The recently completed in-person listening tour brought out many people concerned about many issues at Rutgers.
Who is going to be the next president? What’s going on with the athletic department? Is the school a safe place for those of different religious beliefs or for free speech?
And is college even worth it anymore?
Amy Towers, who began her term as chair of the Rutgers Board of Governors on July 1, listened carefully to all concerns and offered a note of optimism in return.
“We’re OK,” she would say. “We’re in a stable place. The house is not on fire.”
There is a plan.
Towers, in a 90-minute interview with ROI-NJ, detailed all that is going on at Rutgers, from the four searches that are underway or will be shortly (for president, chancellor of Rutgers-Newark, general counsel and athletic director) to how the school handled a campus uprising last spring amid of a wave of antisemitism (better than almost everyone else) to why she is confident there is enough time to make those four hires by the start of next school year to why she feels Rutgers is in a good place today – and will be in a better place tomorrow.
It starts with leadership, Towers said.
“We have had people who stepped into these roles willingly, with gravitas, humility and courage,” she said.
“Jeffrey Robinson stepped up as interim chancellor in Newark. He is beloved.
“We had John Farmer come in as interim GC. He’s a former AG; he’s great.
“We have Ryan Pasarri as interim AD. He’s been fabulous.
“And, of course, Jonathan (Holloway) is still serving as president.
“We are an institution that grows leaders. And we have very ably and capably put wonderful people in those places. We are stable. We’re leading through the challenges; that’s a big statement.”
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The challenge remains steep. And it starts with the search for a new president, the reason for the recent listening tour (and the online listening events that are continuing).
The tour has provided insight into what the community feels the university should do in its search, Towers said.
“There are themes that are already emerging,” she said. “People want someone who’s a good communicator. They want somebody who appreciates a multi-campus university.
“And they want somebody who unifies our campus under the state university banner while preserving individual culture and characteristics of New Brunswick, Camden and Newark.”
Being from New Jersey is not a prerequisite, Towers said.
“We’re not putting any parameters on this search,” she said. “You’re not better or worse because you’re from New Jersey. You’re not better or worse because you are a president or a provost – there are no limiting factors.”
And even though the search figures to be shorter than most of this nature since Holloway did not announce his intention to leave until the middle of September, Towers said the search will not be rushed or compromised.
“Our listening tour took two and a half weeks instead of two and a half months – is that going to make a difference,” she asked.
“When I was interviewing search firms, no one felt nine to 10 months was an unreasonable time to do a search. Nobody said, ‘This can’t be done.’
“So, I don’t think we’re behind the eightball at all.”
Towers said the school will have a position prospectus by the 20th of December – or before Rutgers goes on academic break – and then the search firm of WittKieffer will go to market after the first of the year.
“We gave them eight weeks,” she said. “If you’re not finding a candidate in eight weeks, you’re not finding them.”
The search for a new chancellor in Newark (and Robinson has said he does not want the position full time) will be led by Isaacson Miller – and essentially follows the same timeline as that of the search for the president.
The search for a new general counsel and athletic director will begin next year.
“Those are shorter timeline searches,” Towers said. “So even if we wait until next year – and there’s no reason to start now with the academic break coming – those names will start emerging right around the same time as those for the president and chancellor.
“We’re not in any way tying these searches together, but if you paste the timelines out, they’re lining up fairly nicely.”
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Rutgers has had a lot of things in the plus column lately, Towers said.
From its national ranking to the number of applicants (and the quality of those applicants), record donations and research dollars, the school has never been in a better spot.
Of course, it certainly didn’t feel that way last spring.
Student protests regarding the situation in the Middle East, numerous incidents of antisemitism and a strike by the teachers helped the school make headlines for all the wrong reasons.
This, and what Holloway called an atmosphere of toxic politics, led Holloway to his September departure announcement.
Towers said she’s proud of the way the school handled many of the protests – and encampments – which caused chaos at many other schools.
“We didn’t call in the police,” she said. “Our encampment went down in peace. Our campus has been operating peacefully this fall.”
And she’s proud of the way Holloway handled himself when called before Congressional leaders in Washington, noting that no one was calling for his ouster afterward – as was the case following the stunningly out-of-touch remarks by presidents of Harvard, Penn and MIT.
Like all universities, Towers feels Rutgers needs to find its way in modern times – but do so with old-school ideals.
“Public universities should always be a community of dialog,” she said. “We need to be able to have discussions of disagreement. We should be the intersection of ideas and actions and innovation – nurturing that environment of civic and academic engagement.
“We want that. That’s going to build better students, better leaders, better people for the future. We want that, and we want to create an environment where it’s safe to do that, and where we can encourage that.”
Disruption comes with the territory, Towers said.
“We’re not afraid of that because we deal with it well,” she said. “We have good leaders in place – and we have good relationships with our students.
“We’re a five and a half-billion-dollar enterprise. We can handle this.”
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A native of Wisconsin who spent years working in New York City, Towers was relatively unknown when she joined the Rutgers Board of Governors in 2020, even though she had served as the chair of Rutgers University Foundation Board of Directors. But she was well known – and wildly respected – in both the business and philanthropic communities.
During the past 20 years, she has served on several nonprofit boards ranging from community-based organizations to large national and multinational boards – including UNICEF and the CDC Foundation – providing leadership on international issues and public health.
She established The Nduna Foundation in 2007 to advance interventions in nutrition and public health, community redevelopment and human rights. She was a founding member of the board of advisors to The Elders, created by Nelson Mandela, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Richard Branson and Peter Gabriel to work for peace, justice, human rights and a sustainable planet.
And she was a recipient of UNICEF’s Audrey Hepburn Humanitarian Award.
Towers was more than ready for the role.
“This is not the first time I’m a board chair,” she said. “I’ve done this for the last 15 years.”
She has a method.
“In my opinion, the role of a board chair is service,” she said. “I serve the president, the university at large and my fellow governors. I support alumni, donors – everybody. I’m here to be a roadblock mover, a speed hump smoother. I’m here to help things go better and faster. I’m here to be a spark plug in the engine.
“I don’t drive the car, I don’t build the engine, but I can put fuel in the tank.”
Towers said she joins boards to offer advice, not just acquiesce to the leader.
“I can activate things, but I don’t run the place – and I don’t want to run the place, so whoever’s running the place has to do their job,” she said. “Now I also have a fiduciary responsibility to the state of New Jersey and to people who have given us five and a half billion dollars. I am held accountable that things are done properly, that things are done well, and I have a responsibility to alert the president or others in the university if I believe that something’s not going well.
“It’s not my job to fix it, but it’s my job to see that it does get fixed.”
It’s her job – along with her fellow governors – to help the school fill its key openings and get back to its main purpose: Educating students while creating the next generation of leaders.
Towers said she’s eager for the challenge.
“This is a service role,” she said. “Boards exist in service of the entity, whether it’s fundraising, operational efficiency, being an ambassador or overseeing crisis management.
“My job is to show leadership, bring in new ideas, bring in a new voice, be an inspiration, provide hope and possibly a path that wasn’t there before.”
