Friday, March 06, 2009
By Wendy Gragg
Tribune-Herald staff writer
Baylor University students, faculty and alumni will have a voice but not a vote in the selection of a new university president, officials said Thursday.
Baylor regents announced Thursday that the role of the student government, the faculty senate and the Baylor Alumni Association in the search will be limited to seats on an advisory committee. Last fall, the three groups passed resolutions asking regents for voting rights as members of the presidential search committee.
“Somehow we’re getting hung up on that voting thing, which I really don’t understand,” regents Chairman Howard Batson said in an interview Thursday. “I think we’ve respected the spirit of those resolutions.”
Batson said Southern Association of Colleges and Schools procedures demand that only the board of regents cast the vote for a new president.
“The only way we could have gotten around the voting documents is to let that committee vote, then send it to the board for another vote,” he said. “That just seems like hoop-jumping to me.”
Student government, with one representative on the 10-person advisory committee, is the least represented of the groups on the advisory committee. Student body president Bryan Fonville said the student government is disappointed in the level at which students have been included in the search process.
“The board has signaled, through its selections, which constituencies it considers priority, and the committee’s composition appears to suggest that students are not at the top of that list,” Fonville said. “As the representative organization for Baylor’s student body, we simply want what’s best for Baylor. And what’s best for Baylor is what’s best for students. Today’s announcement is not in the best interest of both Baylor and its students.”
Alumni get 2 seats
Officials with the Baylor Alumni Association, which received two appointments to the advisory committee, also are disappointed with regents’ decision to limit their role. The best outcome for Baylor is achieved if all the stakeholders have a formal voice in the decision, via an official voting role, said David Lacy, alumni board president. The association stands behind its desire for a vote but also is ready to move on with the search, he said.
Lacy said the association hopes to play a part in hiring a president who will support open communication and transparency. Alumni would also like to see all the concerned constituencies, including the board of regents, have better communication with each other than they have had in the past.
“That communication will go a long way in solving problems, some that are real and some perceived,” Lacy said. “The best organizations in any realm are those that have free and open communication up and down the organizational chart, and for that to happen, it has to start with leadership.”
Georgia Green, faculty senate chairwoman and Baylor’s School of Music associate dean, said the faculty senate also would have preferred a search process that included voting rights, but she’s ready to move on and begin the work of finding a new president.
“At this point, talking about the process is not going to help. We move forward from here and use the process we have to make whatever difference we can,” Green said.
Green said she didn’t know what role the advisory committee would play in the search.
“I would hope any candidate the search committee seriously considers as a finalist has the unanimous support of the advisory committee,” she said.
The search process announced Thursday is similar to the process used to hire former president John Lilley, who was ousted in July. Some of the seats on the advisory and search committees are different this time, Batson said.
The current advisory committee includes a Waco community representative, Clifton Robinson, chairman of Specialty Property Ltd., a local philanthropist and an enthusiastic supporter of Baylor 2012, the university’s vision for growth.
Also, this time, all regents were invited to be part of the committee.
“There were regents in the last search who knew less than the advisory committee,” Batson said.
Coming candidates?
Rumors have swirled in the Baylor community that Batson, a West Texas pastor, might pursue the presidency, but Batson would not comment on the subject Thursday.
“I’m very happy at First Baptist Church in Amarillo,” he said.
Batson said he thinks the search for a president needs to be on a national level. But he also said he wouldn’t be surprised if “insiders” from the administration, board and even the faculty apply for the position.
He said interim President David Garland had not expressed an interest in the permanent position. He suggested that for an interim president to pursue the presidency could prove a conflict of interest.
“I think it’s always dangerous territory when an interim is a candidate,” he said.
Batson said there’s no timetable for the presidential search.
“Dr. Garland is doing an outstanding job,” he said. “Things are going well at Baylor. We’re in no rush. We’re in no hurry.”
wgragg@wacotrib.com
757-6901
Comments
By former UT & A&M employee
Mar 9, 2009 12:04 AM | Link to this
When will Baylor's infantile Alumni Association, faculty and students grow up? Take a look at virtually every other university on the planet. What the Baylor regents are doing is exactly in line with what top tier universities do as well its own governing by-laws. The fact that the regents are allowing the alumni association, faculty senate and student government to have a voice is commendable. Stop complaining and start working to build up -- not tear down -- this great institution you claim to love. Methinks you're actually more interested in self-aggrandizing than working for the good of Baylor.
