This story originally published online at NC Newsline.

UNC-Chapel Hill Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz will become the next president of Michigan State University, according to sources at Michigan State directly involved in the decision.

On Thursday morning the university announced a special meeting of its board of trustees for Friday at 8 a.m. The meeting, which will be livestreamed, includes a personnel action. The university will be making no official comment on the action before the meeting, a university spokesperson said early Thursday.

Members of UNC-Chapel Hill’s Board of Trustees told Newsline they had been given no official word of Guskiewicz’s decision as of Thursday morning.

Guskiewicz’s candidacy for MSU’s top leadership position was first reported by that university’s student newspaper, The State News, last month. Since acknowledging he was weighing taking the position, Guskiewicz has fielded pleas for him to stay from faculty members, students and at least one UNC-Chapel Hill Trustee. Top UNC System leadership, including UNC System President Peter Hans and members of the trustees, have also called the MSU presidency a good opportunity for him and say they understand why he may decide to take it.

The revelation Guskiewicz had applied for the presidency at MSU took faculty members, students, alumni and even the UNC-Chapel Hill board of trustees by surprise. His name was leaked as one of two finalists in a search process MSU trustees have described as compromised and “botched.” The other finalist, University of Texas at San Antonio President Taylor Eighmy, dropped out after the leak.

“Of course, there’s politics involved”

A trustee at MSU told Newsline this week the leak and its impact on the search process could be a poor way for Guskiewicz to begin his tenure at the university, with some questioning whether he would have been the final choice in a traditional and confidential search.

That trustee asked not to be named so that they could discuss confidential board discussions and the search process.

At Michigan State, university trustees are directly elected in partisan statewide races rather than appointed by the legislature or a system-wide board of political appointees, as they are in North Carolina. Both systems have been criticized as overly politicizing their universities. While Guskiewicz has butted heads with his board of trustees at UNC-Chapel Hill and the UNC System Board of Governors, MSU has had a series of very public scandals that has contributed to the university cycling through six leaders since 2018.

“I would say that our board is very fractured, with different factions and conflicts,” an MSU trustee told Newsline this week. “It’s very public and can be very embarrassing.”

In October MSU Board of Trustees Chair Rema Vassar faced calls to resign from faculty members and even fellow board members as she underwent an investigation into alleged unethical conduct.

While Guskiewicz has navigated a series of controversies and leadership conflicts since becoming UNC-Chapel Hill’s interim and then permanent chancellor in 2019, members of the UNC System Board of Governors and UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees told Newsline this week Michigan State may not be dramatically different.

“If you want to sit there and question whether or not there’s politics involved, us versus Michigan?” said Marty Kotis, a trustee at UNC-Chapel Hill and former member of the UNC System Board of Governors. “Oh, my gosh. I mean, if you’re sitting there running for your office, of course there’s politics involved.”

“I think what people should be looking at is if the chancellor is applying for a job at Michigan State, with all the dysfunction that it has there, I don’t think board really makes a big difference,” Kotis said. “I think a lot of times the chancellors are looking at the underlying university. So, I don’t think it seems to be putting him off there, the issues that Michigan State has. So really, in the grand scheme of things, what does that mean really? How much does it really impact somebody’s decision?”

Looking toward a new leader

Since Guskiewicz’s possible exit was first reported last month, much attention has been focused on a possible successor.

UNC System President Peter Hans will name an interim president while a search committee, including representatives from the student body and faculty, is formed and tasked with recommending candidates for the position. The university’s board of trustees will then send Hans an unranked slate of at least three finalists, from which he will choose one to present to the UNC System Board of Governors for a vote.

UNC-Chapel Hill trustees and members of the board of governors tell Newsline they’ve heard persistent rumors the interim may be UNC-Chapel Hill Provost Chris Clemens, UNC-Chapel Hill Trustee Malcolm Turner or UNC Board of Governors member Lee Roberts.

Any member of the board of trustees or board of governors would have to resign their board seat in order to become chancellor either or on an interim or permanent basis. As of Thursday, no member yet head.

Members of both governing boards told Newsline they dismiss rumors that Hans has already decided on the permanent chancellor before the search committee has already done its work. Faculty members, students and alumni are already questioning whether Roberts, who has no administrative experience in higher education but is politically well connected as a one-time budget director for former Republican Governor Pat McCrory, will be chosen simply because his politics align best with the Republican dominated legislature and its political appointees on governing boards.

“I think it is way too early for anyone to be saying a decision has been made, and I can tell you I haven’t been part of any discussions about this yet,” a member of the board of governors told Newsline this week.

That board member also said it’s too early to dismiss candidates based on their past experience.

“I think one of the things we’ve seen the last few years is higher education is changing and there’s more acknowledgment that good leaders can come from outside of academia,” the board member said. “They can come from the business world, the military and from politics, too. I think that a lot of the conflict you sometimes see between administrators and our boards comes from the fact they don’t see things the same way, they don’t necessarily have the same world view and values. I think that’s as big a problem as anything.”

Hiring chancellors from outside of the world of higher education — even chancellors with little or no experience with higher education outside of political appointments — could alleviate some of that tension, the board member said.

“The truth is, the people elect our state leadership, and they appoint us to these board positions,” the board member said. “If our chancellors better reflect the mission and the direction of the universities as we see it, if we choose leaders who are on the same page, that’s not a bad thing.”

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