IOWA CITY, Iowa — Two months before his surprise hiring as University of Iowa president, Bruce Harreld met with leaders of the search committee and the school’s governing board during a visit to campus.
Faculty critics said Harreld’s visit, confirmed by the university Tuesday, gives more credence to their claims that he may have been the inside candidate for the presidency all along.
“These are disturbing revelations and they suggest a subversion of the search process,” professor Ed Wasserman said. “It raises questions as to whether he was being fast-tracked for this position.”
The Board of Regents on Sept. 3 hired Harreld, a former IBM executive and lecturer at Harvard Business School with no prior experience in higher education administration or ties to the university, to replace Sally Mason. The selection has drawn criticism from students, faculty and staff, who overwhelmingly rated Harreld as unqualified in an online survey after he struggled during a public forum.
Groups representing faculty and the school’s 31,000 students have approved no-confidence votes in the regents, who passed over three finalists with wide campus support and decades of experience running colleges.
Interim university president Jean Robillard, who led the 21-member search committee, said Tuesday that he invited Harreld to speak to top administrators of University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics on July 8 about “transformational change,” his area of expertise. Robillard said that, at his request, Board of Regents President Bruce Rastetter joined him and Harreld for lunch after the talk.
Rastetter was also a member of the search committee and leads the board that voted 9-0 to hire Harreld. He’s dismissed criticism of Harreld’s selection as resistance to change, saying he was chosen for his strategic thinking and success in positions with IBM, Boston Market and Kraft Foods.
