The UNM Board of Regents began official proceedings to choose the University's next president when it passed the Presidential Search Committee selections during its monthly meeting Tuesday.
The committee is comprised of three regents, three faculty members, one dean, one undergraduate student and one graduate student, one staff member and one alumnus or community leader.
The board selects its candidates through nominations from the Faculty Senate, the Associated Students of UNM president, the Graduate and Professional Association, Staff Council and the Dean's Council.
The committee's members are regents David Archuleta, Sandra Begay-Campbell and board president Larry Willard; faculty members Pope Mosely, Virginia Seiser and Amy Wohlert; School of Engineering dean Joseph Cecchi; staff member David G. Sanchez; ASUNM Sen. Rosalyn Nguyen and GPSA member Beatrice Dominguez-Meiers; alumna Jacqueline J. Baca; and search coordinator Nancy Middlebrook.
The committee will "advise and assist the Board, which has the responsibility for selecting and appointing the President of the University," according to the Charge to the Search Committee in the agenda packet, which the board also approved.
The committee will conduct a nationwide search for applicants and recommend to the board who it agrees are the best candidates for the position.
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Nguyen, the undergraduate representative, said that she is deeply honored by being selected by the regents to sit on the committee.
"It's amazing," she said. "This is one of those once-in-a-lifetime offers."
Nguyen said her job includes bringing in the viewpoint of the "common undergraduate" and the entire undergraduate community.
"My contribution will be to the average student," she said.
Nguyen added that she wants to make sure that the committee finds applicants who will suit the needs of the undergraduate population.
GPSA President Lorena Olmos said during the meeting that she was pleased with the board's selection of the graduate candidate, Dominguez-Meiers. Dominguez-Meiers is currently working toward her doctorate in organizational learning and instructional technologies.
Archuleta, who was appointed to the board in 1997, will chair the committee. Begay-Campbell, appointed to the board in 2001, is a senior staff member at Sandia National Labs. Willard, originally appointed to the board in 1995, is the regional president and chief executive officer at Wells Fargo Bank New Mexico.
Mosely is chairman of the Department of Internal Medicine and has been a UNM faculty member since 1995. Seiser is a reference librarian and women studies selector at Zimmerman Library and has been a UNM faculty member since 1985. Wohlert is chairwoman of Speech and Hearing Sciences and has been a UNM faculty member since 2000.
Sanchez is a senior program manager at the Extended University and has been a UNM staff member since 1991. Baca is president of Bueno Foods and is a member of the UNM Alumni Association.
Middlebrook is the program planning officer for the Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs and has been a UNM staff member since 1998.
The committee will meet by Oct. 31, 2002, and will begin screening candidates and recommending a group of possible finalists to the regents by Feb. 1, 2003.
