Ramsey heads U of L

LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- James Ramsey, appointed Thursday as president of the University of Louisville, quickly embraced an agenda aimed at gaining national prominence for the school while improving lives at home.\nRamsey, the acting president since early September, was the unanimous choice of university trustees to become U of L's 17th president, culminating a six-month nationwide search with a homegrown choice.\nRamsey, who grew up in Louisville, entered the meeting moments later to a standing ovation and told the trustees that "it's a time to recommit ourselves to the task at hand."\nHe pledged his commitment to a 1997 higher education reform law that set a goal for U of L to become a pre-eminent metropolitan university.\nRamsey said the university also has an obligation to uplift lives.\n"Our goal is to see the quality of life, economic opportunity and standard of living for people in this community and in this state to be improved over time," Ramsey said.\nAs president of the 21,000-student university, Ramsey will bring considerable experience ranging from college classrooms and board rooms to the halls of state government.\nRamsey begins his duties immediately as president and will step down as state budget director, a job he retained while acting president. Trustees will work out a contract to negotiate with Ramsey, a process that could take weeks, said spokeswoman Rae Goldsmith.\nIn Frankfort, Gov. Paul Patton said Ramsey's expertise would be missed but said he was pleased for his longtime budget chief and U of L.\n"Jim's academic credentials, knowledge of government and his unwavering commitment to Kentucky's historic higher education reform movement, make him the ideal person to lead U of L to the next level of academic excellence," Patton said in a statement.\nAs acting president, Ramsey stepped in to fill a void left by the departure of U of L's top two administrators.\nJohn Shumaker gave up the U of L presidency in June after seven years to become president of the University of Tennessee.\nCarol Garrison, the school's provost, was appointed as acting president, but she left on Sept. 1 to become president of the University of Alabama-Birmingham.\nRamsey was a late entry in the presidential search. He initially said he wasn't interested but said he had a change of heart after receiving encouragement from people on campus and off to consider the post.\n"His name kept surfacing," said U of L board of trustees chairwoman Jessica Loving. "He hadn't been here 30 days before people started calling me saying, 'The man is doing an incredible job.'"\nA search firm that assisted U of L had contacted 1,000 potential candidates. The pool of candidates was narrowed to eight semifinalists, then pared to a group of finalists, Loving said.\nBased on the groundswell of support for Ramsey, search committee members then asked Ramsey if he would consider the job, and he expressed interest, Loving said. The school's search committee never formally interviewed any candidates before recommending Ramsey be hired.\nLoving said the search process was "as open and as fair" as possible since no candidates wanted their names revealed. She said the finalists were an impressive group but that Ramsey "was not like a second choice by any means."\n"Jim Ramsey has some qualities that really no one else had," she said. "In addition to his brains and his knowledge and his credentials, he has some very solid knowledge about higher education in general, nationally and locally, that no one else had," she said.\nIn outlining his goals, Ramsey cited initiatives under way to make U of L more efficient amid a tight budget and to foster greater diversity.\nRamsey said U of L would seek opportunities to work with other Kentucky universities, but would "compete fiercely" with the other schools for research dollars and top high school students.\nBefore the vote, trustees took turns praising Ramsey.\nTrustee Marie Abrams said that with Ramsey's background as a university administrator he "will hit the ground running."\nStudent trustee Chris Marlin said Ramsey had the full support of students and had displayed an ability to communicate with them.\n"They are excited that not only do they get a new president but they get a new advocate on their behalf," Marlin said.\nRamsey teaches an economics course on campus, and earlier Thursday he had given his students an exam.\nRamsey was accompanied by his wife, their two daughters and his father as he accepted the presidency. Ramsey, who turned 54 Thursday, was serenaded by a U of L pep band with a version of "Happy Birthday To You" and with the school fight song as he left the board room as the school's new president.\nRamsey's resume includes stints as a faculty member or administrator at several universities. He was vice chancellor for finance and administration at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and vice president at Western Kentucky University.\nHe was a finalist for the president's job at WKU in 1997 and has taught at Western, the University of Kentucky, Middle Tennessee State University and Loyola University in New Orleans.