked off at the state of Peden. Helps to project a diverse image in a growing demographic.

Louisville had some messy presidential hires and I think Lori to an extent is tied to it. At her age it might be a 5 year and out thing. A younger hire in their 50's might put in a full decade like Rod and Glidden both did.

Most Memorable Bobcat Events Attended
2010 97-83 win over Georgetown in NCAA 1st round
2012 45-13 victory over ULM in the Independence Bowl
2015 34-3 drubbing of Miami @ Peden front of 25,086

Bobcat Love
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/5/2023 11:40:46 AM

Ball State, Marshall, and Louisville - Absolutely disgusting.

We have no respect for ourselves.

OhioCatFan
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Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 14,016

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/5/2023 3:09:58 PM

Bobcat Love wrote:

Ball State, Marshall, and Louisville - Absolutely disgusting.

We have no respect for ourselves.

What do you want? Harvard, Yale and Princeton?

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/5/2023 3:36:07 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

Alan Swank wrote:

Campus Flow wrote:

Not what I asked. Did anyone actually attend the first forum and get a feel for the candidate?

Curious how you've reached the conclusion about platitudes vs. problem solving. Something she said in the forum? Or do you have prior knowledge of her and her work?

Deciduous Forest Cat
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Ohio
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/5/2023 4:16:12 PM

OhioCatFan wrote:

Bobcat Love wrote:

Ball State, Marshall, and Louisville - Absolutely disgusting.

We have no respect for ourselves.

What do you want? Harvard, Yale and Princeton?

If we're considering current provost/dean level candidates for president, then yes we should be looking at top schools.

Not impressed with the pedigree here. Doesn't mean they are not good candidates, but it's not a good trend and it's not a good look.

Last Edited: 3/5/2023 4:16:28 PM by Deciduous Forest Cat

OhioCatFan
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Location: Athens, OH
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/5/2023 6:26:31 PM

Well, we've had a mixed bag from the Harvard and the Ivy League IMHO:

John C. Baker (1945�1961), excellent
Vernon R. Alden (1962�1969), mediocre at best

And, one other president with a prestige school and Ivy League background -- Herman Gerlach James (1935-43) -- was also probably one of our better presidents. James held a law degree from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. from Columbia.

It was James who reorganized the university into something resembling its modern form. When he assumed the presidency there were only two colleges -- Liberal Arts and Education. Under Liberal Arts all sorts of disciplines were covered from engineering to economics to languages, fine arts and philosophy. From this mess he created: the College of Arts and Sciences, the College of Applied Sciences (now College of Engineering), the College of Commerce (now College of Business), and the College of Fine Arts. He then took the departments of English, history, mathematics and music as well as other duplicate areas out of the College of Education and put them into one of the new academic colleges.

But, Alston Ellis (1901-1921), another of our finest presidents, was a graduate of a place we don't normally look to for leadership. Ellis secured legislative funding for the university and defeated a proposal to fund only O$U for regular college studies and then only the normal schools at Ohio and Miami. This was called the Lybarger Bill, introduced by a legislator from Coshocton. Where did Ellis receive his undergraduate and part of his graduate education? Of all places, it was That School in Oxford, and I'm not talking England here. He also had graduate and law degrees from O$U and Wooster.

The point of this history lesson? Good university leadership can come from all sorts of places -- from the Ivy league to the backwaters of Butler County. Let's emphasize the person and their leadership qualities and not the school name on their diplomas.

[Note: James was accused by some faculty of being a Nazi sympathizer, though there's little actual evidence of this, and he was the president who started the ROTC program on campus, which was widely criticized at the time.]

Last Edited: 3/5/2023 6:35:55 PM by OhioCatFan

Bobcat Love
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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 9:36:31 AM

OhioCatFan wrote:

Vernon R. Alden (1962�1969), mediocre at best

I had little respect for you before this post. Now I have ZERO. This is at least 40% more stupid and ridiculous than your MAC Shuttle post.

And yes, I think we should aim higher than Marshall for our highest Administrators.

