Will UVA's new president survive? should he?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If he had any sense of decency he’d offer to let them do a proper search.

Which would make him a more viable candidate.

This is insane. The council determined the hiring approach, not Beardsley. He doesn't get to decide that they have to do another layer of vetting.

So you acknowledge the hiring approach was politically motivated and abnormal?

No, of course not. It's just nuts that you're trying to hold him accountable for a process that he didn't determine.

Perhaps if he had better educational credentials, he would be able to recognize a flawed process.

You people are ridiculous. He was wildly successful both professionally and as the dean of Darden. There was no outrage then or calls that he wasn't qualified. He has an engineering degree and an MBA from MIT. You want some academic with with no practical operational or fundraising skills? That is what the job calls for - to be a leader, not an academic.

You act like these are either-or things, like you can be a clueless academic or a leader. Actually you can be both, and you see both in the presidency of every top 25 school/SLAC (and almost all of the other t50-75 schools)…just not UVa. Which is embarrassing for UVa, to have a president with a diploma mill, pay to play degree. Yes, it is one,even if it’s from Penn.

Beardsley has an MBA from MIT. Ryan had a JD from UVA.

Just a jd is fine for a top uni president who’s a legal scholar. There are no top uni presidents with just an mba. Beardsley has an mba + two yr pay to play Ed.D., which isn’t much better.

All false. if you had bothered with wikipedia you would know that Beardsley has a

1) BS from Tufts in electrical engineering
2) a MBA from MIT's Sloan School of Management
3) a Doctorate from Universityof Pennsylvania in higher education management (which is what this job is)
4) and will receive a M.Phil from Oxford this year for his work in A.I.

But he doesn't have a Ph.D. in comparative literature, so he could never run a multi-million dollar, complex enterprise like a university and related health system.

Yes, he was only Dean of Darden, one of one of UVA's most successful schools, which raised $650M against a target of $400M in the recently concluded campaign. I don't know why he would be considered.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If he had any sense of decency he’d offer to let them do a proper search.

Which would make him a more viable candidate.

This is insane. The council determined the hiring approach, not Beardsley. He doesn't get to decide that they have to do another layer of vetting.

So you acknowledge the hiring approach was politically motivated and abnormal?

No, of course not. It's just nuts that you're trying to hold him accountable for a process that he didn't determine.

Either you're completely delusional or not responding in good faith.

The firing and subsequent hiring were clearly abnormal and politically motivated.

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/politics-elections/2025/11/14/jim-ryan-breaks-silence-uva-resignation
"Ryan wrote that UVA soon received an inquiry about why it was slow to dismantle DEI.

“The letter asked us to explain why we hadn’t complied with the Board’s resolution, though it exaggerated the scope and nature of that resolution, suggesting—as had Governor Youngkin on television—that we were supposed to eliminate the entirety of DEI,” Ryan wrote. “It was unclear, and still is, why the United States Department of Justice would have the interest or authority to enforce a resolution of the Board of a state university as opposed to enforcing federal law.”"

"“The rector, the vice rector, and others on the board conspired to oust Jim Ryan, and they made the decision to leverage pressure from the Department of Justice in order to enact that ouster,” Matthew Hedstrom, a religious studies professor, said in Friday’s Faculty Senate meeting."

https://facultysenate.virginia.edu/resolution-on-the-presidential-search-timeline

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/governance/executive-leadership/2026/01/07/uva-presidential-hire-raises-process-concerns
“The presidential search, problematic from the start and resulting in this appointment, represents the Board’s continued failure to engage in authentic shared governance with the faculty,” the UVA chapter of the American Association of University Professors wrote in a Tuesday statement. “To accept the result of this tainted process and its appointee as legitimate would be to turn a blind eye to the misfeasance that has reigned at the university since March.”

Ann Brown, co-chair of Wahoos 4 UVA, a nonpartisan group of alumni, students, parents and other constituents, told Inside Higher Ed that she had concerns about both the process and the legality of the search.

“It was an improper search because it was initiated by a board that is not in full compliance with Virginia law,” said Brown, a UVA law graduate, citing the five vacancies."

"Youngkin stocked the state’s Boards of Visitors with multiple conservative donors and former politicians, stamping politics directly onto university oversight. "



Beardsley didn't have to accept the job and/or he could have made a statement about the flawed process.

+100

Thank god Spangerberger appointed a bunch of apolitical moderates to right the ship.....

Is this sarcasm???

They are a mix of Ds and Rs. None that are anti-Democracy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If he had any sense of decency he’d offer to let them do a proper search.

Which would make him a more viable candidate.

This is insane. The council determined the hiring approach, not Beardsley. He doesn't get to decide that they have to do another layer of vetting.

So you acknowledge the hiring approach was politically motivated and abnormal?

No, of course not. It's just nuts that you're trying to hold him accountable for a process that he didn't determine.

Perhaps if he had better educational credentials, he would be able to recognize a flawed process.

You people are ridiculous. He was wildly successful both professionally and as the dean of Darden. There was no outrage then or calls that he wasn't qualified. He has an engineering degree and an MBA from MIT. You want some academic with with no practical operational or fundraising skills? That is what the job calls for - to be a leader, not an academic.

You act like these are either-or things, like you can be a clueless academic or a leader. Actually you can be both, and you see both in the presidency of every top 25 school/SLAC (and almost all of the other t50-75 schools)…just not UVa. Which is embarrassing for UVa, to have a president with a diploma mill, pay to play degree. Yes, it is one,even if it’s from Penn.

Beardsley has an MBA from MIT. Ryan had a JD from UVA.

Just a jd is fine for a top uni president who’s a legal scholar. There are no top uni presidents with just an mba. Beardsley has an mba + two yr pay to play Ed.D., which isn’t much better.

All false. if you had bothered with wikipedia you would know that Beardsley has a

1) BS from Tufts in electrical engineering
2) a MBA from MIT's Sloan School of Management
3) a Doctorate from Universityof Pennsylvania in higher education management (which is what this job is)
4) and will receive a M.Phil from Oxford this year for his work in A.I.

But he doesn't have a Ph.D. in comparative literature, so he could never run a multi-million dollar, complex enterprise like a university and related health system.

Yes, he was only Dean of Darden, one of one of UVA's most successful schools, which raised $650M against a target of $400M in the recently concluded campaign. I don't know why he would be considered.

He’s hugely successful at UVA. I sat with two liberal emerati (profs) at a dinner last week who think he’s not only brilliant for UVA but has been brilliant at fund raising

He has four advanced degrees, the doctorate in ED goes to exactly the kind of management position that President of UVA holds, on top of an MBA from MIT. And je will receive a degree in artificial intelligence from Oxford this year.

He is apolitical, which makes this whole thread bizarre.

There’s no story here.

The UVA Board of Visitors met last week and did nothing to rescind this decision . Everyone is quite pleased.