Monday, May 24, 2004 | 9:25 a.m.
If Nevada State College President Kerry Romesburg is offered and accepts the presidency at Florida's Jacksonville University, the veteran college administrator would face challenges he has never dealt with before.
And that, in a nutshell, is why he says he's considering the position.
Romesburg and his wife, Judy, visited the Florida campus Tuesday as one of two candidates being considered for the position after he was recruited by a search consultant. Romesburg said he doesn't know if he will be offered the position or if he would take it.
"I didn't go seeking the job, I wasn't looking for a job. I'm not looking to leave Nevada State College," Romesburg said on Thursday. "I love what I'm doing and I love living here."
But Romesburg also admitted that he was intrigued by the idea of working for a private institution, which in many ways is an entirely different world from the public colleges Romesburg has led in his more than 30 years in higher education.
"It's a different kind of environment, and that's attractive," said Romesburg said. "I've never done it before."
Private institutions aren't accountable to or dependent on state legislatures for approval or money, but instead rely on student satisfaction to keep them afloat, he said. Private institutions don't have to follow state open-meeting laws and while they do often have boards of trustees, administrators do not have to navigate through the same political waters that colleagues at public institutions swim in everyday.
Private institutions also have a business approach to academia that allows them a far narrower focus than that of a public institution.
Jacksonville, for instance, is a small college of about 2,200 students with an emphasis on recruiting and keeping high-caliber students, Romesburg said. Nevada State College's mission emphasizes providing access to higher education for as many students as possible.
"The president of Jacksonville would never go to the Legislature to ask for money," Romesburg said. "It is a business approach in that the private college survives or thrives or not on its ability to attract students who are capable of paying of the cost of education there and then giving them the education that will help them succeed."
The difference in tuition at the schools is stark -- at Jacksonville University, students pay $24,000 a year for tuition. At Nevada State College it's about $2,200 if students take a full course load.
Romesburg said he sees benefits and challenges in both the private and public approaches to higher education and does not necessarily prefer one over the other.
In fact, Romesburg said if he did ever leave the public sector, one of the things he would miss is working in a political environment with the Legislature and an elected Board of Regents, which he said has been one of his greatest strengths as a president.
Likewise, he said his greatest weakness at Jacksonville would be his lack of experience in the private sector.
"That's the ironic part of this, that that (politics) would not be part of this job," Romesburg said. "I think that is my greatest strength, so that will all factor into whatever decision I have to make."
Leaving Henderson for Jacksonville would not be escaping the challenges of Nevada State College, but trading them in for a whole new set of challenges, Romesburg said.
Jacksonville is financially in the red, and its last president resigned after it came to light that the school had been operating at a deficit for many years and hiding that fact from trustees. And while Romesburg is struggling to raise money for Nevada State College's first building here, many of the one's at Jacksonville's campus are in need of repair.
"That institution has problems and they need some real leadership," Romesburg said. "It will be challenging for whoever takes the job."
Those challenges and the great unknown of working in a private sector that caught Romesburg's interest. At the same time the challenges still facing Nevada State College make him love his position here, Romesburg said.
"I don't want a job that I'm comfortable in," Romesburg said. "I love the challenge of building, such as at this institution (Nevada State), I love the challenge of finances, like at this institution. Jacksonville has the same challenges but in a different way."
When Romesburg agreed to meet with some Jacksonville representatives, he said he had no idea he was going in for an interview. He said he only agreed to stop by the campus because he and his wife were in Florida to visit their son over Mother's Day weekend.
But instead of a casual conversation, Romesburg found himself being interviewed as one of four final candidates.
If he is offered the job, Romesburg said he has a lot of questions to answer before he would be able to make a decision, such as the terms of the Jacksonville job, his latitute in being able to make changes at the university and whether he is willing to leave Nevada State.
In the end, he said that's the hardest question to answer.
"We've built such a team here," Romesburg said. "That would be really hard to leave."
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