Gallaudet Univerisity is expected to name an interim president Sunday, two months after campus protests led to the ouster of the president-designate.
A Gallaudet search committee Wednesday recommended three finalists to the board of trustees: Robert Davila, vice president emeritus Rochester Institute of Technology; William J. A. Marshall, former Gallaudet faculty senate chair; and Stephen F. Weiner, an associate professor and former dean at Gallaudet.
All three candidates are deaf.
The board of trustees will interview the candidates Saturday and announce the selection Sunday. The interim president is expected to serve for up to two years once outgoing president I. King Jordan steps down in January.
Hundreds of demonstrators raised a tent city and shut down the campus in October in their opposition to the selection of president-designate Jane Fernandes. Protesters said Fernandes was a poor leader, chosen in an unfair search and did not strongly support the use of American Sign Language.
Fernandes said her critics didn’t like her because she wasn’t deaf enough; she grew up speaking and learned to sign in her 20s.
The finalists all have connections to Gallaudet, the nation’s only liberal arts university for the deaf.
Davila was appointed Assistant Secretary for the Office of Special Education by President George H.W. Bush, earning the distinction in 1989 of holding the highest position in government ever attained by a deaf person.
Weiner was a finalist along with Fernandes last spring and a preference of many students. He established Gallaudet’s school of undergraduate studies.
Marshall had chaired the Gallaudet University faculty governance system for 12 years. In 1990 he was awarded Gallaudet’s Distinguished Faculty Member of the Year Award.
