Re: Next President of Liberty University
Posted: February 4th, 2023, 9:15 pm
And anyone who brings that kind of big, splashy GOOD notoriety is likely smart enough to stay away. But maybe it’s been long enough, and tide is turning….
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Purple Haize wrote: ↑February 4th, 2023, 8:03 pmI understand what you're saying now. I guess I got thrown off by how you used the term "notoriety" as by it's very definition always connotates something not good. It would be nice to move out of the shadow of Jerry Jr. and the notoriety that's associated with Liberty and get a solid Christian educator, whether he /she is a big name or not. Let's save the "splash" hires for LU sports.Chippy wrote: ↑February 4th, 2023, 7:00 pmI understand what you are saying but I disagree. If LU wants to be a true National University then it needs to have some (positive) notoriety. In fact due to the little notoriety LU has had recently being negative, I would argue they need a huge splash of a hire that can create positive notoriety, at least in segments LU wants to reach.Purple Haize wrote: ↑February 4th, 2023, 6:25 pmI think we've had enough notoriety.
Not necessarily when it comes to raising money, awareness and notoriety
Purple Haize wrote: ↑February 4th, 2023, 8:03 pmI'm curious what segments LU is wanting to reach in your mind and do those segments care if our president is a relative nobody or not? I could see the argument either way. I'm not sure who would be considered a splash hire in the academic world that would be a good fit. If we tried to go out and hire away an ivy league president we would get an instant spike in credibility in many circles but we would be mixing oil with water.
I understand what you are saying but I disagree. If LU wants to be a true National University then it needs to have some (positive) notoriety. In fact due to the little notoriety LU has had recently being negative, I would argue they need a huge splash of a hire that can create positive notoriety, at least in segments LU wants to reach.
Sly Fox wrote:Perhaps Dave Brat is thinking of his next electoral opportunity. I can't imagine that he'd be the choice for university president. But then again this board keeps surprising us with how far their heads are in the sand. Scott Hicks has to have ridden the LU train well beyond where most would have expected it to take him. I suspect he is focused on maintaining his current role once new blood enters the administration.Dr. Brat is most likely at least under consideration. I’m not sure how he could not be. I’ll stick with what I said earlier. I believe Dr. Hicks is the favorite for the president role and the Chancellor will be Jonathan Falwell.
But keep in mind, this board under Prevo's "guidance" makes the final decisions. Most are not alumni. They typically are octogenerians or close to it. They are not focused on the future but leaving a legacy based on the past.
Are you more worried now after that last paragraph? You should be.
lawdawg2002 wrote: ↑February 5th, 2023, 9:42 am I am beginning to wonder if/when we will start to see some names emerge. My institution has also recently conducted a president search by the same group (they seem to do them all now). Based on our timeline, this should be right around the time a list of candidates is submitted to the search committee to get serious. If anyone has any knowledge of where they are in the process, please share.Dr. Hicks wife has been with LUCOM for some time now.
A couple of things I've noticed lately, Scott Hick's salary was decreased a couple of years ago, but his wife's was increased to the point that they had to report her on the 990. Now she is no longer listed on the business school's website as associate dean. Stacey Rhodes has been promoted to associate dean. David Brat, dean of the business school, has become a lot more active on LinkedIn lately. Is this because he wants to impress the new president or because he is a candidate for president? Maybe I'm reading too much into the timing of these moves, but being in business school administration, we don't see this much movement mid-year. These are the types of moves we make in the summer.
Purple Haize wrote: ↑February 4th, 2023, 9:44 pm I’ll answer your question as simply as I can because I don’t feel like typingOut of curiosity I looked up how both schools were able to reach their current status. Notre Dame already had multiple national championships and became the flagship university for Catholics and Irish Americans by the 1920s long before it started to gain a solid academic reputation in the 1950s. Ultimately it took Notre Dame several decades to go from its football school reputation to what it is today. BYU took a different path than Notre Dame. They've been the LDS flagship since its early days around 1900 since it was the only option but it wasn't taken seriously as a University until much later. They weren't even accredited until the 1940s. I couldn't find as much on them but I would venture to guess it really didn't become a household name outside of LDS circles until the 70s since their rise in football coincided with a rise in academic reputation around that time. Both schools found a long time president that took them from essentially where we are now to academic prominence. Neither of them were necessarily charismatic leaders who got the word out. In both cases they drastically increased academic resources, facilities and improved the quality of faculty. Interestingly BYU specifically took steps to encourage faculty to get post grad degrees from other institutions to reduce their "academic inbreeding" issue which sounds familiar. I think a charismatic leader is always nice but not necessary.
