President Ted Carter Jr. discusses his challenges and goals during an exclusive interview with The Lantern. Credit: Nathan Mader | LTV Campus Producer

The Lantern sat down with university President Ted Carter Jr. to discuss Ohio State’s biggest challenges, the controversy surrounding Les Wexner, accessibility and affordability goals, Ross Bjork’s recent appointment and more.

“I believe affordability and accessibility should be our North Star.” 

Q: What would you say are the biggest challenges facing the university as of today? 

Well, obviously, how we are feeling, the sense on campus with some of the global events that are happening that are really conversations. Obviously, as someone who’s been around the world a number of times, been involved in friction points around the world, it’s always tough, especially if you have a personal connection — whether it be a family member or somebody you know — for events that are going on in Israel with Hamas, or even in Ukraine, and there are other events happening around the world. And I know that our faculty and our students feel that and they want to be able to have an open conversation about that. 

So I have already spent some time and gotten in front of some of those students — Hillel, Chabad, Students for Justice in Palestine. I wanted to go in there and hear their concerns and be empathetic and also make sure they know that they do have a voice and their voice can be heard. 

But we also have to understand that keeping the temperature down [is important] so it doesn’t look like one group is pitting itself against one another — it’s not helpful on this campus because my goal is to keep our campus safe and secure. That’s one of our top priorities.

Q: What are your priorities with addressing crime on campus and do you plan to keep some of the things Mohler implemented with the increased cop presence? 

I’ve gotten to look into that a little bit more. I’ve been over to Blankenship Hall and met with some of our security folks over there. I’ve seen the very intricate, integrated camera system that we have here on campus — over 5,000 cameras that overlook an entire campus live, which is very impressive. 

Is that enough? I’m learning a little bit more about some of the things that we’re doing. We’re still looking for seven more hires within [Blankenship Hall] to meet what we said we would get to, and then we’ll take another look. But whatever we’re doing, we’re going to continue to look to make sure that we’re doing everything we can to keep our campus safe and secure, because for our students, it’s not what has happened in the past, it’s not what is the event — a lot of these things have happened off campus, not even on campus — it’s how they feel. You can’t tell someone how to feel, and if they feel either insecure or ‘What else can I do to feel best protected?’ we’ve got to be able to have that conversation, we’ve got to be able to listen. 

I personally believe that we do have a responsibility within, even outside, our own perimeter. That’s where more than 50% of our students live, so we are engaging with the various security forces, whether it be the Columbus police, our own police force, state highway patrol, how they collect and share intelligence information. Are there any gaps there? What else can we do? We obviously have some of our own patrols that are unarmed, that are there to diffuse situations. 

So there’s a lot that has been going on. I think the reporting folks have done a good job telling that story of what is actually happening because sometimes people may not feel secure, but they don’t know all the things that are actually currently happening, or how much we’re going to continue to do to make sure our campus is secure. 

Q: What is your response to the Department of Education investigating the university? How are you going forward with that looming over and with the conflict still going on and with students still calling for more safety measures and also divestment? 

So again, First Amendment rights, student voices — we listen. We’re hearing them. That’s one of the reasons I met with those groups. I learned about the Department of Education claim against the university just yesterday. Obviously, we’ll engage in that, and again, it’s an investigation first. 

What I will say is, whatever the response was from acting President Mohler, I’ve been very clear on my statements coming here from day one. We’re not going to tolerate any harassment. We’re not going to tolerate any bigotry of any kind, whether it be antisemitism, Islamophobia — any type of bigotry. Now I understand there is some speech that is protected, and we’ve got to understand that, but when anything leads to incitement of violence, then we’re going to have to hold people accountable. And that’s how we’re going to be, and I’ve been about as clear as I can be on that. 

Q: Do you have certain policies you hope to implement during your first few months in the office, or a plan to carry out some of the same initiatives that Kristina Johnson started? Acting President Peter Mohler worked to increase police presence on campus — are these things that you hope to continue? If not, what policies do you hope to implement?

There’s been a void of firm presidential leadership here for a while. You all know that. So as I am now in my 24th day in the job, my first job is to make sure I do no harm. If this is a very large ship — for a second, we can use that nautical reference — to keep the ship sailing, clean and straight, and then learn how to operate. And so I’m really getting my arms wrapped around that. 

