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MSU Moves Forward With Presidential Search, Nassar Survivors Not Included

Morgan McCaul speaks to MSU Trustees photo
Scott Pohl
/
WKAR-MSU

Michigan State University has named a search committee to find a new president.

The school has been under fire since hundreds of women said they were sexually assaulted by former MSU sports doctor, Larry Nassar.

Since then, the school’s longtime president, Lou Anna K. Simon resigned and controversial interim president John Engler has taken over.

The 19-member search committee includes MSU professors, deans, Board of Trustee members, and students.

None of them are Nassar survivors.

MSU Trustee, Joel Ferguson is on the committee. He didn’t bode well with Nassar survivors after he vocalized his support for former president Lou Anna Simon and said in a radio interview in January that, "There’s so many more things going on at the university than just this Nassar thing."

Co-chairs of the search committee pointed out that Nassar survivors did not reach out to be part of the committee.

MSU also didn’t extend an invite either.

Capital Correspondent Cheyna Roth says some students and faculty have concerns about trusting the university to pick a new president.

“They are concerned that their voices have been silenced in the past. I’m thinking specifically of the appointment of interim president John Engler. Faculty and students really wanted to have an input in the interim president but then they said that the board just went ahead and picked somebody that they never would have chosen.”

Roth adds that the presidential search committee will hold listening sessions to hear from the community.  

Before becoming the newest Capitol reporter for Michigan Public Radio Network, Cheyna Roth was an attorney. She spent her days fighting it out in court as an assistant prosecuting attorney for Ionia County.
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