If the goal of LU is to be the ND and/or BYU of the Evangelical World a first step would be for most everyone in the Evangelical World know they actually exist. To this day I still run into quite a few people who should but have never even heard of LU. If you can’t get close to 100% name recognition with your core demographic you have some work to do.
How do you do that? IMO it’s a 2 pronged approach. You need a Big Time Fund Raiser with a Characteristic personality who can get the Word out (sounds familiar). Then you need a person running the Academic side who knows what it takes to run a University. They don’t need to be that dynamic or engaging but that would be nice. They certainly need to be competent and raise the Academic perception of LU amongst the Ivory Tower types. Label one President and one Provost. But it’s time to revamp LU’s image
Ill flame wrote: ↑February 5th, 2023, 4:35 pmND and BYU were well known to their respective Sects apart from football. But it did help. Most colleges outside the Ivy League and a few others (university of Chicago etc) had a huge academic reputation Right now LU is kinda known to its Sect and certainly not respected much academically as a whole.Purple Haize wrote: ↑February 4th, 2023, 9:44 pm I’ll answer your question as simply as I can because I don’t feel like typingOut of curiosity I looked up how both schools were able to reach their current status. Notre Dame already had multiple national championships and became the flagship university for Catholics and Irish Americans by the 1920s long before it started to gain a solid academic reputation in the 1950s. Ultimately it took Notre Dame several decades to go from its football school reputation to what it is today. BYU took a different path than Notre Dame. They've been the LDS flagship since its early days around 1900 since it was the only option but it wasn't taken seriously as a University until much later. They weren't even accredited until the 1940s. I couldn't find as much on them but I would venture to guess it really didn't become a household name outside of LDS circles until the 70s since their rise in football coincided with a rise in academic reputation around that time. Both schools found a long time president that took them from essentially where we are now to academic prominence. Neither of them were necessarily charismatic leaders who got the word out. In both cases they drastically increased academic resources, facilities and improved the quality of faculty. Interestingly BYU specifically took steps to encourage faculty to get post grad degrees from other institutions to reduce their "academic inbreeding" issue which sounds familiar. I think a charismatic leader is always nice but not necessary.
If the goal of LU is to be the ND and/or BYU of the Evangelical World a first step would be for most everyone in the Evangelical World know they actually exist. To this day I still run into quite a few people who should but have never even heard of LU. If you can’t get close to 100% name recognition with your core demographic you have some work to do.
How do you do that? IMO it’s a 2 pronged approach. You need a Big Time Fund Raiser with a Characteristic personality who can get the Word out (sounds familiar). Then you need a person running the Academic side who knows what it takes to run a University. They don’t need to be that dynamic or engaging but that would be nice. They certainly need to be competent and raise the Academic perception of LU amongst the Ivory Tower types. Label one President and one Provost. But it’s time to revamp LU’s image
On another note don't underestimate how big of a difference our move to FBS has already made. 10 years ago I had no idea Liberty even existed let alone heard anything positive or negative about it. Nowadays I meet people pretty regularly that have either attended or are fans of the school to various degrees without stepping foot in Virginia. That's just anecdotal, there's plenty of evidence that the brand is growing. 100% name recognition is awhile off but we are well on our way.
Sly Fox wrote: ↑February 5th, 2023, 5:36 pm Before Haize can reference it, LU has had a guy in the president role who did get the academic world and continues to sit on the board. Sadly he had other flaws.The fact he’s still on the Board says a lot, unfortunately not all good
Here is the profile of the Fairmont State President:
Dr. Dianna Phillips
Not sure I would consider her the gamechanger some have openly pined to discover.
TH Spangler wrote: ↑February 14th, 2023, 7:26 am Need to bring in someone exactly like Dr Falwell Sr. Someone focused on training young Christians and bold enough to call it like it is.There was only one Falwell, Sr. and sadly we will never find another. But even he moderated over the years. Never on the essentials but on what he used to preach against as pretty close to essentials.
Sly Fox wrote: ↑February 19th, 2023, 10:46 am My completely uninformed guess is that CarterBaldwin has completed their search and presented a short list of candidates that the search committee has narrowed down to a favorite or top few. Whomever the Search Committee presents as their top choice will be rubber-stamped by the group because they are notoriously uninformed and easily persuaded by the inner circle. We can only hope they picked outside of the organization and someone who has the temerity to stand up to those who selected him. That's probably a huge ask on behalf of the Liberty community. But I remain cautiously optimistic.Lucy called. Wants to know if you wanna go kick the football around