The selection process for Emory University’s next president achieved a significant milestone today with the announcement of a 14-member Presidential Selection Committee.

The committee, approved and appointed today by the Emory University Board of Trustees, is charged with conducting a comprehensive and inclusive search for a successor to current Emory President James W. Wagner. Wagner announced in September that he intends to retire from the university at the end of August 2016 following a successful 13-year tenure as president.

The Presidential Selection Committee includes individuals representing a broad range of interests across the university community. The committee is chaired by John F. Morgan, who has served as an Emory trustee for the past 19 years and currently serves as chair of the Board of Trustees. Morgan, an alumnus of both Emory’s Goizueta Business School and Oxford College, is owner of Morgan Timber in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.

“The members of the Presidential Selection Committee represent a wonderfully talented, diverse, and engaged cross-section of the Emory community,” says Morgan. “I am privileged to have the opportunity to work closely with them as we commit ourselves to the critically important task of identifying Emory’s next president. This is an exciting moment in the history and development of this great university.”

The members of the Emory University Presidential Selection Committee are:

• Rafi Ahmed, director, Emory Vaccine Center; professor, Department of Microbiology and Immunology
• Susan A. Cahoon, trustee; a 1968 alumna of Emory College of Arts and Sciences
• Susan Cruse, senior vice president for development and alumni relations
• Michele Davis, president, Emory Alumni Board; a 1987 graduate of Emory College of Arts and Sciences
• John T. Glover, trustee; a 1968 graduate of Emory College of Arts and Sciences
• Jonathan K. Layne, trustee; a 1979 graduate of both the Goizueta Business School and the School of Law
• John F. Morgan, trustee, and chair, Presidential Selection Committee; a 1967 graduate of Oxford College and a 1969 graduate of Goizueta Business School
• Carol Newsom, Charles Howard Candler Professor of Old Testament
• Leah Ward Sears, trustee; a 1980 graduate of the School of Law
• Raj Tilwa, president, Student Government Association; a senior in Emory College of Arts and Sciences
• Natasha Trethewey, Robert W. Woodruff Professor of English and Creative Writing; director, Creative Writing; United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry
• Chilton D. Varner, trustee emerita; a 1976 graduate of the School of Law
• Gregory J. Vaughn, trustee; a 1987 graduate of Emory College of Arts and Sciences
• B. Michael Watson, trustee; a 1974 graduate of the Candler School of Theology

Peter Barnes, vice president for human resources, and Allison Dykes, vice president and secretary of the university, will support the committee in the selection process.

The presidential selection process is expected to conclude by summer 2016.

The latest information regarding the presidential selection process will always be available on the presidential selection website.