08/23/2023

"Top Gun" Graduate Named 17th OSU President

Walter Carter, Jr. begins role Jan. 1, 2024

The Ohio State University named a veteran higher education leader with extensive military experience as its next president on August 22, 2023, filling a leadership vacancy just as students returned to fall classes at one of the nation’s largest universities.

Walter “Ted” Carter, Jr., 64, is the current president of the University of Nebraska System — another Midwestern land-grant institution with a large medical center — and former superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy. He’s also a retired vice admiral who attended the Navy Fighter Weapons School, known as Top Gun, and holds the national record for carrier-arrested landings with over 2,000 mishap-free touchdowns.

“I feel like I’ve been preparing my entire life for an event that I honestly did not see coming,” Carter told gathered attendees after trustees voted him in. He said leading Ohio State is “one of the highest profile jobs in American higher education.”

Please select this link to read the complete article from The Associated Press.