To answer your question directly, yes, I’m inheriting the same things that were enacted by acting President Mohler, a lot of the things that President Johnson had in place. I haven’t removed or changed any of those policies, other than the ones that have already been started before I got here. So there’s been some changes in hiring practices, and before I make any other changes beyond either increasing resources for more security or any other policy change, I need to make sure I understand exactly how the organization is today. And that’s what’s happening right now. That’s going to take me a few months. 

And meanwhile, I’m trying to take this vision of where I think this university is going to go over the next three to five to 10 years, turn that into a written strategy — something I plan to produce around the 100-day mark — and then we’ll start to move that and measure ourselves against the things we say are important. And then we’ll start to think about making changes as necessary. 

Q: In light of the U.S. Supreme Court decision on affirmative action, how is the university looking to revamp its admissions process? What is your definition of merit, and what does that mean for incoming and prospective students? 

It’s interesting, when I was a superintendent at the Naval Academy, which is the same job as being the president of a university — just a slightly smaller campus — I was deeply involved in the admissions process. And of course, it’s more complicated because you have to have a nomination from a member of Congress or the president or the vice president, and there’s a lot of academic physical leadership standards by which you have to get in. 

If you reference the U.S. Supreme Court decision, they exempted the service academies from that, saying you could apply affirmative action. I never did. For the five years that I ran the Naval Academy, we never had a quota system. We never used any affirmative action, profiling of any kind to get the most diverse student body that we’d had in the Naval Academy’s 170-plus year history. And yet, we were increasing the percentage of women that were coming to campus, the underrepresented minorities every single year, because we just want to attract the best students. 

And a lot of times, what will really make the difference, when students come to a campus and they see what the campus looks like, that will be the best advertising that you’re ever going to have… So what I would tell you is when we’re looking at when rules and regulations are put down to us, we’re going to first follow the rules. 

But second of all, when we’re looking for what types of students we want to have here, we are somewhat of a selective campus. It’s very hard to come here from out of state with only 30% of our student body being from out of state. I think there’s 10 qualified students that want to come here for every one that gets in. And then when you look at who’s coming here from the state of Ohio, it’s still competitive to get in. 

But my view is — again, I haven’t sat down with all the admissions team — we’re looking for not only the most talented students, we’re looking for the best-rounded students. So sometimes that shows up in merit and academic performance. Sometimes it’s going to show up in the ability to be a natural leader. Sometimes it’s going to show up in other skill sets that somebody might have. The application process, I am hopeful as I will learn more about it, will allow those elements of the whole person to shine through so that we can welcome a very diverse campus. 

Q: We know that we’re currently in the process of trying to fill the vice president role. We wanted to see what qualities you’re looking for in a vice president and if you have any notes on significant progress within that search. 

It is underway. The committee has been formed. They’re going through these various listening sessions. And then there’ll be a call-out for resumes and people will be able to apply. 

Some of the basic things that we’re looking for are two simple requirements. One is we need a provost and a senior vice president who is a leader because that person is going to lead the academic mission principally of this great university, but also lead 15 university deans. That alone is a leadership challenge, and you think about all the different academic disciplines those 15 colleges represent. 

But you also have to have somebody that can be a little bit of a follower because that person is still going to work for the president, and those two people have to be aligned. And that’s really important. 

And finally, I would just say that we’re looking for somebody that is a little bit different from me. Obviously, I do not have the classic academic training that a lot of lifelong academicians have. I have different qualities I bring to the job, but I definitely want somebody that’s been more classically trained, been involved in research, has been at multiple levels of academia that is now ready for that position. 

Q: You do have a very different background from typical university presidents. How do you view your military service and your past leadership roles as helping you in this role? 

A lot of people will look at my background and think it was my time wearing the uniform of the nation that got me here. That’s just the job that I had. 

If you take away the military part of it, what I did get to do in uniform was, first of all, lead two world-class academic institutions, but more importantly, lead very large, complex organizations, some of them the most complex things that we do in the military, like taking an aircraft carrier apart, putting it back together to include starting up, nuclear reactors, replacing all the engineering. It was an unbelievable project that we actually delivered on budget in time. So when you do all that, it comes down to being able to manage complex tasks and people. 

And then as I transitioned out of uniform, I was very fortunate to transition out of leading an institution — a leadership institution in the U.S. Naval Academy — then go to Nebraska and lead, again, a very large, complex [university]— the only public university system in the entire state with 50,000 students and 16,000 faculty and staff on four very dispersed geographic campuses. 

