University of Michigan’s next president has brain cancer so won’t take job
Apr 15, 2026, 7:57 AM
FILE - Syracuse University Chancellor Kent Syverud introduces Vice President Joe Biden at the Robin Toner Prize celebration dinner in Washington, March 24, 2014. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)
Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
(AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta, File)
ANN ARBOR, Mich. (AP) — The next president at the University of Michigan said Wednesday he can’t take the job because of brain cancer.
Kent Syverud, chancellor at Syracuse University, said he received the diagnosis after not feeling well last week.
“I am currently undergoing treatment at the University of Michigan. … I am aware that I am one of many, many people who face a diagnosis like this — people who show up each day with courage,” Syverud said. “I take inspiration from all of them.”
Syverud was hired in January and was set to become president in May.
The University of Michigan’s interim president, Domenico Grasso, will stay in the job while the school’s governing board searches for another leader.
Instead of being president, Syverud will be a professor at Michigan’s law school and serve as an adviser to the Board of Regents, the board said.
Santa Ono was university president until 2025, when he was in line to become the head of the University of Florida. But the move backfired when the Florida Board of Governors, which oversees the state’s universities, voted 10-6 against him in June.
Political conservatives had criticized Ono for his past support for diversity, equity and inclusion programs and other initiatives they viewed as unacceptable liberal ideology.
