Tufts' presidential search committee is determined to choose University President John DiBiaggio's successor before the end of the academic year, according to various committee members. But with commencement less than a month away, committee chair Trustee Irwin Heller will not provide any information about the remaining candidates.
"Confidentiality is crucial in this whole process," Heller said yesterday.
The committee will meet next week to discuss the finalists and could choose the new president at that time. But Heller insists the executive committee of the Board of Trustees, which will ultimately make the decision, is not pressuring his committee to replace DiBiaggio by May. "We don't feel ourselves under any pressure to conclude," he said. "If we don't find the right person we have no hesitancy in putting it off."
In December, following a community-wide e-mail from the search committee, hundreds of nominations were sent to Linda Dixon, secretary to the board of trustees.
Each of the approximately five finalists are high-level administrators at one of the top schools in the nation, and some participated in the presidential searches of Harvard, Princeton, and Brown universities.
Although DiBiaggio insists he will remain at Tufts next year if asked by the Board of Trustees, the search committee seems intent on choosing the new president and disbanding before the summer.
"We have great candidates, and it's not too far away until the trustees are going to be given the search committee's recommendation," said Catherine Squires, a professor of microbiology at Tufts' medical school. Squires is one of four faculty representatives on the 12-person search committee. "The trustees hope we will be finished by the end of academic year, so we're trying to work on that schedule," she said.
Most committee members referred all questions to Heller.
"People who become interested in these jobs are very protective of their privacy," said William Sellers, a trustee representative on the search committee. Sellers, a dentist in Reading, MA, would not comment on the remaining candidates.
"I know some institutions are very public, and some are less so, and we tend to be less so," said George Ellmore, an associate professor in the department of experimental plant anatomy and morphology.
Ellmore, who has been at Tufts since 1980, remembers the DiBiaggio search in 1991-1992, and defended the secrecy with which Tufts has conducted its newest search. "Any sort of secrecy is nothing more than discretion," he said.
Committee members say that quality candidates would potentially withdraw from the search if their names were made public, since many candidates do not inform their current employers that they are seeking other jobs.
"Some of these people have not yet informed their institutions," Heller said of Tufts' presidential candidates.
Lee Bollinger, president of the University of Michigan, was a finalist in the Harvard search but was eventually passed over for Lawrence Summers, the former treasury secretary. Since returning to his post at Michigan, Bollinger has been at the heart of speculation concerning the presidential search at Princeton University and other schools, but has pledged not to seek the presidency of another institution.
"To reveal identities in any way would jeopardize the entire process and could threaten our ability to make the best choice," Trustee Joyce Barsam wrote in an e-mail. A French professor at Northeastern University and member of the search committee, Barsam would not discuss the remaining candidates.
"The final stages of a search are obviously the ones requiring the most confidentiality and sensitivity," she said.
Yesterday, all Tufts' search committee members would say was that the finalists are qualified candidates. "Tufts will have a terrific president," Squires said.
According to Heller, if Tufts cannot conclude its search by May, the new president would not come to Tufts mid-year, but rather begin work in the fall of 2002.
"The industry norm is that you try by may to make an announcement that you're leaving by the end of the summer," he said.
