Suffolk is coming closer to finding a replacement for President David Sargent, according to Board of Trustees Chairman Andrew Meyer, who said the field of candidates has been “narrowed to several.”

The Presidential Search Committee has “gone through the process of vetting an extensive amount of resumes,” said Meyer, who could not confirm the exact number of candidates left for confidentiality reasons. “One of the obligations is keeping the confidentiality of those involved or those who chose not to be involved in the process. We have to respect confidences,” he said.

For this reason, Meyer couldn’t name any of the candidates because doing so could jeopardize the jobs they currently hold.

Meyer said the search committee will conduct second-round interviews with the remaining candidates in the next few weeks.

“The Committee as I understand is optimistic,” he said. “[They’re] continuing to march forward.”

Scott Zalatoris, the student representative on the search committee, declined to comment through an email after The Journal requested an interview. Dennis Duggan, the chair of the search committee, could not be reached.

The presidential search has been ongoing for about a year, after David Sargent, who was supposed to stay at Suffolk’s helm until 2013, unexpectedly retired early.

He had previously come under fire for his salary in 2008 and 2009, when he was reported as the highest paid and second highest paid college president in the country respectively.

While some of the money was double counted or deferred until retirement, it still caused controversy at Suffolk.
Some defended him, saying that he was as a transformational figure over his 50-plus years at Suffolk, overseeing it from a small commuter school to an institution with residence halls and a large international population.

Members of the search committee and the board of Trustees have said they hope to find someone that can fill his shoes and lead the university into the 21st century.

A September 20 article in The Boston Herald claimed that the field was narrowed down to ten and listed some names of possible candidates that they got from an anonymous source. Meyer could not confirm or deny the names, but said the number of candidates was inaccurate.

He didn’t give a specific deadline for when Sargent’s replacement would be announced, but said he was hopeful that it would be well before the end of the school year.