System leader search begins

Since UNC-system President Molly Broad announced her pending retirement on April 6, the state has been in an uproar debating who should be her successor.

In recent weeks, the UNC Presidential Search Committee, charged with finding the next president, has been bombarded with names of possible successors.

But the 13-member committee is not seeking names quite yet.

Instead they are looking for qualities that best define the public’s ideal candidate.

Through four public forums held within the last three weeks at UNC-system schools, the committee is quickly discovering what these characteristics might be.

Ray Farris, a member of the committee, said the forums were valuable to the search process and will be considered in the group’s final decision.

“What we heard consistently was the desire of the speakers to have someone who understood North Carolina and its culture, its history and particularly the 16-campus enterprise,” Farris said.

Even though the forums are important to the process, they were hampered by low attendance said Peter Keber, a member of the committee.

“The people that came had a clear point of view, and it was important for us to hear that,” Keber said. “I wish there had been more.”

He noted that one view in particular deeply impacted his thinking on how to conduct the search, prompting a more aggressive exploration of possible candidates.

“(One man) made the point that it was very important to us that we be a search committee,” Keber said, “to be proactive, be searching for the person that would be the best president rather than being a passive collector of information.”

Edward Broadwell, a member of the Board of Governors who served on the search committee that recommended Molly Broad eight years ago, recounted his experience with previous public forums.

“It was rewarding whether in Elizabeth City or in Charlotte that I was hearing concerns of both the professional and public that they wanted the best that we could get,” Broadwell said.

With the conclusion of the forums last Monday, the search committee now moves into a new phase of the process.

They now will attempt to digest the information they have gained and use it to create a profile of the ideal system president, said BOG member William Burns.

“They’ll make a note of all the information,” he said. “Then they’ll get together and they will draw up a … criteria for a president.”

But these are all preliminary movements in the overall search.

The committee still must publish a description of the position and send out advertisements in major publications before they begin to consider candidates.

“We are going to do it as promptly as we can, but we are not going to set a timeline for accomplishing this really major matter,” Farris said. “It’s going to be open, and we have no preconceived ideas of anybody.”

Burns said the committee had much to consider before they could come to a final recommendation.

“It won’t be a hurried decision, there won’t be pressure to hire somebody for the sake of hiring somebody,” Burns said.

“They will be careful and decisive and make sure they get the right person.”

Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.