With another candidate withdrawing his name from consideration, regents at New Mexico State University have three candidates to choose from when they meet today to select the school’s next president.
But, considering that the regents held a closed-door meeting to deliberate on Tuesday and canceled a closed-door meeting scheduled for Wednesday, it’s likely that they made their selection two days ago and negotiated with a candidate who has agreed to accept the job. Today’s meeting is probably a formality and a chance to introduce NMSU’s next president to the public.
Still, the final day before the new president is named wasn’t without drama, as finalist Michael Ortiz, the president of California State Polytechnic University in Pomona, sent a mass e-mail out to that campus stating that he had withdrawn his name from consideration for the NMSU job.
“The outpouring of support we have received over the past couple of weeks has been unbelievably moving. We are privileged to be part of this great community,” Ortiz wrote in the Wednesday e-mail, according to that school’s student newspaper. “In the end, there is so much more we need to accomplish. We are facing the most difficult challenges in our history. To face these we have to come together as a community. Our students are relying on us. This is our fight, and we can’t just walk away.”
Finalist Richard Herman had already withdrawn his name from consideration for NMSU’s top job. Left in the mix are Barbara Coutoure, senior vice chancellor for academic affairs and professor of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln; James Oblinger, professor and recently chancellor at North Carolina State University; and Lisa Rossbacher, president at Southern Polytechnic State University in Marietta, Ga.
As I’ve written, Oblinger has been dealing with scandal at his current school.
The regents meet at 10 a.m. today in the Educational Services Center on the NMSU campus in Las Cruces. The meeting will be webcast live.