Michael T. Benson, the current president of Coastal Carolina University, has been selected to be the next president of West Virginia University.
The announcement was officially made Monday by the university. He will begin the job this July.
Benson will succeed Gordon Gee, who announced last year that he would be retiring from the position. Gee has served as WVU president twice; first in 1981 and then returning to the job in 2014.
At a meeting last Thursday, the WVU Board of Governors indicated that it had agreed on its top candidate, but it held off naming the individual until contract negotiations were completed. Benson confirmed to the Charleston (S.C.) Post and Courier on Friday that he was negotiating a contract with WVU but added, “out of respect to WVU and Coastal, I’m not going to say anything more until it’s officially done.”
Benson has been the president of Coastal Carolina University since 2021. Prior to that he served as president of Eastern Kentucky University (2013-2020), Southern Utah University (2006-2013), and Snow University (2001-2006). He proved to be a prolific fundraiser at all three institutions.
Benson is a historian, who earned his bachelor’s degree in 1990 from Brigham Young University and his doctorate in modern history from the University of Oxford (St. Antony’s College) in 1995. He also earned a master’s degree in nonprofit administration in 2011 from the University of Notre Dame and a master’s in liberal arts in 2021 from Johns Hopkins University.
He is the author of three books, including an excellent biography of Daniel Coit Gilman, the third president of the University of California and the first president of Johns Hopkins University.
Benson serves on a number of national and local boards, including the Council of Presidents of the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges. He has also been the board chair of Omicron Delta Kappa, a national leadership honor society.
“I am honored to be named president of West Virginia University — one of our nation’s oldest land-grant institutions,” Benson said, in a news release. “My 30-year career in public higher education has prepared me for this singular opportunity, and I wish to thank the Board of Governors for the trust they have placed in me and hope to earn that same level of trust and support from the entire WVU community.”
At WVU, Benson will join an institution that has recently experienced substantial challenges and controversies, most notably a high-profile restructuring that saw it close dozens of academic programs and cut more than 140 faculty positions as it attempted to respond to years of declining enrollment and a multimillion dollar budget deficit.
One result of that restructuring was a no-confidence vote against Gee by the WVU faculty, which passed by an overwhelming 797-100 margin. That episode as well as the campus outcry over the scale of the program and faculty cuts at the state’s flagship university attracted prolonged attention from national media.
The university’s downsizing has proven, however, to be far from unique as several other colleges and universities have taken similar cost-saving steps in the past two years to close their own budget gaps.
WVU Board Chair Rick Pill pointed to Benson’s prior success in increasing student enrollment and fundraising at Costal Carolina University as factors that led to his selection.
“West Virginia University remains the formidable, flagship, land-grant institution that we all know and love,” said Pill. “We look forward to Dr. Benson’s leadership in continuing to guide us on this upward trajectory.”