In a 1990 special report, the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching described the search process that brought George Rupp to Rice in 1985 as a model of  responsible inclusiveness. In addition to bringing a bold and unexpected new president, the organization and conduct of this search helped create a new sense of trust between the faculty and the Board of Trustees. This happy state of affairs, though, has been hard won.

Rice's president is chosen by and works for the Board of Trustees. Over time, the board has turned to the school's broader community for assistance in finding and attracting presidential candidates. In the beginning, of course, there was no broader Rice community. The responsibility of recruiting the first president rested solely with the board, which chose Edgar Odell Lovett in 1907. In some respects, though, even this first search bears a strong resemblance to the way presidential searches are conducted today. The board identified qualified candidates by soliciting recommendations from other educators, and negotiated intently to convince their choice to accept the position. Rice's second president, William V. Houston, was recruited in much the same fashion at the close of World War II. 

When Dr. Houston retired in 1960, Rice's board made a small but important change in this process. For the first time the trustees asked the faculty to form a committee to advise them in their search for the new president. This committee submitted a list of names, but the search itself was still carried out by the trustees in the usual fashion, and resulted in their choice of Kenneth S. Pitzer as Rice's third president.

The search for the next president marked a turning point in Rice's history. By the time of Pitzer's resignation in 1967, the world, including academia, had changed a great deal. American higher education was opening up, and faculties were appropriately assuming a larger role in university governance. Although the trustees again asked the faculty to form an advisory committee, they chose a new president extremely quickly, without allowing the faculty group to have any real input. This proved a disastrous mistake. The board's choice, a former Rice faculty member and administrator named William Masterson, was simply rejected by the faculty. Angry at being shut out of the search process and unhappy with the choice, the faculty openly declared their lack of confidence. Without their support, Masterson could not hope to be an effective leader and withdrew after a few days. The board then turned to the faculty for advice and was ultimately able to recruit a strong president in Norman Hackerman, .

When Hackerman resigned after a fifteen-year term, the Rice board recognized that the time had come to develop a truly consultative search process. Board member Ralph O'Connor organized a search committee that included not only trustees, but also faculty members who were chosen by their colleagues,  students, and alumni representatives. In doing so, the board gave real voice to the key constituencies on campus and brought Rice into line with the best practices of university governance. This search, which brought George Rupp to Rice, was the beginning of real democratization in the selection process and has served as a model for searches both here and elsewhere. The principles that guided it--shared responsibility, mutual respect, cooperation and understanding among all the groups that make up the Rice community--also guided the search that found Malcolm Gillis.They now guide the search for Dr. Gillis's successor.