In a surprise departure, Elizabeth “Betsy” Cantwell is stepping down as the president of Utah State University — after spending only a year and a half at the helm of the Logan school that continues to be dogged by allegations of a toxic culture within its football program and, more recently, concerns that prompted legislation about transgender students.
Elizabeth “Betsy” Cantwell is stepping down as the president of Utah State University — after she spent only a year and a half at the helm of the Logan school, which still is dogged by allegations of a toxic culture within its football program.
In a surprise departure, Elizabeth “Betsy” Cantwell is stepping down as the president of Utah State University — after spending only a year and a half at the helm of the Logan school that continues to be dogged by allegations of a toxic culture within its football program and, more recently, concerns that prompted legislation about transgender students.
The announcement came Thursday night with a brief statement from the Utah Board of Higher Education, which provided little information on the circumstances behind her resignation.
The message said Cantwell has accepted another job— as the 12th president of Washington State University, the first woman to lead the school in Pullman, Wash.
“While the details are still being finalized, we expect that she will wrap up her time at USU in the next couple of months and assume her new role on April 1, 2025,” the statement noted.
The board, which oversees the hiring and firing of the state’s public university leaders, said it is “aware of and focused on the opportunities and needs at Utah State University.” The board soon will announce plans for start the search for a new president and for an administrator to serve in the interim.
Cantwell took over at the northern Utah research and land-grant institution in summer 2023, following the troubled tenure of former President Noelle Cockett, who stepped down amid similar scrutiny over the football program and how the school has handled reports of sexual assault.
Some of that carried into Cantwell’s term, with the president making national headlines when she chose to fire former football coach Blake Anderson — a controversial decision that came just months after she took the job.
Cantwell said an investigation showed Anderson failed to appropriately respond when a player was arrested for domestic violence, failing to notify the school of the allegations, allowing the player to continue on the team and then conducting his own fact-finding mission that allegedly included contacting the victim to see what happened.
Anderson has denied those claims and has sued the school for $15 million, saying USU used “sham” claims to purposefully get out of having to pay him a $4.5 million buyout with his coaching contract.
The former coach has also said he was scapegoated for the university’s ongoing problems with the Department of Justice.
The DOJ investigated the Logan school and issued a damning report in 2020 that said university officials repeatedly mishandled cases of sexual assault on campus, failing to investigate when it knew about misconduct and, as a result, “rendered additional students vulnerable.” That included reports filed against football players, fraternity members and faculty in the school’s piano department.
Last September, the DOJ announced that USU had not sufficiently cleaned up its athletics program and it was extending its oversight.
The department slapped the university with a notice of “substantial noncompliance” and gave it a 45 days to show it was working to clean up the issues that were still plaguing it.
At the time, Cantwell said: “We acknowledge and share the DOJ’s concerns. We will take all steps necessary to create an enduring culture of respect within USU and especially within USU Football.”
The Salt Lake Tribune will continue to update this developing story.