PEOPLE LIKED what Michael Lane had to say when he was in Emporia last week as one of the five candidates to replace Kay Schallenkamp as president of Emporia State University.
Apparently, the presidential search committee and the Kansas Board of Regents were impressed, too. The regents hired Lane on Wednesday.
In his public statements in Emporia, Lane was sound on the importance of campus involvement in the community and vice versa. He introduced some interesting ideas about better preparing students to function in the real world.
He was clear and direct in his answers to questions and avoided the use of obfuscating educationalese.
ESU is in good shape right now. Schallenkamp left the campus better than she found it, and John Schwenn, the interim president, has kept things rolling right along.
Another report in Wednesday’s Gazette made clear that Lane is going to need all of his talent as an administrator once he takes the helm on Nov. 1. A regents’ study has tracked the long decline of the state’s financial commitment to its universities. The study indicated that in the past 20 years, state spending on the universities — computed in the study as spending for each student — has fallen by 29 percent.
Broken state promises is not news to Kansas’ universities, but Lane comes from out of state and may not be familiar with the Kansas way of doing things.
But that is a worry for another time.
For now, it is enough to welcome Michael Lane to Emporia and congratulate the search committee and the regents on their hard work and fine choice.
The university and the community also owe John Schwenn their thanks for his leadership of the school over the past few months. He has taken his duties seriously and worked as hard as any president.
The new president is lucky to have him around.