Students hail selection of L. Rafael Reif as MIT’s 17th president
Students who were involved in the search for MIT’s new leader say they welcome today’s selection of L. Rafael Reif as the Institute’s 17th president, citing his “willingness to engage students” as MIT’s provost since 2005. Six MIT students — three undergraduates and three graduate students — formed the Executive Team of a larger Student Advisory Committee that provided input to the 22-member Presidential Search Committee created following Susan Hockfield’s Feb. 16 announcement that she would step down as MIT president. The Student Advisory Committee held a half-dozen campus forums in March, and informally sought out the views of students on the presidential search both in person and in online forums.In conversations with MIT News, the student committee members praised the choice of Reif and discussed some of the issues that arose most frequently during their conversations with students on the presidential search.Reif, stated sophomore Patrick A. Hulin, a mathematics...