Should the chancellor of Alabama's two-year college system be required to have an advanced degree, as the college presidents must? Or is executive leadership experience more important, given the system's growing emphasis on work-force development?
The State Board of Education is torn over those questions, with some members rejecting a draft announcement for the position that requires only a bachelor's degree, along with a minimum five years of senior-level management experience.
It does say a graduate or earned doctorate is preferred, but to board member Mary Jane Caylor of Huntsville, that simply won't suffice.
"That would be, I think, very embarrassing for the board and the state to put out an advertisement for the chancellor of Alabama's two-year colleges and only require a bachelor's degree. That's embarrassing and unacceptable," Caylor said Friday.
"A master's at the least, and strongly favoring an earned doctorate from an accredited institution should be considered," she said.
The board will vote on the requirements at its monthly meeting Thursday and also is scheduled to select an executive search firm to assist in the national hunt for Bradley Byrne's replacement. Byrne, who has a law degree, led the system for two years and resigned last month to run for governor in 2010.
Presidents at Alabama's 25 community colleges are required to have at least masters' degrees but nearly all have doctorates. Board members who are opposed to the minimal requirements said it wouldn't be right to demand less of the person who will be their boss.
"How are we requiring presidents and folks who teach in our colleges to have more academic training than we're requiring for the person at the top?" Ethel Hall of Fairfield asked.
And Ella Bell of Montgomery said she's worried the low requirements purposefully havebeen tailored to fit those of possible candidates that some already have in mind.
"I would surely have to believe that based on what we require for our executive level management staff," she said, adding that more than half of the department's staff would be eligible under the proposal.
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But Randy McKinney of Gulf Shores, who helped shape the draft, said he favors the proposed plan because the chancellor's role involves much more involvement in the business and training world than it used to, and academics are no longer its sole responsibility.
"I'm looking for leadership skills. I mean, technically someone can have a doctorate in something that's not even related to management of people and they would qualify," he said.
"We have millions of dollars that we oversee in workforce education and adult training and those things are a very different skill set than someone who is trained to be an academic leader of an institution," he said. "That's why this has more the look and feel of a CEO with several different segments under that organizational structure."
Besides, McKinney said, "Bill Gates wouldn't even be able to be a chancellor" if the degree requirement was raised.
"And I would submit to you that Bill Gates probably has the skill set to be able to do that," he told his fellow board members.
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