New VCU Presidential Search Committee Includes Two Students

Two upper-class students will serve on the VCU Board of Visitors' new 17-member VCU Presidential Search Committee on Sept. 17, 2008. The committee will help the Board of Visitors, the most powerful body within the university administration, select VCU's next president after current university president, Eugene P. Trani, Ph.D., retires on June 30, 2009.

The two students serving on the committee are Morgan McDowell and Olakunle Idowu.
Morgan McDowell is a senior biology and psychology with a chemistry minor. Besides working on the Presidential Search Committee, McDowell is a senator and chief of staff to the Monroe Park Campus Student Government Association. She is also a student representative to the Student Health Advisory Committee.
Olakunle Idowu is a fourth-year medical student who also serves as a VCU School of Medicine Admissions Committee member. Previously, he was the M3 clerkship group leader, the Class of 2009 curriculum representative, and the tour guide director and professional fair recruiter for the School of Medicine.
Pat Lepley, Director of Communications and Public Relations at VCU, says that neither student--only Dr. Edward Bersoff, chair of the search committee--may speak for the board at this time. Interested students may email Bersoff with questions or concerns about the committee at http://www.presidentialsearch.vcu.edu/email1.html.

Bersoff is the immediate past rector of the VCU Board of Visitors and a member of the VCU Health System Board. He is also the chairman, president, and CEO of ATS Corporation.

Besides students McDoweel and Idowu, the committee consists of members from across the university: six members of the Board of Visitors, five faculty members, two staff members, one alumnus and one VCU Foundation member will work on the university-wide committee.