Eastern hosted the last of the three finalists for its presidential search Friday and Saturday when John Cavanaugh of the University of North Carolina-Wilmington participated in tours and on-campus interviews.

Cavanaugh, who is the vice chancellor for academic affairs at UNC-Wilmington, said he demonstrated a talent for recruiting minority students when he was vice provost for admissions. Since that time, African American student applications have gone up 31 percent and minority applications in general are up 26 percent.

In that position, Cavanaugh also said he worked to create tougher, more intensive admissions requirements. UNC-Wilmington’s average SAT score has since risen from 1097 to 1140 – a move from 24 to 25 in ACT terms.

“As enrollment rises, quality tends to rise,” Cavanaugh said while explaining Wilmington’s status of being the fastest growing institution in the North Carolina system.

Enrollment has doubled there over the past 10 years, Cavanaugh said.

When asked his opinion of online education, Cavanaugh said he felt faculty should determine whether a subject lends itself to that kind of delivery, saying that determining a course format is a question of “matching the teaching method to what we want students to learn.”

For online courses to be successful, teachers need to be fluent with the tools related to technology, and Cavanaugh said “we need to provide teachers with the opportunity to hone their skills and learn new tools.”

At Delaware, Cavanaugh said he helped to develop a faculty mentoring program “which gained national awareness.”

A web force development team was created as a part of this to assist teachers with online-course delivery methods.

“We run a lot of workshops for teachers,” Cavanaugh said, “so they can share the knowledge and expertise with each other.”

Cavanaugh said he also hopes to create more opportunities for students by “taking a look at creative combinations of courses and creating academic programs that mix disciplines together.”

In order for any changes to take place, a president must make himself available

“to identify a common vision and talk to people to make sure that that vision is the right one and is going in the right direction,” Cavanaugh said as he revealed some of his “trade secrets.”

One way to become available is by “taking the scenic route to person X’s office instead of having them always come to you. If they’re always coming to you, then no one sees you on campus and you miss an opportunity to meet people.”

Cavanaugh spoke of his ability to fund raise, specifically in getting alumni donations. He said he recently secured a $400,000 gift for a lecture series in UNC-Wilmington’s history department.

He said he also hopes to bring state legislators to campus.

“I try to get them on my home turf,” Cavanaugh said, “so I can show them what the problems are and expose them to Eastern’s needs.”