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PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — The interim president of the University of Maine at Augusta will serve as president of the University of Southern Maine following the withdrawal of a recent appointee from a New Jersey college.
University of Maine System Chancellor James Page announced the appointment Wednesday of Glenn Cummings, a Portland resident, longtime USM faculty member and former speaker of the Maine House. He will take over as USM's president on July 1.
The announcement came minutes after officials announced that recently appointed president Harvey Kesselman was withdrawing. Kesselman was provost and executive vice president at Stockton University in New Jersey when he was named USM president in March. He withdrew from the Maine appointment to face problems at his current institution, which is embroiled in a legal dispute over the school's plan to develop a campus at the former Showboat Casino Hotel in Atlantic City.
USM, a university of nearly 10,000 students, had faced financial troubles in recent times. Interim President David Flanagan cut five academic programs and eliminated 51 faculty positions last fall to help close a $16 million budget gap.
Cummings will take a salary of $235,000, a university system spokesman said.
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