With the University of Florida’s Jacksonville campus set to launch in a temporary facility in fall 2026, the University of North Florida continues active collaboration with UF in the “task force” established by former UNF president Moez Limayem.

The joint committee between the two universities functions as a network of dean-to-dean and faculty-to-faculty meetings designed to prevent program overlap, according to UNF Vice President Paul Eason. 

Last month, the Board of Governors said they were uncomfortable with the lack of updates from the UNF-UF collaboration committee, but Eason revealed that the “task force” remains highly active. However, leadership within the United Faculty of Florida (UFF-UNF) chapter says they have been excluded from the process.

Addressing BOG concerns

The collaboration committee, established by former presidents Limayem and Ben Sasse, first met in 2024, according to Eason.

“Back in 2024 at the BOG meeting where the campus was approved, we actually met the week before that meeting as an official committee, and it comprised the presidents, the VPs, and the deans at that time of College of Computing, Engineering and Construction, Business, and the law school dean from UF,” said Eason.

Although BOG members recently expressed confusion about the task force’s status, Eason noted that the board had not yet requested a formal report.

“It’s not that we weren’t active; we just were never asked to report that,” said Eason. “If you go back and watch the BOG meeting, I think it was Chancellor Rodrigues who said, ‘To be fair, we have not asked for a report.’”

Decentralized coordination

According to Eason, he and UF Vice President of Special Projects Kurt Dudas serve as liaisons, coordinating quarterly meetings among the engineering, business, and health colleges.

“Kurt and I functioned as liaisons between the two universities more than quarterly during the two-year period, setting up a number of meetings between both universities at the program levels in the colleges of engineering, colleges of business, colleges from UF nursing and UNF health,” said Eason.

According to Eason, the goal is to ensure UF Jacksonville “augments” existing UNF offerings rather than competing with them, and to resolve potential program duplication before entering the formal BOG approval process. 

For instance, UF recently withdrew a proposed Master of Health Administration program to avoid duplicating an existing regional program.

“It’s actually to try to facilitate as much opportunities between the two universities as possible so that a Jacksonville campus augments what UNF does, doesn’t compete with what UNF does.”

While Eason could not detail some of the committee’s initiatives as they are “ongoing and in development”, he did reveal that there are ongoing collaborations between the engineering and health sides of the universities.

Faculty exclusion

Despite Eason’s assertion that program collaboration must occur at the faculty level, UFF-UNF chapter representatives report no involvement.

“That [collaboration] kind of has to happen at a faculty-to-faculty level because programs are developed and disseminated by the faculty,” said Eason.

In 2024, former president of the UNF United Faculty of Florida chapter Mark Halley said faculty have questions about the Jacksonville campus and want to be involved. 

“You’re at a university that’s kind of the premier university in your area, and another university is moving in town,” said Halley. “People wonder, ‘OK, what’s that mean for me? What’s going to happen next?’”

Despite this, the current UFF-UNF president, Madalina Tanase, said that the UFF-UNF has not been involved in the collaboration committee.

“We aren’t in a position to offer meaningful insight on the initiative,” said Tanase. “We have not been involved in any capacity.”

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