Finalist for UNM presidency touts executive experience
University of Idaho boss tells of boosting transparency, graduation rate
Charles “Chuck” Staben isn’t going to pretend that the University of New Mexico and the University of Idaho are carbon copies.
UI, where Staben is now president, and UNM, where he wants to be president, do have similarities, he said. Both are what he called the “major” research institutions in their respective states, and they each have high concentrations of firstgeneration college students.
But UNM is based in the state’s largest city and not a college town. It has twice as many students as UI, a large health sciences system, and a far more diverse population.
And those are some of the reasons Staben wants to make it his new home.
“There are challenges,” Staben said about UNM, “but there are great opportunities as well.”
Staben is the latest of five UNM presidential finalists to visit Albuquerque. He hosted an open forum on campus Tuesday, after previous appearances by David Brenner and Anny Morrobel-Sosa. The remaining two, Garnett Stokes and Kenneth Kaushansky, will visit next week.
Staben on Tuesday discussed what he sees as potential solutions to some of UNM’s existing problems and his experience fostering change at Idaho. The only sitting president in the finalists’ field, he also acknowledged the position’s limitations and the importance of collaboration, describing his leadership style as “open-door.”
“I’d like to be president, but I would never be able to do these significant things by myself,” he said to a crowd of about 90. “It’s really the people in this room working together to get these things done.”
Staben spoke about UNM’s financial difficulty, saying he does not anticipate dramatic improvement in state funding, which has been dwindling. He suggested UNM identify other ways to generate revenue, such as bolstering tuition by recruiting more higherpaying out-of-state and international students.
“What we need to do, frankly, is to take on some responsibility ourselves beyond perhaps what we’re used to taking on,” he said about UNM’s financial health. “We need to be enterprises less dependent on state funding and that could address some of our own issues.”
While UNM has doubled its fouryear graduation rate to nearly 30 percent over the past five years, Staben expressed confidence that it has much room for improvement, particularly in its six-year rate. During six years as provost at the University of South Dakota, he said, the six-year rate jumped 10 percentage points. He said the school worked to identify roadblocks, adding that it re-engineered its entry-level biology class, which many students failed. At UI, Staben hired someone to explore and implement proven student success initiatives used elsewhere.
Staben said he has tried to make Idaho a more transparent institution, inviting faculty and staff into the budget-making process, and welcoming interaction with employees, students and other members of the community. He mentioned several groups with whom he has direct contact, from university retirees to a council that represents Idaho’s Native American tribes. In response to tribal input about their members’ limited advancement opportunities in the fishing industry, UI put its fisheries science program online to improve accessibility, he said.
“If there is one really huge surprise to me about being a president, it is the amount of communication one needs to do. I guess I didn’t appreciate that when I became president,” he said. “Maybe you’ll get lucky and inherit a president who’s been trained up on this should I get this job — but, basically, you have to work at communication; you have to work at transparency.”
The candidate also mentioned the turmoil in UNM’s athletic department, which has prompted investigations by the New Mexico Attorney General and the Office of the State Auditor and new oversight by the state Higher Education Department. Athletics remains a small financial piece of the university puzzle, he said, but a major part of its public profile. He said he sees the forthcoming state auditor’s report and the changeover in athletic directors as a chance for a fresh start.
“It’s probably a great opportunity to turn a new leaf and ensure you operate your athletics program with integrity and to the benefit of the university,” he said.
Forum attendees asked about Staben’s experience fighting campus sexual assault and addressing free speech.
Under his watch, Staben said UI upped the level of sexual misconduct training around campus and added to its investigator ranks in the Office of Civil Rights.
He acknowledged that Idaho has not hosted controversial speakers such as Milo Yiannopoulos — who visited UNM earlier this year, prompting protests and big security bills — and he has not had to respond.
“I guess I can’t give you a better comment than freedom of speech is one of those critical freedoms,” he said. ‘It’s almost central to the way the university acts.”