The Faculty Senate held a special session today, and the following resolution passed 39-23 (and as Tia Mitchell explained, no one in the room spoke in favor of Thrasher's candidacy[1]):
"Be it resolved that we, the members of the Florida State University Faculty Senate, call upon the Presidential Search Advisory Committee not to recommend Senator Thrasher as a candidate for President of FSU. We further call upon the Board of Trustees not to hire Senator Thrasher as the next President of FSU. Senator Thrasher lacks the stated qualifications required for the position, whereas the other three finalists meet those qualifications. We encourage all faculty members to participate fully in the interview process and to submit comments."
I hope that the PSAC and BOT now hear the faculty loud and clear. As one of the interviewees said, the job of an academic leader is very difficult if the faculty aren't behind you. And I imagine it is even more difficult if you've never been in a faculty member's shoes.
I hope that the candidates for president hear the faculty loud and clear as well and know that we are looking forward to hearing from you again next week. This has been a difficult journey, filled with many pitfalls and some new opportunities, but all along we have said that we need an academic leader to help us reach our ambitious academic goals and who values and truly understands shared governance, academic freedom, academic integrity, and tenure.
So I too encourage all faculty members to participate fully in the interview process. I think you will find each of the academic leaders smart, personable, funny, articulate and ready to move us forward into the top 25. That's what the next president of this great university needs to do--in order to make us even greater.
I am, for the first time in this process, cautiously optimistic. This is not over yet, not by a long shot, but we did the impossible once, and the great academic candidates who interviewed during the last two days demonstrate that the long shadow wasn't so long.
