Piper Hutchinson | Louisiana Illuminator
The committee tasked with finding LSU’s next president will hire a Louisiana firm to guide its search.
At its first meeting Tuesday, the search committee announced it would work with SSA Consultants of Baton Rouge with the aim of finding a candidate by the end of the year. SSA’s experience primarily involves recruiting executives for the finance, general business, construction, health care, nonprofit and public sectors.
The committee will meet three times this fall before submitting its recommendations to the LSU Board of Supervisors, which has the final vote on who will lead the LSU System and the Baton Rouge campus. The search process hopes to forward three and five finalists for the board.
LSU Board Chairman Scott Ballard said he hoped the new president could start at the beginning of the spring semester next year, though he said the start date could change depending on who is ultimately hired.
The committee is tasked with finding a replacement for former President William Tate, who left earlier this year to take the same job at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Since Tate left, LSU Vice President for Agriculture Matt Lee has served as interim president.
SSA Consultants president Christel Slaughter said some of her firm’s work related to the search will be subcontracted to Eric Monday, executive vice president for finance and administration at the University of Kentucky. Monday, who was formerly LSU’s chief financial officer, has been rumored to be interested in being LSU’s next president.
Several people have already expressed interest in the LSU presidency, Slaughter said, but ads will be placed soon to allow candidates to formally apply.
Among those rumored to be interested in the position are Lee, McNeese President Wade Rousse, who has the support of LSU Board Vice Chairman Lee Mallett, and Republican U.S. Rep. Julia Letlow.
This is the first leadership hire at LSU since Gov. Jeff Landry, with the legislature’s support, gained control of choosing the chairs of the state’s higher education system board. Since Landry took office in January 2024, he has moved to steer college curriculum and faculty governance to the right.
Slaughter has ties to conservative politics in Louisiana. She is on the board of the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry, and state campaign finance records show she has primarily donated to Republicans. They include former LABI CEO Stephen Waguespack, who ran unsuccessfully against Landry for governor in 2023.
The search committee members are:
- Scott Ballard, LSU Board of Supervisors chairman
- Lee Mallett, LSU Board of Supervisors vice chairman
- Valencia Sarpy Jones, LSU Board of Supervisors past chair
- Rémy Voisin Starns, LSU Board of Supervisors past chair
- James Williams, LSU Board of Supervisors past chair
- John Carmouche, LSU Board of Supervisors
- Blaise Zuschlag, LSU Board of Supervisors
- Ben Bordelon, Bollinger Shipyards president and CEO
- Clarence Cazalot, LSU Foundation Board of Directors
- Paul Coreil, LSU Alexandria chancellor
- Greg Feirn, LCMC Health CEO
- E.J. Kuiper, Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System president & CEO
- Pete November, Ochsner Health CEO
- Roger Odgen, LSU Foundation Board of Directors
- Emily Otken, LSU Health Sciences Center Shreveport student, former LSU Board of Supervisors student member
- Kenneth Schafer, LSU Boyd professor and Ball Family distinguished professor
- Ryan Theriot, Former LSU baseball player and CEO of Parrish Construction
- Daniel Tirone, LSU A&M Faculty Senate president, associate professor
- Bill Windham, Shreveport-Bossier businessman
- Olivia Phelps, former LSU Staff Senate president