On Wednesday, Michael Gottfredson will start his role as University of Oregon’s president. And given the turbulence of the past year and a half, we thought it important to focus on just what the UO president will be in charge of in what should be another important year.
For background, Gottfredson was selected on June 11 by the Oregon State Board of Higher Education as the sole finalist for the position and officially named on June 15, with his start date then scheduled for Aug. 1. He replaces interim President Robert Berdahl, whose plan from Dec. 28 was to only serve until mid-September 2012 or until a permanent president was selected.
A recent guest commentary in The Oregonian from Berdahl said a few things that should guide Gottfredson’s term in office. Berdahl, who has voiced support for institutional boards in much of his term, summed up most of the recent developments in Oregon’s education system before arguing for what he would like to see come out of the 2013 Oregon legislature.
“While President Ed Ray does not prefer an institutional board for Oregon State University, he agrees with (Portland State University president Wim) Wiewel and me that greater institutional flexibility is required to meet Oregon’s statewide goals,” he writes. “Gov. John Kitzhaber, the State Board of Higher Education, legislators from both parties, and business and community leaders have all expressed support for moving ahead with the establishment of institutional boards.”
Berdahl points out here, and we emphasize, that Gottfredson’s term will begin with one of the biggest debates facing the UO and how it deals with the larger university system.
We’ll go one further to argue that Gottfredson’s legacy — how his term in office will be perceived by future generations — will depend on how much autonomy the UO can get through an institutional board.
And that means it’s crucial you pay attention.
Because it’s clear that enough students had not and, not surprisingly, were taken aback by former President Richard Lariviere’s overnight firing.
Also, not to be forgotten, the faculty’s successful attempt to create a union is not that far in the rear-view mirror. Starting on Wednesday, Gottfredson will be working with a faculty senate that has made its stance on shared UO governance quite clear. The presidential transition will have a lot to do with how the UO drafts policy going forward.
On the other hand, we don’t know a lot yet about our 17th president. Before accepting this position, he was the provost and executive vice-chancellor at the University of California, Irvine, joining Berdahl as former UC administrators to take the position. An academic in the field of criminology, he co-wrote a book, “A General Theory of Crime,” before taking administrative roles.
Ultimately, we’d like to get to know Gottfredson here, as we’d like to get back to some stability in that role. Since 2008, students have had four different people in that office in Johnson Hall: Former attorney general Dave Frohnmayer retired in June 2009 after a 15-year term, preceding the train of Lariviere, Berdahl and now Michael Gottfredson.
With all there is to consider about tuition, student loan debt and the inner workings of how athletics and academics should interact, on some level, we’d like some kind of stability in that position.
“The 2013 Legislature should act to complete the educational reform it began in 2011,” Berdahl wrote. “It should enact measures necessary to enable its major universities to be governed by institutional boards.”
We agree, and we hope to see leadership from our new president on this issue — as long as it’s not joined by a stubborn persistence that would cause history to repeat.