UNC-system students and faculty add input to president search at NCCU

Faculty, students and community members showed up to N.C. Central University Thursday to voice their expectations for the next UNC-system president.

The event was the third and largest yet of four regional input sessions in the Board of Governors’ search for President Tom Ross’ successor.

Presidential search committee chair Joan MacNeill said the session had a bigger turnout than those at UNC-Asheville and East Carolina University, and 5,000 responses also came in online.

“It was very candid, it was very passionate, it was very thoughtful. It was really what we needed to hear," MacNeill said.

Several speakers shared hopes for a president who would restore transparency and public trust in UNC administrative boards.

David Zonderman, faculty chair at N.C. State University, encouraged openness in the search process. 

“I think your consultants will urge you to make this as closed as possible,” he said. “It’s antithetical to the principles of universities as open forum.”

Faculty and students at NCCU expressed concern with the lack of diversity in the search committee and how UNC's five historically black schools will fare under new leadership.

“I would like the president to be be inclusive to all universities in regards to funding, resources and opportunities,” said Omari Collins, a senior at NCCU.

Salima Taylor, a senior at NCCU, said she felt that the conversation didn't focus enough on fixing current deficiencies like inequality across the system's 17 campuses.

She said students coming from impoverished backgrounds can feel as if their futures are limited.

"And yet at a university, why continue that?" Taylor said. "Shouldn’t you be able to go outside of that box, those boundaries, and create your own narratives?" 

Taylor said leadership that promotes interaction across campuses would encourage students to dismantle system-wide inequalities in race and class. 

"But if it’s just a silo of just at UNC, just at State, just at Central, you don’t understand, you’re not compassionate about these struggles of HBCUs,” she said.

Izaak Earnhardt, a UNC graduate, said he wanted a president committed to affordability and the University's sanctity as an open marketplace of ideas. 

"The University should remain a place where academic freedom is valued, where professors and students have the capacity to speak out without fear of reprisal,” he said.

Nancy Farmer, a UNC alumna, echoed a common sentiment that a new president should sustain rather than tear down current successful practices. 

“Tom Ross is as close to William Friday as we’ve had in recent years, and I have no information as to the reason to his termination. Please use his qualities as a guideline,“ she said.

Several other speakers also resisted causeless change.

“I would urge you not to fall in love with words like ‘change agent’ and ‘transformative’ that go around a lot,” Zonderman said. “Today most of the faculty would like to know what we’re changing or what we’re transforming.”