A Q&A with LSU interim president Matt Lee

Last month, Matt Lee, vice president for agriculture and dean at LSU’s College of Agriculture, was tapped to serve as LSU’s interim president.

Business Report sat down with Lee to discuss his plans for the university.

Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

What has the last few weeks looked like for you?

I’ve officially been in the role for a few days. It’s been exhilarating. It’s been a lot of work as we made sure that the LSU Ag Center and College of Agriculture had appropriate interim leadership in place and then started working with the executive team for the system to make sure I could get transitioned into the interim presidency. This week in particular, I have been spending a tremendous amount of time getting briefed on a variety of critical issues, as well as doing touchpoints with critical stakeholders to assure them that we have stability, we have continuity and that we are in good shape. I’ve been involved with supporting the prior president for the last four years. I know the plan and we’re sticking to it.

How do you plan to balance preserving existing initiatives with introducing new strategies to address emerging challenges?

We spent a few years putting together the Scholarship First strategic plan, as well as what we call the Pentagon of priorities. Those are five focal areas for us that really capture the expertise and core areas of strength for the institution, which overlap most clearly with the needs and strengths of the state: agriculture, biomed, coast, defense and cybersecurity, and energy. The plan is to continue growing our research and scholarly impact in those areas as we seek to drive LSU to become a Top 50 research institution. We have a set of plans in place that involve two things. It comes down to people and facilities. Culture is sort of a third part that binds those things together.

As interim president, how would you define success for your tenure?

A part of our success is going to depend on how long I’m in the role. If it’s a very short period of time, then basically ensuring that all of our supporters and all of the players that help maintain the momentum of LSU, that we keep them with us and keep them on board. Part of the message that I’m trying to convey to people is that I’m intending and trying very hard to bring a sense of stability and continuity to what we’ve been achieving. We’ve set high goals. We’ve been making great progress toward them.

What are some focus areas and priorities?

Ensuring that we have the highest caliber academic programming, and we do. I’ve been in conversations with the provost, and we’ll have conversations with the deans about the tools that they employ to make sure that we do that. Another main thing is enrollments. Many institutions around the country are struggling with enrollment. LSU and the LSU brand overall are not. We’re setting enrollment records and continuing to do that is going to be critical. Also, focusing on making sure we have the facilities in place to have a high-quality learning environment for our students, as well as top-flight research facilities for our faculty to conduct their work.

Do you plan to apply for the permanent position?

At the moment, I’m focusing on performing the role. I try to emphasize that the role is president, and “interim” is the timeframe. The job is to work in conjunction with the board leadership and ensure that we are properly discharging the duties of the presidency. We’ll see what happens with the surge later on. I’m on day five and I’m focusing on doing the job to support the LSU employees—to provide leadership for them—and the tens of thousands of students that we have to make sure that we’re getting the resources lined up and everything ready for them to come get their fall experience.

This story was originally published by Daily Report on June 6. To keep up with Baton Rouge business news, subscribe to the free Daily Report e-newsletter here.