The Special Committee on the Nomination of a President will meet today to prepare for interviews with selected candidates.
"The purpose of the meeting is to announce that within the next 15 days the Committee will start having interview meetings with candidates," University spokesperson Carol Wood said.
At its most recent meeting, the Committee reviewed a list of almost 200 potential candidates. It then narrowed the field of nominations to "serious candidates that reflect the qualities and skills that we're looking for in the next president," Wood said.
The search process began in July with the announcement of search committee members, following President John Casteen, III's June announcement that he would step down at the end of his 20th year as University president. Casteen will retire Aug. 1.
Bill Funk of R. William Funk & Associates initiated the search and recruitment process, though the committee did not begin to consider potential candidates until it established a list of qualifications. To help define these qualifications, the committee established a Web site that allowed members of the University community to comment about the search, said Leonard Sandridge, executive vice president and chief operating officer. Additionally, the Committee held five forums in Charlottesville and one at the University's campus at Wise. Both online and in person, students, faculty, and alumni voiced their opinions about what they wanted in the next president.
"That input proved to be critical to the development of the profile for the new president," Sandridge stated in an e-mail. "The engagement of literally hundreds of individuals in the process is impressive."
Student Council President John Nelson and Engineering graduate student Jen Warner were selected as student representatives to the committee and headed a student consultation group, which consisted of 23 other students. In its report to the search committee, the group stated that the University needs a president who understands the distinctive student experience the University provides and someone who will be able to critically evaluate the University's stance and come up with a novel vision for its future.
"In these tumultuous times, the University needs a leader who has the courage to propose innovative and proactive solutions," the student report stated. "The University's leader should understand potential challenges on the horizon, welcome dialogue and criticism, and be prepared to make difficult choices."
While Nelson and Warner collected feedback from students, Faculty Senate Chair Ann Hamric worked to obtain input from several senators and faculty members.
"We need above all a person of courage who is not daunted but energized by the dynamic tensions that currently characterize this University: its unique combination of public mission with private initiative; its commitments to educational breadth and to the rigor and intensity of highly focused research; its dual needs to innovate freshly, even radically, and to sustain its finest traditions," the faculty consultation report to the search committee read.
Moving forward, search committee members will progressively trim the applicant pool. They do not yet have, however, a definite date by which to name the University's next president.
"We have set no firm deadline for completing this work, and we will not rush to a decision," stated John O. Wynne, Board of Visitors rector and search committee chair, in an Oct. 30 letter to the University community. "But we will work diligently on behalf of all who love the University of Virginia ... Once the work of the committee has been completed, it will send its recommendation to the Board of Visitors, which is charged with selecting the University president. When the Board has made a decision, I will write again with the good news"
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