President Sargent’s tenure at Suffolk should have been up a year from now. His contract was extended, as everyone knows, until 2013, amid a public relations crisis and national negative press for the school and the president because of his outrageous salary.

But what if his contract extension didn’t happen? Who would be succeeding President Sargent?

We now have knowledge of the existence of a Succession Committee, which includes some of the members of the Board of Trustees, and is supposedly hiring a consultant to assist with choosing the next president of Suffolk University – and that’s all they’ve done.

As students who are being totally and unabashedly ripped off by an administration trying to make up for Sargent not being paid enough in the past, we deserve to have a say in the future of this school. After all, our diplomas and resumes are going to say “Suffolk University” for the rest of our lives – we might as well be making sure that those words aren’t followed by an “ouch.”

Both President Sargent and the head of his succession committee, Andrew Meyer, have said that they want student input. Well, here it is: get a move on!

There are only three years until Sargent’s time is up. We should already have a short list of possible candidates to “vet,” consider, and talk to – and, naturally, parents, alumni and faculty should also have a say. It’s going to take years for this process to be completed in a way that the multiple thousands of people aligned with this school deserve and it should get underway as soon as possible.

Because President Sargent and his ridiculous salary and bonuses have created a deep mistrust of the higher-ups at Suffolk, there needs to be complete transparency of the whole succession committee process.

Lists need to be released, any names that are being thrown around need to be thrown into mass mailings to students, parents, faculty and alumni, meetings need to be announced and open to any and all who want to attend, and anything other than complete openness should not and will not be tolerated.

What is worrisome is that the Succession Committee doesn’t seem to have anyone in mind, or announced possible candidates for the job that was supposed to be available a year from now.

Anyone who cares about their tuition money, their salaries, and the name of their alma mater on their resumes needs to step up and make it clear to the administration that they will not stand for being bullied into accepting yet another misstep in regards to the president’s office.