Sweeney: Rutgers Board of Trustees is unnecessary: Opinion

By Stephen Sweeney

With the restructuring of our higher education landscape now complete, Rutgers University is poised to become one of the nation’s leading research universities, as it should be. But the work is not done. Rutgers will not become the institution we believe it can be by accident, or on its own. It still needs a governance structure that can propel it to the next level.

Unlike every other public institution in the state — and the vast majority of research universities nationwide — Rutgers maintains a multileveled bureaucracy with both a 15-member board of governors, which holds the ultimate responsibility for the university’s management, and a 59-member board of trustees, which holds responsibility for, seemingly, its own self-preservation.

The reality is that while we are trying to make Rutgers a 21st century powerhouse, it is stifled by an unwieldy governing model stuck in the 18th century.

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