{"id":797095,"date":"2026-10-09T14:36:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T14:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/797095\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T14:36:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T14:36:14","slug":"us-office-star-brian-baumgartner-in-the-running-to-be-new-st-andrews-uni-rector","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/797095\/","title":{"rendered":"US Office star Brian Baumgartner in the running to be new St Andrews Uni rector"},"content":{"rendered":"

Current rector Stella Maris, who has been embroiled in a long-running dispute with the university, is not on the ballot.<\/p>\n

Maris was initially removed from the university court<\/a> in August 2024 over comments she made on the Israel-Gaza war, but won an appeal nine months later.<\/p>\n

Her second dismissal, in January 2026, came after she objected to a series of planned changes to the make-up of the institution’s governing body, but she was reinstated after she changed her stance<\/a> on governance rules.<\/p>\n

Manivannan, who was elected to Holyrood earlier this year, is also in the running to replace Maris, who they describe as having been “mistreated”.<\/p>\n

The MSP described themselves as “a proud St Andrews alumnus” and said students deserve “safe and affordable housing, more artistic spaces, and the opportunity to express their anger at the state of the world, without fear of risk of isolation”.<\/p>\n

The other four candidates are Dr Arthur Bernhoff, a St Andrews graduate working as an analyst at the Ministry of Defence, Mark Brunner, a previous guest lecturer at the university’s school of international relations, Dr Conor Philip, a doctor and recent graduate of the university, and Dr Edison Yau, a student doctor who graduated from St Andrews this year.<\/p>\n

The position of rector exists at Scotland’s oldest universities and is elected by the student body every three years.<\/p>\n

At St Andrews, the rector is the President of the University Court and presides over meetings which make crucial decisions about everything from budget allocations to academic policies.<\/p>\n

Students will cast their votes for on 15 and 16 October.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Current rector Stella Maris, who has been embroiled in a long-running dispute with the university, is not on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":797096,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,96,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-797095","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797095","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=797095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/797095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/797096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=797095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=797095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=797095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}