Martin Tadlock, the interim Regional Chancellor for the University of South Florida St. Petersburg, is removing the "interim" part of that title.
USF officials had previously indicated that a search for a permanent campus leader would start this month.
Instead, System President Judy Genshaft announced Wednesday that Tadlock will serve as regional chancellor through June 2021.
“As the USF System moves closer to consolidated accreditation and becomes one unified university, stability of leadership is more important than ever,” Genshaft said in a release. “I have been impressed with the impact Chancellor Tadlock has made on USFSP through his focused leadership, his strong relationships with the community and his collaborative spirit as a member of the USF System.”
Genshaft also praised Tadlock for a campus-wide effort to increase student success, which led to a 10 percent gain in the campus' retention rate this year, as well as his work in getting USFSP's planned 375-residence hall approved by the USF Board of Trustees.
Tadlock, who had been named the campus' Regional Vice Chancellor of Academic Affairs in May 2016, spoke to WUSF's University Beat shortly after he assumed the job last October.
"It's not about me personally, it's about us," said Tadlock. "We have strong people here, we have good leadership, we have people in key positions that move the institution forward, we have plans, we have priorities - all of those things are in place because of the good people that work here."
The announcement comes at a critical time, as USF faces a state mandate to bring all three of its campuses under one accreditation.
According to Tadlock, that's going to require steady leadership.
"The continuity to be able to do the things we need to do in going through the consolidation process is absolutely dependent on people who know the history of the institution, and live and breathe the role that they have to play," he said after the USF Consolidation Task Force held its first town hall meeting in Tampa Wednesday. Tadlock is a member of the Task Force.
Tadlock joined USFSP from Bemidji State University and Northwest Technical College in northern Minnesota, where he had served as Provost and Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs. He had previously been Assistant Vice Chancellor at the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh and Provost and Interim President at Northeastern State University in Oklahoma.
Tadlock took the interim position when Sophia Wisniewska resigned in Sept. 2017, in part over her handling of the evacuation of campus during Hurricane Irma.