At the time, that was the job that I never knew that for my whole life I was training for. And as I got into that job and lived through COVID like everybody else, we prospered during the most difficult times of that global pandemic and came out of it strong enough to do well in a state that’s not very populated. And they’re still on a course to do well as a public university, land-grant, R1 research university at the flagship in Lincoln. 

As I’ve shared with a lot of people, I wasn’t looking to become the 17th president of The Ohio State University. I actually was very happy with what I was doing in Nebraska. Ohio State kind of found me, and they convinced me that I was what they were looking for. I questioned that, to be quite honest, at the beginning, knowing the great history of this university.

As I got more involved, spoke to everybody from student leadership to faculty to the board of trustees, that’s when I realized maybe this is the right time and the right place to come here. Maybe I would be the right fit here.

This would be my last point: I’ve done transitions where the leadership of some of these institutions should’ve had a Ph.D., should’ve gone through multiple phases of their academic progressions, and I showed up without those classic pieces of paper. That doesn’t mean that I don’t have the utmost respect for those who have done it. In fact, I’m probably the biggest champion of those that have been through that. 

But I did fine at all those organizations. I even got the same questions when I went to Nebraska, and you can read about how upset they were when I left, meaning that I guess I was doing OK.

The last point I’ll make is, the Navy has some pretty unique academic programs, and I was very fortunate to go through one of them. That was the Navy Nuclear Power Program. It’s a classified program, so it’s not accredited. You don’t receive a master’s degree when you get it because you have to go to a specific place to do all the courses of study.

I did well beyond master’s-level education in that program. I took 54 exams, eight-hour finals multiple times, stand-up boards, prototyping — where you actually get qualified to operate a nuclear reactor. 

And then on top of that, my command of an aircraft carrier wasn’t one that drove a carry around the world. It was actually taking one and completely dismantling and rebuilding it, as I just talked about. So I got to [apply] the courseware that I took, and I’m very comfortable talking [about] technical things, STEM background. And I believe that part of my job is to be a champion for not only our students but our academicians that are here. We have world-class faculty here and I’m really proud to just be part of that team. 

Q: During your time at Nebraska, something you worked on a lot was making it more affordable for students, and it kind of mirrored the Scarlet and Gray Initiative that President Johnson used to have. Are you hoping to continue that legacy or do you have other goals of making Ohio State more affordable and attainable for students who may not be able to afford to come here? 

I believe affordability and accessibility should be our North Star. The cost of education has gone up significantly over the last 10 to 15 years. I’m very, very sympathetic to that for students. I know that can be a challenge. 

I like to make sure I understand all the scholarship and needs-based programs that we have here. The Scarlet and Gray Advantage that you just described, I’ve looked into it just a little. I think it’s still in its early stages. I support the concept. I did something very similar in Nebraska with the Promise program. I noticed Columbus State has a program almost exactly the same, so I was really heartened to see that. 

The whole impetus behind creating that was, as we were going into a global pandemic, I said, “We have wonderful merit-based scholarship programs in Nebraska. What are we doing for Pell-eligible students or those students that are somewhere in between Pell and other qualifications?” And we didn’t really have a program. And the beauty of that program is we created it and did not take it from taxpayer money. 

We actually cut our budget $5 million for the initial offering and paid for it out of our own budget. I cut my own personal staff by 25% to help pay for that. And I’m really proud of what we did. It started out with the 7,000 students that applied in six weeks, and by the time I left, we had over 18,000 students that have gone through that Nebraska Promise program. And what’s interesting is they were performing at or better than all of the non-promise programs, which is again the statement that, given an opportunity for those that are inspired, they’re going to do well. And they were. 

So I’ll continue to take that mindset here and look at how we can best support those that may not have the same background and resources as everybody else. Reducing student debt is more than just getting it down to $0… It costs more now to attend university than it costs for just the tuition. 

So there’s the cost of education part, and there’s the cost of total attendance, and the cost of total attendance is what’s been rising the price tag up today in most public universities, and I’m sure it’s the same here. I know it was in Nebraska. Almost two-thirds of the total cost of attendance was living, eating, driving, parking, books — all the rest compared to just the tuition fees. And I froze tuition for two years.

Q: More information has come to light with Les Wexner’s affiliation with Epstein and — with someone who’s such a big donor to the university and much of campus is named after him — many are concerned with the connection between the university and Wexner. How will the university respond to those concerns in light of recent events? 

