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These 8 semifinalists, plus the provost, could be next president of Miami Dade College

A lot has happened since Miami Dade College embarked on its search for a new president in spring 2019.

The college’s board of trustees scrapped its first search for president following Eduardo J. Padron’s August 2019 retirement, leaving a new search committee to choose his successor during the coronavirus pandemic. Interim president Rolando Montoya came out of retirement to serve.

On Wednesday, a 19-member search committee whittled down 77 applicants — a significant increase from the 14 applications submitted back in March — to eight semifinalists.

Madeline Pumariega, Gregory Fowler, Carlos Cortez, Junius Gonzales, Joseph Di Salvo, Irene Rios, Kenneth Gonzalez and Morgan Phillips will be interviewed next week as semifinalists. Cortez was interviewed as a semifinalist in the 2019 search.

The committee will meet in person Nov. 5 and 6 to interview the candidates via video conference.

MDC provost is a finalist

Miami Dade College’s current executive vice president and provost, Leonore Rodicio, the sole remaining finalist from the first search, automatically advanced as a finalist in this search.

In one of his last acts as chair, trustee Bernie Navarro on May 19 motioned to name Rodicio president. He was quickly shot down by all four of his fellow trustees who said they didn’t want to rush the process.

The search committee is chaired by trustee Nicole Washington, who led Wednesday’s meeting along with Rod McDavis of the contracted search firm, AGB Search.

“We were delighted with the process.” McDavis said, adding that there were “no outside influences or pressures to get anyone into the pool.”

“I’m just delighted how well things have gone to this day,” he said.

Prior to the meeting, each committee member voted on their top five picks. Those results steered the meeting’s discussion and led to the final slate of eight.

Hialeah native is a favorite in MDC president’s search

Madeline Pumariega is already considered a favorite. A Hialeah native and former Miami Dade College student, she is the current executive vice president and provost of Tallahassee Community College and former Florida College System chancellor. She won 15 votes, the most of any candidate.

Gregory Fowler, commissioner and board member on the New England Commission of Higher Education, and Carlos Cortez, president of San Diego Continuing Education at San Diego Community College District, also quickly advanced as semifinalists. They won 10 and eight votes respectively, clinching the second and third semifinalist seats.

The discussion was driven by the candidates considered as “maybes.” McDavis said AGB, the search firm, did a first round of background checks “in terms of a Google report.”

Fred Moore of AGB offered to fill the committee in on what they found on the top four semifinalists from their preliminary background checks, but Washington turned him down.

Eight committee members liked Junius Gonzales, provost and vice president for academic affairs at New York Institute of Technology. They touted his experience at the University of North Carolina, his academic excellence and student success, leadership and fiscal responsibility and his international experience. He nabbed the fourth seat.

The committee passed on Shaun McKay, former president of Suffolk Community College in New York, who has been accused of sexual harassment. Though he was local, they didn’t give a nod to Larry Rice, president of Johnson and Wales University’s North Miami campus, which will shutter next year.

The committee received some interest from candidates with military backgrounds. Citing a desire for nontraditional candidates, they picked one among them. Joseph Di Salvo, a retired lieutenant general with the U.S. Army, edged out James Anderson, deputy undersecretary of defense for policy and former head of the Marine Corps War College.

Committee members noted an imbalance among gender and Black applicants who became semifinalists. That drove the committee members to take a straw poll to pick their favorite three candidates out of five remaining hopefuls.

Irene Rios, chief executive officer at SUNY Suffolk, received 17 votes. Kenneth Gonzalez, vice president of student and enrollment services at El Paso Community College, received 13 votes.

And Morgan Phillips, vice chancellor for academic excellence at the Pima Community College District, who originally just had one vote in the original tally, received eight votes, just enough to edge out Kevin Pollock, former Montgomery County Community College president, and Charles Lepper, vice president of student affairs and enrollment management at Salt Lake Community College.

Next week, there will be two candidate interviews in the morning and two in the afternoon each day. Each candidate will have five minutes to answer each of the 12 questions. The committee is determining who will ask questions of the candidates.

The committee will have time to deliberate on the candidates.

The selected finalists will be on campus Nov. 12 and 13 for a second round of in-person interviews with the board of trustees, search committee and stakeholders. According to the timeline, there will be “intensive referencing, background checks and assessments conducted on the finalist candidate(s).”

At 8 a.m. on Nov. 17, the board of trustees will meet to review feedback from the candidate visits and vote on the new president.

This story has been corrected to reflect that Carlos Cortez applied in the 2019 search and made it to the semifinalist round.