Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz ‘weighing’ leaving UNC for Michigan State presidency
UNC-Chapel Hill Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz is “weighing” a decision on whether to become the next president of Michigan State University following a report that he is the sole finalist for the job.
“I am focused on serving the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a special place I have lived, worked, and loved for 28 years. I am very proud of what our university accomplishes every day as one of the best public universities in the country,” Guskiewicz said in a statement provided by the university. “Through the years, a variety of professional opportunities have been presented to me. My family and I must weigh each one, and we are weighing this one.”
The State News, Michigan State’s student newspaper, first reported the news Wednesday night that Guskiewicz had been seeking the MSU presidency.
The Michigan State Board of Trustees was down to two finalists: Guskiewicz and Taylor Eighmy, who is president of the University of Texas at San Antonio, according to the report. But Eighmy dropped out of consideration, sources told The State News, making Guskiewicz the only remaining candidate.
Guskiewicz has been chancellor at UNC since 2019, filling the role on an interim basis from February 2019 until he was selected permanently as the university’s 12th chancellor in December that year.
Guskiewicz, a specialist on sports concussions, has a long history with the university, becoming a faculty member in 1995. He served as dean of the College of Arts & Sciences for three years prior to becoming chancellor.
UNC System President Peter Hans told reporters after a Board of Governors meeting Thursday that Guskiewicz “has done a good job of leading Carolina through some of the most challenging times in its recent history.”
“And it’s no surprise that he would be on anyone’s shortlist elsewhere in the country to strengthen public higher education,” he said.
Hans did not expressly say whether he had talked with Guskiewicz about him potentially leaving UNC, but said they share “a very strong working relationship” and “talk frequently.”
John Preyer, chair of the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees, said he and his colleagues “wish Kevin and his family well as they consider this important decision.”
Preyer said the board would keep its focus on UNC itself. “The success of our university and the promise of its future is bigger than any one person,” he said. “The momentum and leadership of our state’s world-class university will continue.”
Michigan State has 50,000 students, including about 11,000 graduate and professional school students, according to a job posting for the presidency.
Dealing with controversy as UNC chancellor
Hans said he and Guskiewicz “trade back and forth” a joke on which of them has the harder job — with both leading institutions that have been subject to controversy during their tenures.
“I’m often taken by the amount of attention paid to something relatively minor at Chapel Hill, versus something relatively large at other universities within the system,” Hans said. “And sometimes that is to Chapel Hill’s benefit, in terms of its profile. And unfortunately, too often, it’s an inordinate amount of attention, because we have so many wonderful things happening across the system.”
Upon assuming the interim chancellorship, Guskiewicz inherited a yearslong controversy at the university over Silent Sam, the Confederate monument that stood on campus for more than a century. His predecessor, Carol Folt, ordered the statue removed upon her resignation following years of contentious protests over the monument.
In November 2019, he drew criticism when one of the university’s vice chancellors was part of a controversial deal to settle over the monument with the Sons of Confederate Veterans. That deal, which was later overturned by a judge, would have given the Confederate group $2.5 million to care for and preserve the monument. Guskiewicz told The Daily Tar Heel in 2021 that the vice chancellor worked on behalf of the UNC System Board of Governors in that deal, not on behalf of Guskiewicz.
In more recent years, Guskiewicz has led the university through the COVID-19 pandemic, coming under fire for bringing students back to campus in August 2020 — only for them to be sent home shortly afterward due to rising case numbers.
Two years ago, concerns rose among some faculty that Guskiewicz might be removed from the chancellorship, in part because he supported the hiring of journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones as a faculty member and expressed disappointment when she wasn’t initially offered tenure by the university’s Board of Trustees, The N&O reported. Hannah-Jones later declined the offer to teach at UNC, and the university settled with her over the issue.
This fall, the university had two campus-wide lockdowns after reports about a gun on campus. In the first incident, a professor was fatally shot in a classroom building. Guskiewicz led a campus vigil to honor the slain professor.
This story was originally published November 15, 2023 at 10:01 PM with the headline "Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz ‘weighing’ leaving UNC for Michigan State presidency."