The first thing we should acknowledge is that the Wexners, both Les and Abigail, have been incredibly generous to this university, almost like nobody else in our history. We should be very thankful to them and their family for that kind of generosity.

The second is that I know what has been written up in the media no differently than anybody else, and I don’t know anything more. But for those that are worried about this, the word I would use is patience. Let the facts play out. 

As you pointed out, there have been some more things that have shown up but I don’t know anything really new — I mean, it’s well-known that they had a business relationship. And Mr. Wexner has been very clear that when he had any inkling of inappropriate business things happening, let alone anything else, they cut ties. So I think patience is the right word, and again, I don’t know anything more than what’s been written up and the same things you’ve read. 

Q: I wanted to know a little bit more about why Ross Bjork was the chosen athletic director, and what made him stand out against other candidates. 

Well, the first thing people should know is we had a wonderful range of candidates that wanted to come to this job. The second thing that’s really important is there isn’t any replacing Gene Smith, and I’ve said that publicly. Nineteen years in that kind of job anywhere in the country, not to mention that he’s leading the highest revenue, 36 D1 sport program in the country — It’s extraordinary. I mean, there isn’t a Hall of Fame ballot big enough to put Gene Smith in. 

So we knew we couldn’t exactly replace Gene, but as I said at the press conference, I was looking for somebody that, first of all, was coming from a major program already. This was not a job that you could come in and learn. You had to be ready for it. So I was looking for somebody that could come in and lead a very large, complex 36 D1 program right out of the gate. 

The second thing I was looking for was somebody that understands this incredibly fast-changing landscape and college athletics. I mean the landscape is changing as we’re sitting here talking. So we’re talking about changes to name image likeness, potential revenue sharing with athletes, which, not today, but could be the governance model for the NCAA and where it sits with division one, Division Two division three and even FBS football. 

So all of those things are on the table, and I needed somebody that was not only conversant but that’s actually in the arena. And Ross Bjork is in that he’s in compliance committees. He’s been on the NCAA committees, he’s led the athletic directors conference for the entire country. So he is a leader among leaders. 

Because we are The Ohio State University and we are part of the 14-member Big Ten today — soon to be 18 — I needed to have somebody that came in and had a certain weight, a certain gravitas to their voice leading this institution right out of the gate. Ross stood out in those categories in the interviews above the other candidates and that’s why I thought he was a natural pick.

Q: Some critical things were said about Bjork in a recent Sports Illustrated article, including one of the scandals of 2014 with Hugh Freeze. The article alleges that there were a lot of major NCAA violations that were downplayed by Bjork to the media and that there was also the expensive contract extension when he was at Texas A&M that cost the program a lot of money. With these things in mind, does that bring any concern to you at all or do you still have a lot of faith in his capabilities?

We pull that all apart in great detail, so there’s no surprises. We go through a lot of personal back checks. I want you to know that I asked the questions about all those things, just as you’re asking me in more detail than you are. And his answers were outstanding. And we back check them. 

So yes, did Hugh Freeze make a very bad personal mistake? You bet, and they fired him over that — the NCAA violations. They were already into looking at that. He didn’t hire Jimbo Fisher. And they were at a point where a lot of college football coaches were getting extensions and they had a risk of losing him. And it was part of recruiting. And I even said in the press conference, I lived that in Nebraska and it is a very, very hard call when you give a coaching contract extension like that. 

He also owned the decision even though — and when you really get down to it, that’d be the same here — the athletic director, although we give them lots of authority and a big budget to manage, those decisions don’t get made in a vacuum. 

And then finally, I’ll make this last point, and I said this there: There’s some ADs out there that haven’t had to live through a lot of controversy, they’ve just — maybe the right timing, programs weren’t as large or complex — they hadn’t been in that type of arena. And again, to use a nautical reference, a calm sea never made a good sailor. So those that have been in rough seas and had to live with it and deal with it, they’re better prepared for whatever’s going to happen here. 

The final thing I’ll say is at this level — as office of the president, the athletic director all the way down to the coaches — it’s incredibly important and rare to have an alignment on what you believe the institutional beliefs are and how you want to perform. Ross Bjork is ready for that and the coaches, I know they’re excited about having him here. 

Was his life perfect at A&M and at Ole Miss? Certainly not. But I’m confident that those life lessons are going to make him better prepared to come here and do the job.