DePaulia
The
Volume #106 | Issue #15 | Feb. 21, 2022 | depauliaonline.com
Presidential uncertainty
Five years ago, President Esteban was hired, but his replacement remains unknown By Lawrence Kreymer & Josephine Stratman Editor-in-Chief & Asst. News Editor
DePaul plans to hire a new university president by Easter weekend, according to Student Government Association (SGA) President Watfae Zayed during their general body meeting Thursday night. The university, however, has not commented if what Zayed said is in fact true regarding the timeline about hiring a new president. Zayed is one of 15 people on the search committee. “Although our search process has been extended, our goal of selecting a new president before the end of this academic year remains unchanged,” a DePaul spokesperson Mary Hansen told The DePaulia on Friday. DePaul has recently had a setback in its process to find a new president, with two of the four finalists deciding to take their name out of consideration due to “personal considerations,” according to Judy Greffin, chair of the search advisory committee. “We prefer to have a full slate to present to the Board,” Greffin said on Feb. 2 “ Given this preference, we plan to continue the work of the Search Advisory Committee to evaluate additional candidates.” The DePaulia has requested two times to do an interview with Greffin, but has been refused both times by the university. Those on the student vetting committee were not given much information about any of the candidates thus far and have not received detailed updates about the search process, according to a source. The four candidates would have been brought to campus in early February “for sessions with key constituents including vetting committees – student, faculty, staff, senior administrators, and board,” Greffin wrote in a Jan. 14 update. Originally, the search advisory committee would have submitted its own confidential report on the finalists, in addition to separate vetting committee reports, to the
board for their consideration in late February. DePaul has not released the names of any of the finalists or people in consideration for the job, which is consistent with how the university conducted its search five years ago. “…The names of finalists will not be shared publicly to protect the confidentiality of the candidates. Even so, students, faculty and staff can expect an inclusive and collaborative finalist interview process,” DePaul spokesperson Russell Dorn said. “All finalists will meet with vetting committees comprised of representatives selected by Faculty Council, Staff Council and Student Government Association.” “Considering students make up a large majority of the DePaul community, it is super important to have student representation in the presidential search,” Zayed previously said in an email to The DePaulia. “Actually, students should be the most represented group in the search, even though that’s unfortunately not the case with this one. Without students, there’s no university and our input should be considered when making such a big decision.” The university hired current DePaul President A. Gabriel Esteban on Feb. 20, 2017. In this current search, however, DePaul is not likely to hire a new president before spring quarter starts. According to Dorn, Esteban has no role in the search process. Dorn reaffirmed that Esteban is still planning to leave DePaul on June. 30. The reconsideration has delayed the search, but it’s unclear to what extent or why. “As Judy Greffin, chair of the search advisory committee, mentioned in her Feb. 2 correspondence with the university community, the search advisory committee will continue the search process until the best candidate emerges from the field, with the continued expectation that they begin their role as president of DePaul on July 1,” Dorn said. Esteban is planning to step aside from the university at the end of this school year.
He has spent five years as DePaul’s president. Esteban surprised DePaul five years ago for being appointed the university’s first laypresident. “DePaul has been led for 120 years by Vincentian priests so this spirit is in our DNA, it’s in the DNA of everything,” Professor Fr. Patrick McDevitt, a member of the Vincentian order, said at the time. “DePaul is going to inform the new president, this new president will learn from the institution and they will get it because it’s in the DNA. There’s no way to gut this.” Esteban has come under fire from students and faculty for a lack of transparency over his tenure. “After much prayer and reflection, I have discerned this is the time for me to shift my focus and energy to my personal and familial journey, and away from our shared institutional endeavors,” Esteban said in the email. “Now may be the best time for my wife, Jo, and me to pursue some of our other dreams, which includes discovering different ways to serve others.” ALICIA GOLUSZKA | THE DEPAULIA
Guilty, helpless, afraid: Ukrainian Chicagoans witness conflict from afar By Stephania Rodriguez Contributing Writer
Somewhere in London, DePaul alumnus Julian Hayda, 29, sits and anxiously awaits the day he’ll be able to return to Ukraine — his motherland, and the country he and his wife, Summer, recently made their new temporary home. With Hayda intending to become a priest, they planned to live there for the next four years while he completed his seminary and they both did journalistic work. Their plans have now been put to a halt as decades of turmoil between Russia and Ukraine have led to Russia surrounding Ukraine’s borders with tens of thousands of troops, ready to potentially invade the country at any moment. Americans were advised by the U.S.
State Department in late December not to travel to Ukraine, citing “increased threats” from the Russian military. President Joe Biden affirmed Friday that the U.S. has intelligence that Russian President Vladimir Putin has made the final decision to invade Ukraine “in the coming week, in the coming days.” Hayda, born in Chicago’s Ukrainian Village neighborhood, grew up in a Ukrainian household with strong ties to his heritage. His parents were second-generation Ukrainians, but he recalls not learning to speak English until grade school because his parents wanted to teach him to speak Ukrainian. Hayda graduated from DePaul in 2015 with a bachelor’s degree majoring in digital cinema production. After being involved in several journalism projects and covering the 2012 NATO summit protests, he decid-
ed to double major, adding journalism to his repertoire. “It increasingly became clear that instead of narrative films, narrative documentaries — Ukraine doesn’t need just more stories,” he said. “Ukraine needs more truth and more coverage.” Hayda, whose father was a priest in the Ukrainian Catholic church, said his family often moved around and lived “wherever the church needed us.” He is now continuing the 400-year lineage of priests in his family, completing his seminary with the Ukrainian Diocese of Chicago. Hayda and Summer, 27, got married last September before traveling to their new home in Ukraine and staying there until December. When they left Ukraine to visit Chicago for Christmas break, they did
See UKRAINE, page 4
PHOTO COURTESY OF ONLINE NEWS ASSOCIATION
DePaul alumnus Julian Hayda, 29, doesn’t know when he will be able to return to Ukraine next.