How UNC interim chancellor plans to leave the university ‘better than we found it’

Four days into his tenure as interim chancellor at UNC-Chapel Hill, Lee Roberts said Thursday that the job so far — which has included “meeting as many folks as possible” and cheering on the Tar Heels at basketball games, among other tasks — has “been a lot of fun.”

Roberts, a private investment manager and former state budget director under Republican Gov. Pat McCrory, assumed the interim chancellorship Jan. 12 as Kevin Guskiewicz departed the university to become the president of Michigan State University.

Roberts outlined several of his priorities in his new role to reporters Thursday following a Board of Trustees meeting, his first as interim chancellor. He reiterated, as he previously told The News & Observer, that he hopes to abide by the Hippocratic Oath in the role and “do no harm” — “try not to screw anything up,” he clarified — to the university and “ensure a smooth transition.”

“A lot of things are working really well,” Roberts said. “So let’s not mess that up.”

Roberts, who said he is “very interested” in the possibility of teaching a course at the university in a future semester, as he has done previously at his alma mater of Duke University, noted he is “certainly not here to tell the faculty how they should teach their classes or how they should do their jobs.”

But he sees room for improvement in some areas, such as ensuring the university is using its classroom and building space effectively and addressing student mental health.

“It’s important to make sure that we leave the institution better than we found it,” he said.

Addressing campus classroom use

During a Board of Trustees committee meeting Wednesday, the board received a presentation on how effectively the university is using its classroom and lab spaces — an item Roberts said he suggested be put on the agenda after seeing the information presented annually to the UNC System Board of Governors when he served on that board.

“I thought it was going to be important for the Board of Trustees to see the campus-specific data that relates to Chapel Hill,” he said Thursday.

Roberts said Wednesday he plans “to spend considerable time” as interim chancellor on the issue, which shows, in part, that the average number of hours UNC classrooms and labs are used for instruction each week is below the UNC System’s suggested target times. In 2021, the presentation showed, classrooms were used an average of about 26 hours per week, which is below the system’s target of 35 hours. Labs were used about an average of eight hours per week, which is below the target of 20 hours.

The information shows UNC has “done a decent job of of utilization, but we can do better,” Roberts said Thursday.

The university has already begun attempting to address the disparities between use of space and the system’s goals, with Provost Chris Clemens telling faculty in a November memo that UNC will use “a phased approach,” which next fall will ensure classes meet at standard start times.

Roberts said Wednesday that exploring the issue allows the university to have a better understanding of the spaces it currently has, and whether it might be more efficient to improve those spaces — by improving accessibility for those with disabilities or modernizing classrooms with updated technology, for example — or build new ones.

“This isn’t some minor, miscellaneous issue,” Roberts said. “This goes to the core of how we use our resources.”

The presentation drew hearty discussion from trustees during the committee meeting, which Roberts said Thursday “was really just a starting point.”

Campus safety and mental health

The trustees on Wednesday also received an update on campus safety and the ongoing review of the university’s response to the fatal on-campus shooting last August. A report generated from that review, which will include recommendations for how the university can improve its campus safety infrastructure and its response to emergencies, among other areas, is expected to be finished and released by the end of the spring semester.

Almost five months after the August incident, the university has not implemented required active-shooter training for faculty or staff — despite being urged to do so in a 2020 audit and at least one trustee and Guskiewicz stating publicly that they are in favor of such measures.

Asked Thursday whether he would like to see such a training requirement implemented at the university, Roberts — noting that the training is currently available “to anybody in the community who wants it” by request — indicated he would wait to see if the final report recommends requiring it.

“There’s generally a resistance ... to mandatory training, especially for faculty, but this might be an exception to that and the provost had some thoughts on that,” Roberts said. “So we’ll have a recommendation on that shortly.”

Roberts also addressed student mental health, saying he has met with the student body president and graduate student president, among others, to hear their concerns about the issue.

In the days following the Aug. 28 shooting, faculty called for a task force to address the mental health of graduate students. Tailei Qi, the former UNC graduate student accused of fatally shooting his professor in a campus lab, in November was found unfit to stand trial due to severe mental illness.

“There are remarkable opportunities facing today’s college students, but there are significant challenges as well,” Roberts said. “And mental health is at the top of that list.”

Roberts said he wants to ensure members of the campus community “are aware of the broad array of resources that are available” on campus for mental health currently, while also noting that it will be important to continue investing in those resources and “develop them further.”

New strategic plan

Roberts noted that the university’s current strategic plan, which former Chancellor Guskiewicz touted as one of his proudest accomplishments in the role, is set to wrap up next year — which “means it’s time to begin thinking about the next strategic plan,” Roberts said.

Roberts said the task won’t be a one-person job.

“That’s not something I’m going to sit down to my desk and write, that’s something the community, as a whole, is going to craft,” he said.

He indicated the plan could address artificial intelligence, ensuring the university has “a really robust strategy” around the ever-evolving technology. And update to the campus master plan, which Roberts called “probably a little bit out of date,” will also likely be included in the strategic plan, with an aim of answering “questions about the physical state of our infrastructure.”

It remains unclear how long Roberts will remain in his role. Neither a search committee, nor a timeline for the search, to find the university’s 13th chancellor has been announced.

The university’s previous chancellor search, which resulted in Guskiewicz being selected for the job, began in August 2019, seven months after Carol Folt left the position and Guskiewicz was named interim chancellor. Guskiewicz was named the university’s 12th chancellor in December of that year, about four months after the search began.

Asked whether he wants the chancellorship on a permanent basis or to be considered for the role, Roberts — who said he has an “excellent relationship” with UNC System President Peter Hans, who holds the authority to select a chancellor, pending approval from the Board of Governors — said it was too early to say.

“I’m on day four,” he said, “so I think it’s a little bit premature.”