Idiotic.

OUPride
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Member Since: 9/21/2010
Post Count: 562

Status: Offline

RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 9:49:20 AM

Bobcat Love wrote:

OhioCatFan wrote:

Vernon R. Alden (1962�1969), mediocre at best

Vern Alden was pretty bad. He let Miami play him like a stooge, and at the end of the day, Ohio ended up locked into mandatory open admissions like everyone else except Miami. Gross strategic error on what was probably the most significant issue of his tenure.

Bobcat Love
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Post Count: 937

Status: Offline

RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 9:56:28 AM

Nobody did more for this University during their tenure. I can't believe I'm even allowing myself to have this conversation. No wonder you people all want to pull Administrators from the school ranked #299 on the latest US News and World Report list of National Universities. TOP 75%! (We are #182)

Marshall. LOL. What an embarassment.

Bobcat Love
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Post Count: 937

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 9:57:56 AM

Ball State comes in at an impressive #212.....

We are the Village Idiots. Absolutely no standards. Who was running the Search Committee - Swank and Wannamaker?

OhioCatFan
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Member Since: 12/20/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 14,016

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 10:16:29 AM

Bobcat Love wrote:

Ball State comes in at an impressive #212.....

We are the Village Idiots. Absolutely no standards. Who was running the Search Committee - Swank and Wannamaker?

I believe, Sir, those two would do a better job than you would!

OUPride
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Member Since: 9/21/2010
Post Count: 562

Status: Offline

RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 10:35:14 AM

Bobcat Love wrote:

Please tell me what great things Alden did. Particularly the ones that are so great that they make up for his epic mishandling of the selective admissions issue. And don't say that he grew enrollment. He was President in the era when the baby boom wave graduated high school and the era of college deferments from Vietnam. An inflatable sex doll could have sat in his chair in the 60s and grown enrollment.

SBH
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Post Count: 3,747

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 11:28:48 AM

OhioCatFan wrote:

I suspect your lack of esteem for Vernon Alden is, again, due to your loyalty to Marshall, which in the 1960s operated an athletic program that was a criminal enterprise.

Last Edited: 3/6/2023 11:33:11 AM by SBH

BillyTheCat
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Member Since: 10/6/2012
Post Count: 9,454

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 1:15:09 PM

Bobcat Love wrote:

OhioCatFan wrote:

Vernon R. Alden (1962�1969), mediocre at best

100%

Alan Swank
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Member Since: 12/11/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 7,022

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 2:07:02 PM

Bobcat Love wrote:

Ball State comes in at an impressive #212.....

We are the Village Idiots. Absolutely no standards. Who was running the Search Committee - Swank and Wannamaker?

Hey, what did I do? :)

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame
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Post Count: 3,280

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 4:30:37 PM

I get the impulse to recruit away from Ivies and agree that neither Marshall, Ball State, not Louisville seem like schools to emulate.

But I think the fact that OUs President makes ~450k makes recruiting from the Ivies a tall task. For reference, Harvard's President makes ~$1.1m year. Princeton's President makes $945k. And I understand it, that's pre-bonus and incentive comp. Columbia's president had all in comp of 3.3m in a single year (2012). I suspect you have to go pretty far down the org chart at places like that to get to OU President level comp wise.

I'm not gonna pretend to know the ins and outs of the higher education labor market, but I do wonder how attractive this job is for a talented administrator who is progressing at an elite institution.

Alan Swank
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Member Since: 12/11/2004
Location: Athens, OH
Post Count: 7,022

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RE: Presidential search

Posted: 3/6/2023 10:15:23 PM

Bobcat Love's Sense of Shame wrote:

.

In yesterday's Dispatch, there was an article about the to$u presidential search. If found this paragraph to be most interesting:

Given the circumstances under which Dr. Johnson resigned I'm not sure why anyone would find this job appealing," Professor Judson L. Jefferson told the board. "However, because academia is replete with careerists and opportunists, administrators will be lined up to interview for this job."

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