This isn’t presidential finalist Meredith Hay’s first time as a top five finalist in a UNM presidential search, but she says she’s better prepared for the job this time around.
In 2007 she made it to the final five in the presidential search that ended with President David Schmidly’s appointment.
Hay said during her on-campus meet and greet with students and staff Tuesday that now she’s better suited to being UNM’s next president after helping the University of Arizona manage a $180 million cut in state appropriation during her tenure as provost there.
She said she is confident she can apply what she learned in Arizona at UNM. UNM’s state funding has been cut by $63 million over the past three years.
However, Hay’s cost-cutting measures at the University of Arizona made her less than popular with the university’s faculty.
After 60 percent of faculty voted “no confidence” in her leadership in 2009, then-University of Arizona President Robert Shelton reassigned Hay to a newly created position of “special adviser for strategic initiatives.”
Arizona Faculty Senate Chairwoman Wanda Howell told the Albuquerque Journal that Hay did not equally distribute budget cuts across university departments, which led some faculty to feel underappreciated.
“I think that it’s wrong to send the message that she flunked out of the University of Arizona,” Howell said. “She didn’t mesh well with our culture. I don’t know what kind of implication that has for the University of New Mexico. …. She’s a very talented woman; I can say that without reservation. She just occasionally has issues with how she gets the job done.”
Hay said UNM has great, unrecognized potential.
“I think the sons and daughters of the state of New Mexico deserve a high-quality research institute like UNM,” she said. “The fact you’re a minority-majority serving institution is an asset that hasn’t been leveraged, and can be leveraged in ways you haven’t even dreamed of leveraging it yet.”
She said she will make sure budget cuts don’t affect UNM’s cultural centers.
“At Arizona, we have had an LGBTQ support center for many years and haven’t cut funding even in the most difficult financial situations,” she said. “All of our cultural centers are important for student and faculty success, so I am committed to that and would not want to change it.”
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
Hay said collaboration between faculty, students and staff is paramount for the University’s success.
“Shared governance is the cornerstone of any great American university,” she said. “If UNM really wants to move forward and engage in that shared vision of the future, then everybody has to be at the table.”
