Florida A&M Board Chair Kristin Harper's vision: naming a new president by June 2025
Florida A&M University Board of Trustees Chair Kristin Harper says her "vision" for FAMU's presidential search and selection process is to ideally have someone named by June 30, 2025.
Although a more detailed timeline has not yet been confirmed by the board, the desired end goal means FAMU's 13th president would be in place for the 2025-2026 academic school year.
Trustees met virtually Wednesday afternoon during a retreat for preliminary discussions on next steps amid the university's president transition, where an overview of the Florida Board of Governors Regulation 1.002 — Presidential Search and Selection — was presented.
"Our best next steps are to continue this conversation in September," Harper told trustees. "We will identify and prioritize what's most important to this board as it relates to what the university needs, and therefore what the requirements are for the president."
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Plans for FAMU's presidential search and selection process come after former President Larry Robinson stepped down, which led to interim President Timothy Beard's appointment, where his first day was Aug. 5. Beard will serve in the role for 12 months or until the board completes a search for the university's next president.
Besides FAMU, two other Florida State University System (SUS) institutions with president vacancies are the University of Florida and Florida Atlantic University .
Harper said she has been in "constant contact" with SUS Chancellor Ray Rodrigues , the Board of Governors and its chair Brian Lamb, the Office of the General Council and Artis Hampshire-Cowan — a senior consultant of the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges — to prepare for the Wednesday trustee meeting.
To follow through with the Board of Governors regulation, Harper — as chair — will be responsible for appointing a 15-person search committee, which will include three FAMU trustees, a Board of Governors designee and representatives of the university's faculty, student body and Foundation Board. The appointed chair of the committee will be one of the university's trustees.
The Board of Trustees will provide an estimated timeline for the search and selection process and will also approve the search committee's criteria for the president's position.
"We're going to be looking for a president for Florida A&M, which is the number one public HBCU in the country in the number one university system in the country," FAMU trustee Kelvin Lawson said Wednesday. "So, I want to just make sure that we set our sights high as we look for whomever that next person is going to be."
When it comes to the search committee, its responsibilities will include interviewing a pool of eligible applicants, recommending an unranked list of applicants and selecting more than two final candidates by a majority vote to be submitted to trustees for consideration, Harper said.
In addition, the Board of Governors' guidelines state that only the names of confirmed finalists will be released when they reach the point of being invited by the university's search committee for interviews.
More discussions on establishing a search committee will take place during the board's Sept. 11 and Sept. 12 meetings before completing additional tasks such as conducting a compensation analysis and hiring a search firm.
Contact Tarah Jean at tjean@tallahassee.com or follow her on X: @tarahjean_ .
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FAMU BOT chair hopes to name next university president by June 2025
