BULLETIN: Kermit Hall to leave USU

ALBANY, N.Y. – Utah State University President Kermit Hall was named president of New York’s state University at Albany on Wednesday.

Hall’s appointment was approved unanimously by the State University of New York board of trustees. He is to be paid $280,000 a year in the new job, according to SUNY spokesman David Henahan.

“Kermit’s experience, academic stature and success will make him a valuable asset to the campus and to the greater community for many years to come,” said SUNY Chancellor Robert King.

Hall was president and history professor at Utah State for four years. Before that he was provost, vice chancellor and history professor at North Carolina State University for two years and was executive dean and a professor of history and law at Ohio State University from 1994-97. He’d also held academic and administrative jobs at the University of Tulsa, the University of Florida, Wayne State University and Vanderbilt University.

Utah State enrolls 23,500 students on eight campuses, compared to about 17,000 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled at SUNY’s Albany campus. His focus there was on improving academics while increasing the freshman retention rate and attracting better students as measured in tests.

Hall succeeds Karen Hitchcock, who resigned in October 2003. She was paid $210,000 a year at the university of 17,000 undergraduate and graduate students.

Hitchcock, who took the university’s helm in 1996, resigned after failing to land the University of Florida presidency and amid reports of discord between her and King, the longtime friend of Gov. George Pataki and his former state budget director.

Hitchcock lost a power struggle with Alain Kaloyeros, the school’s dean of nanosciences and nanoengineering and a strong ally of Pataki, according to the Times Union of Albany. The newspaper first reported Hall’s selection as the new SUNY-Albany president in its Wednesday editions.

In October, the SUNY board approved a plan that could raise salaries for 29 campus presidents by about $100,000 a year over their current average pay. Presidents at SUNY’s university centers in Buffalo, Binghamton, Albany and Stony Brook could be paid between $176,000 and $339,200 a year, under the plan, compared with an average $227,143 before the new salary structure was approved.

In a statement, Utah Board of Regents chairman Nolan Karras said Hall was an outstanding president who has done “much good during his four years at Utah State University.”

Karras is expected to name an interim president in the next few weeks.

“We knew when we attracted him to Utah State that he is a scholar and leader with a national reputation, and that at some point he would be going elsewhere,” Karras said.

In May, Hitchcock become the 18th principal and vice chancellor of Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, where she was also named professor of anatomy and cell biology.

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