By cfant
Mar 7, 2009 12:49 PM | Link to this
"I don't think the alumni association represents the average alumnus-it appears to be dominated by Reynolds and McCall factions who are quick to run to the press when they disagree with the administration. And I'm not a big Sloan supporter either-he had his good and bad points."
Considering the number of years that McCall and Reynolds served, It would not be surprising if the total number of alumni themselves were "dominated" by those factions. But look at the Board of Regents. I, for one, can not be happy with that group being "dominated," if not virtually unanimously, by the Sloan faction.
"The desire for input is proper, but we don't need the alumni association or the students running the school. Their desire for voting status is pretty disingenuous to me." Why, when by far the majority of top-tier schools do it that way?
I agree 100% with your statement: "No more preachers as presidents! Find an administrator/manager from one of the top schools that Baylor desires to emulate and stop looking inward. The school needs fresh, outside perspective and to get out of the constant Baptist infighting that seems to be part of their tradition. Go top tier in this search." But if we want that kind of president, the Regents had better share the process, or no sane person would walk into this presidency, given the divided state of the campus. This is not a corporation where the board, or the president, can fire all dissenters.
By Baylor Bear
Mar 7, 2009 11:15 AM | Link to this
As an out of town alumnus with above average interest, it has appeared to me for some time that all of the "constituencies" want to be the "chief" and not an "indian". The desire for input is proper, but we don't need the alumni association or the students running the school. Their desire for voting status is pretty disingenuous to me.
I don't think the alumni association represents the average alumnus-it appears to be dominated by Reynolds and McCall factions who are quick to run to the press when they disagree with the administration. And I'm not a big Sloan supporter either-he had his good and bad points. I believe they do more harm to the school's reputation than good and I'm not aware of another alumni association that tries to be so involved in the management of the university. Frankly, I'm pretty sick of hearing from them myself.
On the other hand, Lilley was a terrible choice and PLEASE, no more preachers as presidents! Find an administrator/manager from one of the top schools that Baylor desires to emulate and stop looking inward. The school needs fresh, outside perspective and to get out of the constant Baptist infighting that seems to be part of their tradition. Go top tier in this search.
By cfant
Mar 7, 2009 10:55 AM | Link to this
We are currently in a presidential search at Stetson University. All the constituencies named to the Baylor advisory committee are full voting members at Stetson (where undergraduate students are represented also).
The current Board of Regents continue to pursue the same domination of Baylor's affairs that they showed in cutting the number of board members, ostensibly for budgetary purposes, cloaking their desire to eliminate certain disagreeing members and placing full control in this narrow group--former Sloan backers.
Tokenism, by "listening" to those who have no vote? Hardly an adequate process. The early British colonies in this country had those rights. It led to a revolution.
By Left off the list
Mar 6, 2009 12:47 PM | Link to this
Baylor staff member, do you think you can be any more of a suck up? I'm sure your application is already in his hands.
By null
Mar 6, 2009 10:18 AM | Link to this
Get ready for Bob Sloan #3. We will contiune to lose the Baylor we all knew and loved.
By The way it is....
Mar 6, 2009 10:11 AM | Link to this
Allowing a voice without a vote is simply providing the board of regents the outwardly appearance of fairness and consideration in front of the public spotlight. That's a 'plastic-smile' weak facade of a veneer.
We can "voice" until we're blue in the face. It's what goes on behind those closed doors - those agenda perspectives - that ultimately prevail as our "voice" dissipates into faint and dying echoes in the wake of the board's final decision.
It's the way it has always been structured - without the presently-granted weak facade "voice but no vote" of course. Anyone that has bought into that facade has accomplished the equivalence of purchasing massive amounts of ocean front property with sandy beaches in the Mojave desert from a fly-by-night realty firm. Sorry, Baylor staff member, that's just the way it is in the big picture, but do continue to find solace in your concurrence with the granting of our "voice, but no vote."
After all, that fly-by-night realty firm did say there was sand on those beaches (just neglected to add the fact that the ocean was many, many, many miles away from them).
By Baylor staff member
Mar 6, 2009 9:33 AM | Link to this
Thank you, Dr. Batson, for creating a structure that allows for a great deal of input from all of us who care about Baylor. I agree with you that the Board of Regents -- and only the Board of Regents -- has the responsibility to appoint our next president. You could have simply left the search process in the Board's hands and been within SACS and Baylor's guidelines. But with the advisory group and the web form -- where ANYONE can provide input -- you have shown you want opinions and suggestions from the entire Baylor family. Bravo.
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