@vu72 — the alumni site has not been updated in some time. The staff directory still includes a number of individuals who no longer work at the university. Still, a little odd not to announce at least the venue or format of tomorrow’s announcement. New coaches and ADs get tons of fanfare, but not a university president?
I agree with @vu72 here - this seems like an obvious unforced error.
An update that says, "The Board will announce the president-elect at 10:00am Central on Tuesday, December 12. More information will be forthcoming via a press release later in the day. On Friday at 9:00am, the president-elect will meet with the Faculty Senate, followed by a a welcome event with students, faculty and the community at (name the location) at 11:00am. The president-elect will make brief remarks to the public and alumni at 2:00pm, with those remarks live-streamed."
How hard is that? Or does no one think of these things?
Even the always positive VU72 is underwhelmed. Wow. What should a cynic like me think?
An announcement to announce the announcement does seem to be a bit of an over kill regarding the whole transparency thing. Could have just made the official announcement of a name on December 2nd with the schedule of upcoming press events without giving everyone a head's up it is coming.
I think the botched rollout is a symptom of the larger problem that’s plaguing Valpo currently.
A lack of talent working in silos. There are certainly talented people at Valpo but they seem to be the exception rather than the rule. And the talented people are not in leadership positions. Plus you have that fact that much of the old leadership has been shown the door recently.
The new President will need to hire qualified, talented people immediately to turn this ship around.
The "Presidential Search Updates" does mention an announcement on December 2, yet there is no detail. It also is not the "Valpo Stories" page, nor on the "Upcoming Events" page that lists other things happening at VU by day, nor is it on the main university home page.
I get that we don't know who it will be, yet it would have been easy to put something on the calendar,
First and foremost, the new President has to restore enthusiasm, pride, and hope about VU's past, present, and (drum roll) future.
Everything else flows from that. Because if it's about slicing and cutting and rightsizing (I hate that term) VU's path to "sustainability," then we can forget about this presidency and perhaps this university.
Some universities in VU's general category will manage to thrive even during these tough times for higher education, without sacrificing their traditions or their principles. The question is whether VU will be among them.
This is purely speculation, but my guess is that the announcement may announce the person and that he/she is starting July 1st (thus there will be an announcement of an interim president).
"There will be opportunities for our campus community to engage with the president-elect as early as next Friday, December 5, and we look forward to sharing those details soon."
So whoever the next president is its safe to assume they will be on campus this week? Thats my take from that statement.
The fact that the announcement about the new President is tomorrow and that there is zero posted on the Valpo website or alumni site is flat out nuts. Is there going to be a press conference? Will it be online? If not, will the new person face the press at some point and if so, WHEN?
Once again, a most serious announcement like this has been botched and that is giving it too much credit.
Botched?
An email went out to the campus community last week informing everyone to be prepared for the announcement coming on Tuesday. Individual messages have gone out to media outlets setting up individual one-on-ones. I'd imagine the University is going to roll out its own announcement with a video introduction to the President-Elect. Media interviews will take place over the next several days with various outlets, including The Torch, if not WVUR and VUTV.
This was hardly botched. I can't tell you how appreciative I was to get the email last week informing me of when the announcement is coming. That announcement helped provide a little bit of structure into an already crazy week. I've got three classes tomorrow as well as five hours of driving and a Valpo basketball game. That said, I won't be blindsided when the announcement comes. I'll be up and in the office at 7:30, awaiting the news for whenever it comes. I've worked ahead to clear my schedule on everything that is movable so I can dedicate time to this when the news comes down. That doesn't happen if there is no announcement last week.
So whoever the next president is its safe to assume they will be on campus this week? Thats my take from that statement.
A more reasonable assumption is that there will be an online method of meeting the P-elect as it is wholy unreasonable to think they are on campus already much like the many other unreasonable requests some think are standard academia processes mentioned here over the course of 10 hours
Glad to hear PO is pleased with the communications. I don’t agree that the communication with alumni was not botched. Heck, I actually talked to someone in the alumni office who had no clue more than “an announcement “ would be made.
Botched?
An email went out to the campus community last week informing everyone to be prepared for the announcement coming on Tuesday. Individual messages have gone out to media outlets setting up individual one-on-ones. I'd imagine the University is going to roll out its own announcement with a video introduction to the President-Elect. Media interviews will take place over the next several days with various outlets, including The Torch, if not WVUR and VUTV.
This was hardly botched. I can't tell you how appreciative I was to get the email last week informing me of when the announcement is coming. That announcement helped provide a little bit of structure into an already crazy week. I've got three classes tomorrow as well as five hours of driving and a Valpo basketball game. That said, I won't be blindsided when the announcement comes. I'll be up and in the office at 7:30, awaiting the news for whenever it comes. I've worked ahead to clear my schedule on everything that is movable so I can dedicate time to this when the news comes down. That doesn't happen if there is no announcement last week.
Glad to hear that the campus community got an email with more detail and local press has been well-informed - this makes sense. Some more communication to the larger community (even sharing the email) would have been easy to do.
I am amazed at the "experts" who have posted negative comments announcing the new President here that think they are public relations/media pros. Throughout the hiring process I believe the University has kept the constituency well informed. As a number of people who know the ropes as have stated, I also think the University has done a good job of handling this monumental announcement. As many of us know, talk is cheap. As many of us have learned over the years, some people can't wait to criticize... no matter what the topic. GO VALPO!
