When he resigned last week, former UNLV President Keith Whitfield became the latest leader to leave the Southern Nevada institution within five years of arriving. 

In his announcement, Whitfield said it was something he had been considering for a while because he needs to devote more of his attention to his mother and one of his grandsons who are experiencing health challenges. 

“Once my decision to leave was final, it did not seem fair to the university or any of you to draw out my departure,” he said. 

But the UNLV community is still left to wonder if there is more to the story after he left abruptly in the middle of the semester, during a legislative session, and just a year after the Board of Regents voted to extend his contract for another four years and increase his base salary by $65,000, to $565,000 a year. 

Whitfield did not respond to requests for comment sent through LinkedIn. He was also not reachable through the university’s public affairs director. But faculty members say his resignation followed months of tension between the UNLV leader and some donors and regents. 

Whitfield’s legacy

Whitfield arrived at UNLV in August 2020 at the height of the pandemic after serving in various roles at Wayne State University in Michigan. He was the institution’s first Black president. 

Views about the legacy Whitfield leaves behind are divided among those in his orbit, with some saying he didn’t do enough to address long-standing safety concerns or build relationships with donors and others saying he offered the support students and staff needed to move past those periods of turmoil.

UNLV Faculty Senate President Deborah Arteaga called Whitfield an “extraordinary leader.” 

She said she worked well with Whitfield in the aftermath of the 2023 on-campus shooting that left three faculty members dead and that he often checked in on student and staff mental health to make sure they were OK. The university offered reimbursement for any employee who needed mental health counseling.

”So that really shows you how much he valued — values probably still — the UNLV community,” Arteaga said. 

But Bill Robinson, past UNLV Faculty Senate president, said other faculty members felt that Whitfield’s response to the shooting fell short.

“A lot of us felt he waited a long time before he said anything, he’s been reluctant to spend any money on security enhancements and that he won’t make commitments about what they’re going to do in the future,” he said. 

Robinson said many of the security upgrades that UNLV did make to the shooting site, Beam Hall, were paid for by the university’s insurance rather than with UNLV’s own funding, which has raised questions about how invested the university itself is in safety. He added that even before the shooting, faculty had been asking for a long time for more security cameras and better door locks across the campus as well as safety training. 

“So that continues to be a complaint,” he said. 

Kris Engelstad, CEO of the Engelstad Foundation, a former major donor for the university, said she felt Whitfield should have never been appointed. Last year, she announced the foundation would no longer provide financial support to UNLV because of “poor and unacceptable behavior” by its leaders. 

“The president's job is to be a public ambassador, to raise funds, to be out there,” she said in a Thursday phone interview. “Keith Whitfield not only didn't raise any money, he lost money. He didn't go to anything. He sat alone in a university box at sporting events and did not invite anybody to come.”

Prior to Whitfield, UNLV received $75 million a year on average between 2015-2020 in fundraising compared with about $53 million it received on average between 2021-2024 under Whitfield’s leadership, according to a 2024 annual report. 

Tension with regents?

Robinson argued that UNLV tends to receive the short end of the stick from the Board of Regents and the Legislature compared with other institutions in the Nevada System of Higher Education (NSHE). 

He believes regents scrutinized Whitfield more harshly during board meetings compared with leaders of other NSHE institutions, namely UNR. Most recently, Whitfield came under fire for $80 million in budgetary reserves that UNLV has built up from student fees, an amount significantly higher than other NSHE institutions, including UNR, which had about $7.5 million in reserves. Regent Stephanie Goodman accused UNLV of not using it to benefit the students who are paying the fees. 

“This is a lot of money. This is hoarding money and I don’t like it,” she said during a Dec. 5 board meeting. 

Last year, Whitfield was berated by Regent Byron Brooks for meeting with a pro-Palestine student group.

UNLV was also dealt a heavy blow a year ago when a major donor, the Engelstad Foundation, announced it would no longer support the university following poor relations with UNLV leaders. The foundation had given more than $47.3 million in support of the university.UNLV over the years.

Robinson said Whitfield’s departure follows a pattern of presidents who were fired by the Board of Regents or left right before they were going to be fired after similar tensions. Whitfield’s predecessor Len Jessup, for example, blamed his exit on “personal and professional attacks” by then-NSHE Chancellor Thom Reilly and some regents. 

In 2009, former UNLV President David Ashley was demoted by the Board of Regents for going against its budget plan, which called for larger cuts for UNLV compared with UNR, and instead independently lobbying the Legislature.

“UNLV presidents always feel like they are fighting against the system, so there’s always going to be some natural tension there,” Robinson said. 

NSHE and the Board of Regents said in a Friday statement to The Nevada Independent that most leadership transitions at UNLV and other Nevada institutions are a result of planned retirements or long-anticipated changes as senior leaders conclude their services. 

“The NSHE Board of Regents remains focused on recruiting strong, forward-thinking leaders, both at the system and institutional level, who will strengthen NSHE’s long-term vision for student success, workforce development, and community impact,” they said in a statement. 

The Board of Regents chair and the NSHE chancellor did not respond to a question via email on whether the board’s relationship with Whitfield had soured and could have contributed to his exit. 

Other turnover across NSHE 

UNLV is among four NSHE institutions out of eight total in need of a new boss. UNLV has had seven presidents in the past two decades. UNR, for comparison, is on its fifth during that time period. 

Former Great Basin College President Joyce Helens retired last June as part of a planned “consolidation” under UNR. She had led the Elko-based institution since 2017. 

Last April, the board appointed Amber Donnelli to serve as interim president. The board has not yet announced a formal search for a permanent president, but under the board’s policy, an interim president may stay on for one to three years, and can be considered for a permanent appointment after at least one year. 

College of Southern Nevada President Federico Zaragoza also stepped down last June at the end of his contract. He was appointed to the job in 2018. The Board of Regents is meeting Tuesday and Wednesday to interview finalists and possibly to vote and make an appointment. 

The board is conducting a national search for a new president for Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno after President Karin Hilgersom announced last year she plans to retire this summer. 

There’s also a pending search for a new chancellor. NSHE opened applications for the position in January. 

The system’s last permanent chancellor, Melody Rose, resigned in April 2022 after less than two years on the job after months of conflict with the Board of Regents. 

After Whitfield’s resignation, NSHE named UNLV Provost Christopher Heavey as the officer in charge, an appointment that gives Heavey the authority to lead the university as the board works to name an interim or acting president. Heavey was among the finalists for the UNLV president position in 2020 when Whitfield was ultimately picked. 

During an internal meeting with faculty last week, Heavey responded to a question that he’d be interested in the interim position to help keep the university moving forward.

Doug Unger, president of the Nevada Faculty Alliance’s UNLV chapter, argues that higher education employees need more of a say in the form of collective bargaining rights amid the instability in NSHE’s leadership ranks. 

He’s pushing for AB191, sponsored by Assm. Natha Anderson (D-Reno), that authorizes collective bargaining for “professional employees,” which could include graduate assistants. The Board of Regents has previously said it cannot recognize a newly formed graduate student union without the Legislature’s go-ahead. 

“The problem is that a new president comes in with new plans, new mandates … and it completely derails or changes plans and policies that we've been working on through the previous administration,” he said. “If faculty has more of a say, we can stabilize that situation through collective bargaining contracts so that it really makes less of a difference who's leading our institutions.”