The Nevada Board of Regents said they would like a new president in place at the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR) by July 1. The regents met with members of the UNR President Search Committee for the first time last week and discussed the process of replacing outgoing President Marc Johnson.
President Johnson announced his decision to step down to a teaching position in November.
Jason Geddes chairs the Board of Regents and said the selection process should go smoothly: “I think the university has made great strides in the last decade, and I think it will be a very attractive position. We will get a great pool of candidates to pick from and to take this university the next steps.”
Students, though, said the next president will have to tackle some tough issues right out of the gate.
Anthony Martinez is president of UNR’s student government. “I think most definitely having to gain student trust, because we’ve definitely seen a lot of students have issues with the current president," Martinez said. "So I think first of all it’s going to have to [involve] just gaining that, ‘Do you trust me and these decisions I’m going to make moving forward?’ And the students will either be like, ‘yes, no, or show me.’ ”
Members of the search committee said they would like to conduct on-campus interviews with candidates by mid-April.
As a note of disclosure, the license to this station is owned by the Board of Regents for the Nevada System of Higher Education.
Jayden Perez is a junior studying at the Reynolds School of Journalism.
