We are very optimistic about the College Board’s selection of Mark Keenum, MSU alumnus and former USDA undersecretary, as MSU’s next president.
Although the real test for Keenum will come in January when he steps into office, his interviews before various constituency groups Wednesday were promising. He seems to have a genuine passion for bringing the university stability and moving forward after eight months of a rather complicated search process.
As a student newspaper that often ran into problems with a two-year administration that severely lacked transparency, we appreciate how openly and honestly Keenum has already dealt with us. He has expressed the importance of interacting with the people of the university, and after being chosen, he first talked to The Reflector before he went on to speak to other papers from around the state, which was an encouraging gesture.
Keenum displays a strong dedication and a clear set of goals. He left prominent positions with the USDA in order to fulfill what he called a dream for being MSU’s next president. Furthermore, this year is Keenum’s third attempt to be given a chance as president, which indicates a high level of interest.
Despite federal and local economic setbacks, his goals include increasing enrollment to 22,000 students by 2015, a 25 percent increase; raising funds for research and pay for faculty; meeting formally and informally with campus constituency groups and turning MSU into a U.S. News & World Report Tier 1 school.
Some have questioned Keenum’s experience in academia and therefore his ability to cooperate with faculty, but we would point out he has a doctorate and, more importantly perhaps, comes from a very different culture than former President Robert “Doc” Foglesong’s background of domineering leadership.
We expect that the presidential search process got it right this time, although we can’t know for sure. That being said, the search process, as we have stressed all year, still possesses serious flaws. It needs to be open and transparent, and the list of potential candidates, not just the name of the preferred candidate, during a search process should be provided to the public. While we believe Keenum to be a nice pick, it could be argued that MSU wouldn’t have had to go through a Foglesong era if we all had known more about Foglesong prior to his being chosen. Perhaps Keenum would have been selected two years ago instead.
Keenum is a young and ambitious individual who wants to tackle a great deal of tasks while at MSU. His wife, Rhonda, is also very impressive and has shown interest in being actively involved with the university. We hope Keenum will be the right person for the job, we wish him luck and at this point, we are considerably positive about the future of the People’s University.
The Reflector editorial board is made up of opinion editor Matt Watson, news editor Carl Smith, assistant news editor Josh Starr, sports editor Brandon Wright, entertainment editor Kyle Wrather, photo editor Bud Sorey, copy editor Aubra Whitten, online editor Adam Kazery, managing editor David Breland and editor in chief Erin Kourkounis.