Former South Carolina president Harris Pastides starts as University of Tampa's interim president
He will lead UT while it searches for a successor to President Teresa Abi-Nader Dahlberg.
TAMPA - Harris Pastides, the former longtime president of the University of South Carolina, started Monday, Nov. 2, as interim president of the University of Tampa, according to the university. He will lead UT during its search for a new president.
The university says a search is underway to replace President Teresa Abi-Nader Dahlberg, who resigned last month. UT's story does not give a timeline for the search.
Pastides came out of retirement for the job, UT says. He led USC's eight-institution system from 2008 to 2019 and returned as its interim president from 2021 to 2022. He earned a Ph.D. in epidemiology at Yale in 1980, chaired the biostatistics and epidemiology department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and was dean of USC's public health school before becoming its president.
"It's a university on the move," Pastides told UT. "I want to help keep that momentum."
He made an early appearance Friday, Oct. 30, at the unveiling of a sculpture in UT's Schoomaker ROTC and Athletics Building. UT says his first official appearances include a conversation with faculty and staff at Falk Theatre on Thursday, followed by a welcome reception that includes students.
Source: University of Tampa News, Nov. 2, 2026: "Interim President Starts First Day as a Spartan" (read 6:15 a.m. EST Nov. 3, 2026); UT News: "'We Will Fight in the Shade'" (read 6:15 a.m. EST Nov. 3, 2026).