The Daily Bulletin Archive

From the Chair of the Presidential Search Advisory Committee
The Buffalo State College Presidential Search Advisory Committee has been very busy since our last communication, as has been the case since our formation in spring 2009. I want you to know that I have had the opportunity to participate in the community as a volunteer for over two decades, and I have never had the pleasure to work with a smarter, more committed, more collegial and participative group of people. They have represented you well.

We are pleased to announce the interview schedules for bringing our finalists to campus, beginning January 31 and concluding February 9.

Campus Interview Schedule
Candidate 1: January 31–February 2 
Candidate 2: February 2–February 4 
Candidate 3: February 4–February 6 
Candidate 4: February 7–February 9 
Download the full Campus Interview Schedule (PDF).

First, a brief recap of activities related to the search: I hosted about 20 meetings with a variety of the college’s constituency groups in the spring, and we formed our search committee and began work in earnest in June. We hired our search consultant, Academic Search Inc., in July, and we hosted our search consultant, Jessica Kozloff, for two days in September so that she could learn more about Buffalo State. During Dr. Kozloff’s visit, we developed our recruitment ad and institutional profile. We ran the ad in a variety of key academic publications and Web sites and reviewed many dozens of applicants and nominees during the next few months.

In November we checked references, and in December our committee personally interviewed eight candidates. We will host four finalists on campus. We believe each candidate has the potential to be an outstanding leader as Buffalo State’s eighth president. Please know that the final number of candidates we interview may change, as is sometimes the case with competitive and public searches such as ours.

Our goal is to give the college community broad exposure to the finalists and to garner input from all of you during their two-day visits to campus. More details of the method by which we will collect your input will be provided soon.

Maintaining confidentiality is vital to a successful search process, and I am proud of the confidentiality that has been maintained since the inception of our committee. As you know, we owe that to our candidates first and foremost. It is a reflection of our professionalism and respect for others that we maintain such confidentiality. We will release the names of our finalists, along with their bios, on January 25. We are always mindful that we are both interviewing and being interviewed. We will endeavor to give our candidates broad exposure to our college and the college community during their visits. I am certain that this exposure will only heighten their interest in the position.

Our mission at Buffalo State College is vital to our community and our state. We are the largest comprehensive college in the SUNY system. We are in a fabulous place in our history as a college, poised to move forward and build on the many successes we have accomplished together during the past decade. Please participate and help us select the candidate best suited to lead our college in accomplishing our goals and identifying new opportunities for us to explore in the future.

The recommendations of our search committee, informed in large part by the feedback we receive from you, will be forwarded to the Buffalo State College Council for their consideration.

The College Council is expected to forward to the SUNY Chancellor’s Office their list of candidates (ideally three, per SUNY guidelines), along with a summary of each candidate’s strengths and weaknesses. As you may know, each SUNY president reports directly to the SUNY chancellor. Each recommended candidate meets with the chancellor, and the chancellor makes the final recommendation of a single nominee to the SUNY Board of Trustees. The SUNY Board of Trustees ratifies the recommendation of the chancellor in order to hire a new president. We believe we are on track to have our president hired by this summer. 

I am confident that working with SUNY will be a collaborative and consultative process to the end, as it has been throughout. We have had an excellent working relationship with the Chancellor’s Office since the inception of the search.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me. Again, thank you for your participation, which is so vital to the successful outcome of our presidential search.

Sincerely,

Howard Zemsky
Vice Chair, Buffalo State College Council