Single finalist being considered for University of Arizona presidency

A single finalist will be interviewed to be the next president of the University of Arizona, the state Board of Regents announced early Thursday.

Suresh Garimella, the current president of the University of Vermont, will be interviewed by the regents on Friday morning.

The board is expected to vote immediately after the private interview. The announcement comes just one day after the board voted to begin interviewing finalists.

“The board and search committee were impressed by the exceptional caliber of prospects aspiring to lead the University of Arizona into a new era of excellence,” Cecilia Mata, who chairs the board said in a statement. “After a thorough search process, Dr. Garimella displays the visionary leadership qualities, and a record of distinguished scholarship necessary to lead the U of A into its next chapter.”

There was no formal timeline for the search, though at the beginning of the process there was discussion about moving quickly given competition with other universities like the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill.

UA President Robbins announced his impending resignation this past spring, saying that he would stay on until his successor was named, or until June 2026 when his contract formally ends. His resignation announcement came after many faculty, staff, students and community members blamed him for the university’s financial crisis. Earlier this year, the UA announced it was facing a $177 million deficit. The UA is predicting that by the end of next year, it will be reduced to $53 million.

Garimella isn’t expected to start straight away if the regents vote to offer him the position on Friday. He still would need to negotiate his departure from the University of Vermont. Sources told the Star that he will most likely begin his tenure closer to October.

The lone finalist is currently on campus and meeting with various constituencies.

Garimella is a mechanical engineer and assumed the presidency at the University of Vermont in 2019 after serving as executive vice president for research and partnerships at Purdue University.

Born in India, to parents who did not attend college, Garimella earned his bachelor’s degree from the Indian Institute of Technology before receiving a master’s from Ohio State University and a doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley in 1989.

Garimella was named a Jefferson Science Fellow by the United States Department of State in 2010 during the Obama administration and in 2018 was appointed as a member of the National Science Board by the Trump administration.

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It was “hard to beat” Garimella’s qualifications, Joellen Russell, a distinguished professor in geosciences at the UA and a member of the presidential search advisory committee, told the Star.

“How can you beat a sitting president at another land grant university who is also in the National Academy,” Russell said with enthusiasm. “ I am thrilled that the board listened to our recommendations and did such a great job of landing a fantastic for president.”

All 18 members of the search committee were unanimous in their recommendation to the board to pick Garimella.

“Working at public universities like the University of Vermont and Purdue, you don’t make as much money as you would make if you went to work at a private,” Russell explained. “He serves the way we all do here at the University of Arizona. He serves his state and the nation.”

Russell defended ABOR only interviewing one. If all of the finalists were deans or provosts, she said, it would be easier to bring multiple to campus. But to be strongly considering a sitting president at a different university makes things more complicated.

Garimella, Russell said, fulfills “all” of the qualities that they were looking for.

“He just knocks it out of the park,” she said. “He’s absolutely at the top of his field.”

The fact that, as president at the University of Vermont, he still teaches consistently was also appealing.

“He’s really dedicated to students and student learning,” Russell noted. “I find it hard enough to get to my classes and I’m just a department head, let alone being president of the whole university where (you) really are supposed to sacrifice research to support us. But he didn’t sacrifice his contact with students, and that was just for us, so important.”

While at the University of Vermont, Garimella did face criticism over instituting cuts and terminations of select humanities programs, according to an article written in the university’s student newspaper in 2021.

And, according to the VTDigger, Garimella’s administration faced pushback for its response to a Department of Education investigation into antisemitism on campus and over the cancellation of a planned guest lecture by Palestinian author Mohammed El-Kurd.