With the chancellor finalists visiting this campus during finals week, it’s pretty likely that few students will make it out to any of these meetings. So, if you don’t mind, I’d like to give my impressions of the candidates, starting with College of Letters and Science Dean Gary Sandefur.

Bottom line: Nothing impressive today. Sandefur seems like a nice guy, but too softspoken and non-committal.

During the press conference, most of his answers were vague enough not to arouse any follow-up questioning:

How will he handle the Legislature? Said he wants an open dialogue between his office and the Capitol so that it doesn’t just seem like we pester them when we want something. Probably a good idea, but I wonder if his tone will change at all when forced to deal with people like Nass and Suder head on. Plus, let us not forget that the sociology department was targeted by Nass as being a left-wing teaching unit. Sandefur is a sociologist by training, is he not? I doubt they’ll be picking daisies together, regardless.

As for private fundraising, he seemed up to the task, noting that as dean of the College of L&S, he already spends about 30% of his time fundraising anyway. Didn’t realize it was that much.

Our new news editor asked a question about Plan 2008, but Sandefur seemed to have little to say on the subject. He noted the success of the PEOPLE and Posse programs, but there was nothing specific mentioned.

In fact, when someone asked during the press conference if he had any specific plans or visions (other than tearing down humanities) for the university, he didn’t really have anything to say.

However uneventful the press conference was, the student “reception” provided at least one or two highlights.

First off, it was a sign of how nervous this committee is about the search process. When discussion got a little more heated and some tougher questions were asked, not only was it stressed by the people handling the event that “this is not a public forum” but I was told to turn off my camera in the middle of the discussion. I refused, but still seemed to unnerve the people in the room from the search committee.

As for the questions asked by the 8 or 9 students who showed up…
Ashok Kumar came with one question: If the student workers wanted to unionize, would you recognize that right? Sandefur didn’t exactly answer that question, saying he would have to see if the workers had a significant desire to organize in this way, but he said he definitely supports a group’s right to organize for purposes of collective bargaining.

“I understand there might be some benefits for students, but there might also be some downsides too that we want to make sure…”

Ashok: “Like what?”

Sandefur: “Well, I don’t know! I’m just saying it’s something you’d want to look at and think about and talk about before you just plunge ahead.”

Ashok: “Well, it’s good to hear that you support unions.”

Sandefur: “Well, it’s easy to say!”

One person asked him how he would redirect funds from federal grants to non-science departments like the arts and humanities. Sandefur says that the arts and humanities are very hard to direct federal funding toward these areas, but that what he wants to do is direct private gifts and foundations’ support toward the humanities.

After this, Erik Paulson tries to remind the people there that this is not a “hammer-the-candidate” style open forum and it’s intended to be one-on-one personal experiences to give some idea what the issues are (the same thing Suchita attempted to tell me in order to get me to shut my camera off).

Kumar interrupts at this point to try and argue that this event was billed as a question-and-answer session and says that he’s going to “keep on asking questions.” Paulson tries to stress the individual nature of this “reception” again, but is cut off by an unidentified man to my left:

“I think you’re actually treading on some kind of dangerous ground and I would just trust that the people would ask questions that Dean Sandefur would be able to handle…and if it’s a difficult question, I’ll help him, because I’ll stand up for Dean Sandefur whereever he’s at.”

There’s one more question asked about the “Republican” Legislature and another question from a few band members about how there was so much scrutiny for them but doesn’t seem to be that much with the fraternities considering what they’ve been accused of.

He doesn’t give any groundbreaking answers. Repeats his previous Legislature answer and says that the hazing situation should be guided by our set guidelines and leadership of these institutions. *shrug*

I leave as he’s going over Plan 2008 again, saying he believes in the “legal justification” for diversity. What? Is that to assume some colleges practice an illegal justification?

All in all, I look forward to seeing the other candidates throughout the week, but if one thing needs to be improved, it’s letting the students ask what they want to ask and allowing the reception to take more of a public forum style. Just because the candidates “can’t commit” to anything during this time doesn’t mean they don’t have ideas that would help us decide between one and the other. And furthermore, the students aren’t even making the ultimate decision, so why are you so concerned about them asking tough questions of an individual who might indeed become their next chancellor?

Carolyn “Biddy” Martin tomorrow. Video compilation of the candidates will be posted at the end of the week.

Edit: According to Mr. Oliveira Jr., PEOPLE program is more directed at minorities than Posse. Posse is not even funded through Plan 2008 and is more about a diverse group of student leaders, but it is not specific to minorities. PEOPLE is funded through 2008.