MU Chancellor announced, former provost from SUNY

University of Missouri has selected Dr. Alexander Cartwright to be the new chancellor of the MU campus.

Cartwright comes from SUNY where he served as provost and executive vice chancellor. SUNY is the largest higher-education system in the United States with 64 campuses serving nearly 1.3 million students.

UM system President Mun Choi made the annoucnement.

“I was looking for a chancellor who will serve in this role for five, 10, 15 years,” Choi said. “Who wouldn’t use this opportunity as a stepping stone, but to move the university forward with both short-term, immediate plans but also long-term plans to grow the university. Our next leader, Dr. Alexander Cartwright, possesses all of these characteristics.”

Cartwright was born in the Bahamas and said his math education ended in seventh grade for various reasons. He moved to Iowa with his mother. He said his first job was on a farm.

“This is certainly a long way from my first job in the U.S. cleaning various farm buildings, specifically hog-confinement buildings,” Cartwight said. “It’s a long way from completing a GED. A long way from working second shift in a factory as a custodian so I could afford to attend community college and take classes part-time to study accounting.”

Cartwright said his story is not unique.

“We see these people all the time who have similar stories to this,” Cartwright said. “That have benefited by attending a public land-grant university like Mizzou. We must insure the university provides access and opportunity to all Missourians.”

Cartwright’s appointment comes just days after a budget proposal by Interim Chancellor Garnett Stokes submitted Friday night. The proposal has nearly $60 million in cuts.

“The challenges that we face are very urgent, compelling, but the opportunities are immense,” Choi said. “We owe it to the citizens of Missouri to become the top flag-ship university that we all know we deserve.”

Choi said the budget recommendation is just that, a recommendation, and will continue to work with campus leaders to see where they will accept those proposals and where, if anywhere, they need to cut deeper.

“This is not a budget-cutting exercise to meet the budget deficit,” Choi said. “We are also making strategic investments in faculty hiring in programs such as open-source textbooks, open-educational resources and additional scholarships so that we can attract the brightest students and those otherwise who would not be able to afford an education at the University of Missouri.”

Choi has until June 2 to finalize the budget.

Cartwright will officially begin his role on Aug. 1.