MEMORANDUM
May 3, 2007
TO:
FROM:
SUBJECT:
Campus Community
Gary Abramson, Chairman, Board of Trustees, and Chairman, Presidential
Search Committee
Update on the Presidential Search
The Board of Trustees is fully aware that the presidential search process is of great
importance to all members of the AU community and that the university’s constituencies
want the greatest transparency possible in discussing the search process and its status and
timing. To this end, the board brought together a search committee composed of 15 members
representing all the major university constituencies—eight members of the Board of Trustees,
including six AU alumni; the dean of the School of Public Affairs; three representatives of the
faculty, including a member of the Faculty Senate; the president of the Student Government
and the executive chair of the Graduate Leadership Council; and the former chair of the Staff
Council. The committee reports to the board and is charged to present one or more
candidates to the board for review and election as the next university president.
Since our first meeting last September, the committee has been busy, first soliciting and
reviewing proposals from several well-known academic search firms and then selecting the
firm of Edward W. Kelley & Partners. With the advice, guidance, and participation of the
search firm’s consultants, Shelly Weiss Storbeck and Stephen Leo, we held several meetings
in November with the deans, school and college faculty, students, staff, alumni, and
administrators. The campus clearly communicated its desire for a process that cast a broad
net to find candidates who live up to AU’s accomplishments and would help this university
fulfill more of its potential. In late November, the committee developed an extensive position
description and summary of the university—its history, values, academic programs, faculty
and student achievements, etc.—and distributed it to the presidents, provosts, and academic
deans at nearly 1,000 colleges and universities in the U.S. and abroad and to senior officers of
academic organizations and societies across the country. We also publicized the position
widely by word of mouth and published the materials on the university’s public Presidential
Search Web site (www.american.edu/presidential_search). In addition, we established a
successful e-mail address (PresSearch@american.edu), inviting feedback and asking all those
who care about the university’s future to recommend candidates.
As in any search for top talent, some promising candidates were made known to the
committee early on, while others took time to develop. The committee used late December
and the months of January and February to solicit and receive nominations and applications
and also to recruit candidates who did not initially come forward, to ensure both the highest
quality and the most diverse group possible. In the process, we received over 160
nominations and well over 100 applications for the position. For the past three months, the
committee has been reviewing and evaluating CVs and résumés and conducting extensive
additional research on the candidates to ensure our recommendations reflect careful
consideration of the individual qualities we want our next president to reflect. Based on our
publicly shared profile, we narrowed the pool to a shorter list and began the interview process
in mid-April.
We know how important the success of this process is, and so the committee continues to
invest a lot of time in screening, interviewing, checking references, and extending the list of
references beyond those provided by the candidates. At this point, we continue to have
meaningful discussions with a smaller, but not-yet-final number of candidates. We wish to
advance individuals to the next stage only if we think they are of the finest presidential
material. Candidates, too, will rightly want to know they have passed our threshold if they are
to agree to move forward.
When we began the search, we announced that our goal was to reach a successful conclusion
before the end of the academic year, while at the same time agreeing to take as much time as
needed to “get it right.” At this point, with commencement and other end-of-the-year
commitments looming, it is clear that meeting last September’s goal would require
unacceptable compromises. While this is disappointing to us and, no doubt, to those on the
campus expecting the committee to have reached a decision by mid-May, this has occurred
because of positive events: rewarding, ongoing discussions with multiple candidates and the
committee’s desire to conduct extensive background and reference checking related to these
candidates.
The committee has decided that to rush this process to completion using our initial deadlines
would not do justice to the search, the candidates, or the university. We believe we need a
few more weeks, but this additional time will inevitably mean our work will continue beyond
the end of the spring semester. At this point, we should emphasize that our plan remains to
complete our review in the next few weeks and to have the short list of candidates, with their
agreement, meet confidentially with a series of representative groups of faculty, staff,
students, and administrators in late May. These representative groups have been identified by
the members of the search committee in consultation with their constituent groups. To the
extent that individuals who would otherwise have been part of that process will no longer be
on campus, we will work with them to ensure they are still able to participate.
In short, we have been focused on bringing in the best candidates for the groups to
meet—consistent with our mandate from the campus at the beginning—and we thank the
campus community for understanding the positive reasons behind this change of schedule:
that we have a number of high-quality candidates to consider and want to spend the
necessary time to consider each of them.
Finally, the committee is concerned that some individuals are characterizing the search
process as “closed.” As I stated earlier, the committee is made up of university
representatives, most of whom were selected by their constituencies. The committee and its
consultants held more than 15 meetings related to the search process with various campus
groups in the fall. When campus groups asked for additional meetings to discuss specific
issues, the committee gladly obliged. The profile that describes the type of president for
which AU is searching was developed with campus input and made public. Nominations were
solicited from anyone and everyone who cares about the future of American University and
wished to bring a candidate to the committee’s attention.
The committee deliberations have remained confidential, which is entirely appropriate given
the nature of an executive search and the university community’s desire to attract the finest
candidates. Many candidates are sitting college and university presidents, provosts, and
nationally recognized deans who would not apply if confidentiality was not ensured. With this
understanding as a necessary part of the search, the search process itself—from the formation
of the search committee through the campus meetings; the development, distribution, and
posting of the position description; the establishment of an active electronic communication
with the search committee; and updates to the community following committee
meetings—has been transparent and inclusive and reflective of the best means of interaction
that characterize and energize this university.
I hope that you understand that the balance is not an easy one, but the search committee and
the Board of Trustees believe we are operating in the best interests of American University,
and we will continue to do so as the search moves toward its conclusion.