The University of North Florida is poised to hire a new president – after its search process resulted in a lone finalist for the prestigious, high-paying job.

If that scenario sounds familiar, that’s because it is. 

Florida’s university and college presidential searches are noticeably anti-climactic, conducted in secret and, more often than not, yield only a sole finalist. 

The public – students, professors and alumni – are only afforded the opportunity to look from the outside in on the final steps, as political appointees on university and college boards interview a single candidate and vote swiftly after. This is a starkly different process than Florida’s open-government laws, intended to guarantee citizens access to every step of a decision-making process, generally allow.

To blame is a 2022 state law that shielded most of the presidential-interview process from public view, legislation that some of its former champions, including the incoming Florida House speaker, now regret. 

Since the law was signed, sole finalists have been selected at the University of Florida (twice), Florida International University, South Florida State College, Polk State College, the University of West Florida, Pensacola State College, and the University of North Florida.

At UNF, the search committee settled on Michael Shannon, who is currently president of the University of North Georgia.

Shannon will visit the Jacksonville campus on Wednesday to publicly interview with the university’s board of trustees, who will immediately hold a vote afterwards on his potential hire. 

If Shannon is selected, his total compensation package is expected to be in the range of $1 million to $1.4 million.

James Beasley, president of UNF’s faculty association, said the fact that Shannon has no competing finalists changes the dynamic completely. 

“We’re not really interviewing him,” Beasley said. “He’s interviewing us, because there’s no one for us to compare him to.”

State education officials say UNF attempted to create a group of finalists, but hit a roadblock: several prospective finalists rejected the idea of an open, public competition for the job. 

Instead, they only wanted to be named a finalist if they were the sole finalist.

“You can’t force somebody to go forward as a candidate if they don’t want to go forward,” said Alan Levine, chair of Florida’s board of governors, which oversees the state university system.

Levine said the reluctance of candidates to compete publicly as finalists is a nationwide trend – few prospective candidates want to return sheepishly to their potentially slighted employer if they don’t land the new job after a public process. 

“That could cause harm to their career, or their relationships at the institution they are coming from,” Levine said.   

That view is no longer shared by some of Florida’s most powerful officials.

In a statement to The Florida Trib, state Rep. Sam Garrison, the incoming House Speaker, expressed regret at the outcome – and pointed the finger at the 2022 law that shrouded presidential searches in secrecy.

“Two things can simultaneously be true,” said Garrison, a Republican from Fleming Island, about 21 miles outside of Jacksonville. “First, UNF Board Chair Steve Moore and Search Committee Chair Jack Boyle did amazing work navigating the Presidential Search Process and deserve a huge thank you.”

“Second, the fact that UNF’s Board is committed to competition, yet still ended up with a sole finalist tells me the current system is broken. I ran the legislation that created this public records exemption for presidential applicants in 2022. It sunsets next year and, candidly, the law can’t go away fast enough for me.”

Even with the current law still in place, Beasley, the UNF faculty president, said the university’s search could have gone much, much differently. 

In March, a faculty group that advises the board of governors, the Advisory Council for Faculty Senates, provided a set of suggested policy revisions to the board, focused on improving the presidential-search process, and increasing competition. 

Among the suggestions: removing the “exceptional circumstances” exemption that allows for a single finalist to go forward, even though the board’s regulations require multiple finalists. 

Instead, the proposed new rule would have stated: “if the search committee cannot move forward two or more qualified applicants, they must meet until they are able to do so. Failure to meet until they do so would constitute a failed search.”

“According to our new language, what’s occurred at UNF would be a failed search,” said Beasley, who chairs the presidential searches subcommittee of the advisory council. 

The proposed revisions would also prohibit the appointment of an “interim” president who is not already a university employee. 

At both FIU and UWF, former Republican lawmakers, who are allies of Gov. Ron DeSantis, were appointed as interim presidents, and then later named the sole finalist for the permanent job.

But in the six months since the council provided its recommendations to the board of governors’ chairman, Levine, and to its system chancellor, Ray Rodrigues, the matter has never once come up for a public vote. 

Twice, Beasley said, faculty were told that the board of governors would publicly discuss their suggestions – and then the agenda item got postponed. 

“We’ve had two searches since that have had another sole finalist,” Beasley said. “That creates a culture of mistrust and uncertainty.”

Levine said he wants faculty to be involved in reshaping the presidential search process, but he doesn’t support the proposed changes that faculty suggested back in March. 

“Anything you do to put a limitation on the choice is just that, it’s a limitation,” Levine said. “You don’t limit yourself.”

Regarding the faculty suggestion to prohibit external “interim” presidents, as a way of reducing outside political influence, Levine said politics has always cast a long shadow over Florida’s public university system. 

“This is not new,” Levine said. “Ron DeSantis is not the first governor to be involved, or express preferences, or encourage the boards of trustees to pick certain candidates.” 

Shannon, the lone finalist for the UNF job, has said he is “honored” to be considered for the position. 

But if Shannon is ultimately hired, he may have to work hard to win over some skeptics. 

Anonymous faculty comments at UNF, submitted recently to an online portal, show that some professors remain extremely upset about the entire process. 

“Another “sole” candidate for the top job at UNF?” wrote one faculty member. “Why did UNF’s Board of Trustees spend tens of thousands of dollars for a search firm if this is the best they can do?”

Said another: “How did the committee come to just one candidate for the role of the next UNF president? Such a lack of choice suggests either that UNF couldn’t attract a broad and diverse set of finalists or worse, that the committee has been pressured to push forward one person who might appeal to a far-right BOG.”

Michael Vasquez is an investigative reporter at The Florida Trib. He can be reached at michael.vasquez@floridatrib.org.