Nationwide Search for Permanent MU Chancellor Announced, Foley Indicates Interest

By Ryan Famuliner

Published December 5, 2016 at 10:31 AM CST

The University of Missouri System is beginning a nationwide search to name the next permanent Chancellor of the University of Missouri campus in Columbia.

Hank Foley has been serving in the role of Interim Chancellor since the resignation of former Chancellor R. Bowen Loftin in November 2015. Foley issued this statement Monday, indicating he will apply to the position in an effort to drop the “interim” title:

“I have been honored and privileged to serve as interim chancellor of Mizzou this past year. The team we’ve built to lead Missouri’s premier public university is strong and uniquely positioned to continue to move MU in the right direction. The opportunity to work alongside our tremendous faculty, staff and students – to grow research, seek new funding models and improve our best-in-class programs — is an honor I’d cherish,” Foley writes. “While it is my hope to continue serving as chancellor, I understand that a national search for a permanent chancellor of this university is necessary, and I applaud and support President Middleton’s and President-designate Choi’s choice to do so. I look forward to participating in the process.”

In a press release Monday, the nationwide search was announced by Interim UM System President Michael Middleton, “in consultation with President-designate Dr. Mun Choi.” Choi will become the next UM System President in March 2017.

“We believe in the tradition of shared governance, and the position of chancellor at MU demands that we honor that tradition by instituting a national search that is clear in its structure and process,” Choi said in a written statement Monday. “A detailed, comprehensive national search befits MU’s status as one of the nation’s top public universities.”

The UM System will hire the the search firm Isaacson, Miller. It is the same search firm that handled the search that led to the selection of Choi in November. According to the release, a yet-to-be-assembled search committee will recommend finalists to Choi.