The LSU Fight Song resonates from his cell phone – then Chancellor Sean O’Keefe quickly drops his hands from behind his head to answer the call. His chair no longer leans back with two legs off the ground, O’Keefe apologizes and relates the interruption to an Oval Office meeting with President Bush during which O’Keefe’s cell phone disrupted their meeting. “It turned out to be somebody from the office wanting to check to make sure I had made it to the White House in time for the meeting,” O’Keefe said, recognizing the situation’s irony. O’Keefe’s office is devoid of personal belongs. Nails protrude from the wooden walls where pictures once hung. Less than a dozen books remain on his spacious bookshelf. His only visible belongings remaining in the office are stacked neatly on and beside his desk. O’Keefe relinquishes his administrative duties as the University’s chancellor Feb. 1. The desolate office reflects his departure. O’Keefe said his proudest accomplishments during his tenure as chancellor surround his role in furthering the University’s Flagship Agenda; his regrets stem from the incompletion of the same mission. “I’d like to have achieved every [aspect of the Flagship Agenda] before I get out of here,” O’Keefe said. “But that’s not to be. We’re well on track to hitting it, and that’s for the next person to pursue. It’s been a full sail all the way toward hitting that goal. It’s just a matter of leaving it on autopilot, and it will get there.” O’Keefe said the University’s progress in advancing the Flagship Agenda will propel the school into a high tier in the U.S. News and World Report rankings as early as next year. The full list of reasons surrounding his resignation remain unknown, although many think he was ousted by a changing LSU Board of Supervisors and newly hired System President John Lombardi. The only hint justifying his departure is a difference of philosophies of whether the University should increase enrollment in order to secure funding for facility growth. Lombardi shared his view Jan. 24 at the Faculty Senate’s meeting. “You have to do things that force people to respond,” Lombardi said to the Faculty Senate. O’Keefe said the University must differentiate itself from other higher education institutions within the state in order to attract a specific type of student. He said standards for admission should be strict, and efforts to retain students at the University after being admitted should be increased. “This is a deep philosophical issue, and it’s one of the reasons it’s time for me to go,” O’Keefe said. “I am of the mind if you’re chasing after a number, you don’t care as much about standards. You start driving after numbers, and all of a sudden the message to the institution is all about body count. “And it’s not about what the quality of the experience is anymore. I have a fundamentally different philosophy than that.” O’Keefe said the changing objectives and direction of the University put him in a position where he is no longer fit for the job. “If you can’t go out there and passionately advocate for what the goal is, what the greater objective could be, then you owe it to yourself and you owe it to the people you work for to leave,” O’Keefe said. “There should be no ambiguity about that.” O’Keefe will remain at the University for the remainder of the spring semester as a professor of public administration in the E.J. Ourso College of Business. He said his family provides the driving force of where he will go at the end of the semester. O’Keefe said having his daughter and two sons all in college within the next 18 months has caused him to eliminate the possibile run for Congress, a move some of his supporters wanted him to make. “Public service is something I spent most of my life doing,” O’Keefe said. “There are a number of opportunities I want to look at, and they might be a little bit different field than that.” O’Keefe said he has been approached by a private, nonprofit firms a think tank and several industry corporations concerning future employment. He also has been approached by several university offers for other chancellor/president roles. “I have to shift through all that and figure out which one fits,” O’Keefe said. “The idea of moving on to university administration is probably not something I would be overwhelmingly attracted to. But you never know, and I learned a long time ago, you don’t turn down things that aren’t offered yet.” O’Keefe said the biggest difficulty he faced as chancellor is trying to relate to the various constituents he represents. He said it is impossible to please everyone, as people have widely differing ideals of the University’s future. O’Keefe, praised by his supporters for his fundraising abilities, said he found people were willing to contribute to the University because it is widely visible to everyone in the state. “What it is that makes fundraising activities work in my mind is real simple,” O’Keefe said. “It’s nothing more sophisticated than simply having the temerity to ask and having something you can follow up with to say, ‘Here is what we’re asking for.'” O’Keefe said the Forever LSU campaign has been successful because donors are able to make contributions and see where the money will go. He said the campaign has identified specific areas of the campus needing improvements, and donors are attracted to a plan of action. O’Keefe recognized that some criticized his lack of experience in academia before coming to the University. “To those who didn’t think I had the academic background, they obviously weren’t familiar with what I had done,” O’Keefe said. “And frankly, no amount of familiarity was going to change their minds anyway. The nature of a chancellorship is to lead an organization. It isn’t to be the chief academic – that’s the provost’s job.” O’Keefe said he hopes those who began donating during his tenure will continue to do so. O’Keefe wrote a letter Jan. 29 to many University donors encouraging their support of the University after he leaves. In his letter, O’Keefe leads donors to continue their contributions by example. “Because of my love for Louisiana and my passionate enthusiasm for LSU, I signed a $1 million gift agreement last fall,” his letter reads. “I intend to honor that commitment and will continue to do whatever I can to support the campaign.” He smiles as he shuts his cell phone, ending the call that interrupted the conversation. “That’s a ring tone I think I’ll keep anyway,” O’Keefe said.
—-Contact Nichola Persac at [email protected]