Michigan State University Board Chair Brianna Scott said Friday that President Kevin Guskiewicz’s departure for Clemson University was “devastating” but “completely avoidable.”
Scott told The Detroit News that she placed the blame squarely on the “unfettered” behavior of several of her fellow trustees, echoing what Guskiewicz said in his Wednesday goodbye message to the campus community. She said “three trustees” used their positions to undermine Guskiewicz and made it impossible for him to effectively lead the university.
“I can’t think of any other institutions, whether that be public or private, that would have to deal with what he had to deal with and put up with it,” she said.
Guskiewicz and Scott did not name the trustees. But the former MSU president said he was “appreciative” of the five trustees who approved a revised board Code of Ethics and Conduct in line with what “national governance advisors have said are best practices for university boards.”
Trustees Rema Vassar, D-Detroit; Dennis Denno, D-East Lansing; and Mike Balow, R-Plymouth, opposed the revised code.
“Michigan’s popularly voted elected constitutional officers do not surrender their First Amendment rights as a condition of service,” Vassar said at the May 17 special online meeting. “A prior restraint on the political speech of elected trustees on matters of direct concern is constitutionally suspect on its face and it demands independent review.”
Balow told The Detroit News that he had a good relationship with Guskiewicz and that “I did not cost MSU its president in no way, shape or form.”
Scott and the rest of the board will now face an uncertain summer. She said the transition timeline for Guskiewicz’s departure and the naming of an interim president is still to be determined. The board will also have to figure out how to put differences aside to show the next leader of the university that the board’s dysfunction won’t make it impossible to lead, she said
But Scott couldn’t say she didn’t know this was coming.
“I suspected that given his expertise, his background, that he would be considered an attractive option,” she said. “Last year I was starting to get worried about him leaving due to issues with the board, maybe last fall. … There were considerable communications where he has engaged with trustees explaining his frustrations, multiple conversations. … We were well aware of his frustrations.”
The next leader of MSU
Scott didn’t name any candidates the board is considering or who had expressed their interest in the role of interim president.
Guskiewicz would likely stay in the role for a few months, she said, and the board wasn’t rushing to start a presidential search.
“Things are ever-evolving. We have not collectively met to share our thoughts,” Scott said. “The first thing is to sit down and engage with each other on where we are and where we need to go. … We need to determine what the transition will look like and what the timeline is going forward.”
The board hasn’t committed to paying the next president the $2 million, which was what the board offered to Guskiewicz at a May 17 board meeting to try to convince him to stay, the board chair said.
“He didn’t take it,” Scott said about Guskiewicz. “The idea was that we were going to get donor funding for him, and that his salary increase wouldn’t come out of the general fund. After the meeting, (Trustee) Sandy Pierce indicated that several donors were willing to pay to keep him. … This is something we were doing to try to retain him.
“I can’t say we were going to start off there for the next candidate,” she continued. “I’m not committed to the two million, but I am one vote out of eight.”
Scott couldn’t say what specific qualities she’d like to see in the next president, but said she hopes they continue the initiatives Guskiewicz started and pointed to the Green and White Council, the Williams Scholars program and the Spartan Bus Tours.
“I hope these will be sustained to continue the momentum of the transformational things he’s done as president,” she said. “We have so much to be proud of that he was able to start.”
satwood@detroitnews.com
This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Guskiewicz’s exit ‘completely avoidable,’ MSU board chair Scott says
Reporting by Sarah Atwood, The Detroit News / The Detroit News
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