A culture war crusader is out and the football coach is in.
By Johannes Werner
Original Air Date: March 11, 2026
Host: Christopher Rufo is out on the New College Board of Trustees, and Urban Meyer is in. On Tuesday, the football coach bowed at a public event on the stage of Sainer Auditorium. WSLR News tried to gauge why Meyer joined the board and what his ideas for the college are.
Christopher Rufo. Still from ReasonTV via Wikimedia Commons
Johannes Werner: Is the culture war phase over, after the political takeover of the public liberal arts college three years ago? Christopher Rufo—the conservative higher-education crusader who rarely showed up in Sarasota during his three-year tenure—set the combative tone on issues such as DEI, LGBTQ, gender studies and tenure.
Inheriting Rufo’s seat is Urban Meyer, the football coach that became a legend at the University of Florida. Ahead of his first board meeting in April, Meyer was the main attraction of an event at New College’s “Socratic Stage” series. It was essentially an on-stage interview, followed by Q&A with the audience, and the title was “Character, Competition and Culture.” A video praising his achievements played.
Meyer bought a home in Sarasota in 2022 and has been living here since. At his talk on Tuesday, Meyer said it was a neighbor and friend who first made him aware of New College. He then met President Richard Corcoran through an ongoing mentorship program for high school students at New College.
He said he became concerned about higher education when some of his college football players could not find a job after graduation. He blames what he calls majors that “do not count” and low grades.
Urban Meyer
Urban Meyer: I’ve been to probably 1,000 high schools. They have really started to anger me, because education really changed in the last 15 years. I noticed it. I was seeing these players—I tell these players in our fourth week meeting—I remind them, every time, why we’re doing this. I had players at Florida graduate. There was a time, when you graduated college, you got a job. Those times are gone.
JW: His response: Universities should teach five disciplines, particularly in a tough job market like the current one.
UM: We teach the five disciplines. I believe, in this country, if you become an expert in these five disciplines, you’re going to be fine. The first one is leadership. Lead yourself; lead others. The second one is fiscal responsibility. The next one’s communication. The next one’s conflict resolution. The fifth one is career paths.
JW: Meyer then shared another set of five principles in what he looks for in players he recruits. One is competitive spirit; then there’s toughness, leadership, intelligence and adaptability. He also shared his 10-80-10 theory: 10% of humanity are elite performers, 10% “occupy all your time” and 80% could go either way.
Meyer also said he does not believe in firing.
UM: I wasn’t good at that. I was a head coach almost 20 years; I fired one person. Everybody says, “C’mon.” I created a kind of standard where people would just leave sometimes because they just became uncomfortable.
[Audience laughs]
UM: But, from the bottom of my heart, I believed, if I hired you, it was my job—Say it was a player. If I recruit you, I’m not going to kick you off the team. We recruited you.
JW: Rather, he says he believes in developing particular strengths of players and coaches.
UM: Here’s what you get when you start helping people. At the most competitive environment that I can think of, the highest level of college football, you start to create this amongst the team. If that player or coach on your staff knows that you’re going to go to the nth degree to help them as opposed to just firing them, what kind of work environment do you create? I’ve seen it. It’s a very trustworthy environment where people are very “one for all, all for one.”
JW: In the Q&A, Meyer also shared that Ron DeSantis is the best governor of all time and that he recently played golf with Donald Trump.
UM: I got to play golf with 47 a couple weeks ago. Boy, was that awesome.
[Audience laughs]
UM: DeSantis, our governor—the best governor in the history of governorship, DeSantis—
[Audience applauds]
UM: Some guy named Nick Saban was with us, too.
[Audience laughs]
UM: We all played really good and had a ball together. They put this together to have a conversation. The one thing I really admire about our president is that he’s going to dive into it if he believes it’s important, but he wants to learn. I know how he comes across sometimes on TV and everything else, but he was asking questions. He wasn’t telling us. He was asking questions.
JW: Reporting for WSLR News, Johannes Werner.
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