Hardin gets new job

Lu Hardin has accepted a position as president of Florida's Palm Beach Atlantic University.

On Tuesday the PBA Board of Trustees voted unanimously to hire Hardin. His term begins today.

"I am humbled, honored and energized by the board's confidence in me to lead and serve PBA as its new president," Hardin said in a news release issued from the West Palm Beach university Tuesday. "I feel truly blessed."

In August Hardin resigned his presidency at the University of Central Arkansas amid controversies including allegations of favoritism in student housing and a memo in support of his privately approved $300,000 bonus penned by Hardin but attributed to three UCA vice presidents.

The UCA Board of Trustees voted 5-1 to accept his resignation and approved a paid sabbatical of almost a year and a $670,162 contract buyout paid using public money from the Board of Trustees Endowment Fund as well as $47,570 paid through privately raised UCA Foundation money.

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"I think my only comment would be that I hope he has a more successful presidency there than he had here, and I hope he's learned from his mistakes," UCA Faculty Senate president John Parrack said Tuesday.

UCA trustee Rush Harding III said Tuesday that he was excited that Hardin would "have a chance to provide great leadership at a new institution."

"I think Lu realizes that he should have done some things differently at UCA, but he also did some wonderful things here, for this university," Harding said. "I think what Palm Beach Atlantic is getting is more focused Lu; a more determined-to-do-things-the-right-way Lu Hardin and also a more relaxed, re-energized Lu Hardin."

Harding went on to say that he believed PBA hired Hardin to help the university, which he said is "landlocked" in an urban area, expand its campus on about 100 acres of university-owned land on the "outskirts" of the West Palm Beach community.

"They want to be innovative and creative as far as how to use that new land for a new campus," he said. "I think the things that Lu does best are what they're looking for in a president."

According to UCA figures, enrollment during Hardin's six-year tenure increased from 8,000 to about 13,000, with average incoming ACT scores rising from 22.1 to 23.5 and graduation rates increasing from 47 to 55.4 percent.

During these years UCA also obtained National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I status.

The UCA Board of Trustees voted earlier this month to hire Allen C. Meadors as the university's new president.

PBA has Florida campuses in West Palm Beach, Orlando, and Wellington and is a private, independent university offering undergraduate, graduate and professional degrees. The University is dedicated, according to the news release, "to the integration of Christian principles to prepare students for lifelong learning."

(Staff writer Joe Lamb can be reached at 505-1238 or by E-mail at joe.lamb@thecabin.net. Send us your news at www.thecabin.net/submit.)