Richard Lariviere, the University’s final candidate to replace President Dave Frohnmayer, appeared at his second and final public forum Wednesday to introduce himself to the campus community.
The talk in the EMU Ballroom was more well-attended than the Tuesday evening discussion, but lacked significant student participation. Members of the faculty and administration, however, attended in decidedly high numbers.
Lariviere is currently the senior vice chancellor and provost at the University of Kansas, and his last day at KU is expected to be June 30. Oregon University Chancellor George Pernsteiner said the Oregon State Board of Higher Education will not officially hire Lariviere until Friday morning. However, KU Chancellor Robert Hemenway has already replaced him.
Joseph Steinmetz, dean of KU’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, has been named interim provost at KU, according to an article published Tuesday in the Kansas newspaper Lawrence Journal-World.
Although KU seems to have accepted its provost will leave for Oregon, Pernsteiner said Lariviere’s visit to campus is certainly more than a formality. “This is a real session,” he said, adding that all comments about Lariviere will be taken seriously.
To that end, Pernsteiner said all the comments he has heard have been positive and that people on campus have thanked him for the 25-member presidential search committee’s choice.
In Wednesday’s forum, Lariviere touched on many of the topics he discussed during Tuesday’s forum. He expressed his admiration for the University, referring again to its “bread-and-water diet” when it comes to state funding and also praising the autonomy of the athletic department.
Lariviere spoke about the relationship he hopes to build with the student body. He said he’s impressed with the level of organization and sophistication of student groups on campus. Communication is easiest when there is agreement between both parties, he said, but emphasized his hope communicate openly with students on points of contention as well.
As dean of the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Texas at Austin, he received several student awards, he said. Lariviere said he counts those among the most meaningful he has received in his career.
Money plans also permeated Lariviere’s address. He said he intends to continue pursuing fundraising for the University and praised both Campaign Oregon and the continued efforts of the campus community to fundraise further.
Lariviere also said he hopes to encourage fundraising for humanities departments as well as the sciences. Sometimes, he said, it is easier to sell the sciences because it is more obvious what they do, but the humanities are equally important.
“It’s easy to put a price tag on a piece of equipment,” he said, but added that the University must learn to do the same thing for humanities studies.
The audience’s reaction to him was mixed. Karen Scheeland, public and governmental affairs coordinator at the University, said, “I think he’s very articulate, very personable.”
She admired his confidence and sense of humor, she said, and thought he addressed most questions directly.
Senior Tiffany Koc felt differently. “I thought he gave a lot of vague answers,” she said. Lariviere didn’t clear the concerns of most members of the audience, she said.
Senior Matt Rose said he had hoped to hear more about diversity, but thought the likely new president had spoken well overall. “I was pretty pleased,” Rose said. He particularly admired Lariviere for admitting when he didn’t know the answers to technical questions about the inner workings of the University.
It seems likely he will need to know those answers by July 1, the day the new president will begin working at the University.
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