"I'll just say it to a public audience. I'm not looking for any other jobs," Coleman said in Tripp Commons at the Memorial Union. "I would like to be here because this university is distinctive and it has a particular place in my heart, and I think the work we can do here is really profound."

Coleman rose from assistant professor to chair of the political science department during his time at UW-Madison, a role he held for seven years. He has served as provost and chief academic officer at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign since 2023, following a stint as dean of the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities from 2014 to 2023.

He is competing with Rashid Bashir, also of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, who presented Monday, and Radenka Maric, president of the University of Connecticut, who is scheduled to speak Friday from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. at Tripp Commons. The public event will not be streamed online.

Questions for the finalists were submitted in advance, and Annie Jones, a professor in UW-Madison's Division of Extension, moderated Thursday's discussion using more than 70 submissions from the campus community.

Coleman outlined three priorities: making life better for Wisconsin residents and expanding opportunity, ensuring faculty and staff feel valued and supported, and growing the university's $1.93 billion research enterprise. "Research really drives everything else," he said.

On access and affordability, Coleman, a first-generation college student, said he expanded Illinois' financial aid program to cover tuition and fees for in-state students whose families earn $75,000 or less. He suggested UW-Madison should reexamine whether to raise the $65,000 income threshold for Bucky's Tuition Promise.

"If you have two students, one of whom graduates in four years and had an opportunity to do research, study abroad, do an internship, and another student who graduated in four years didn't have any opportunities to do any of those things, they did not get the same education from the institution," he said.

Asked about shared governance and potential changes to state labor and collective bargaining frameworks, Coleman pointed to his experience in UW-Madison's Faculty Senate and said he has worked with collective bargaining units. "I think the way we make better decisions is by working together and by communicating clearly what it is that we think we need and what we think the options are in front of us," he said.

He cited his handling of a Canvas outage that disrupted final exams at Illinois and other campuses this spring, saying administrators engaged with shared governance and students before postponing the first day of exams and scheduling them on a Sunday, which he called "the least disruptive thing to do."

On free speech, Coleman described himself as a prominent defender of academic freedom and said building a culture of inclusion is key. "It's the things that you say and do so that students from every single background and perspective … know that there's a place for them in this community and that our community is better because they're here," he said. He acknowledged that unpleasant or hurtful speech may occur but said what matters is how the university responds and supports those affected.

Coleman also warned against treating the arts and humanities as an afterthought to economic development. "The worst possible thing that can be done" is to design a business or entrepreneurship project and then add arts and humanities at the end, he said. "The questions that engineers and business people and others will pose will actually be stronger if they can be infused by the thinking and questioning of people in the arts and humanities at the very beginning, not at the end."

Community members can submit feedback on the candidates through an online survey until 10:30 a.m. Saturday. The UW System Board of Regents will appoint the next chancellor, with a small committee of regents scheduled to meet Friday and Saturday to conduct interviews and consider a recommendation to the full board. The selected candidate is expected to start next year, succeeding Jennifer Mnookin, who left in May to become president of Columbia University. Eric Wilcots, dean of UW-Madison's largest college, has served as interim chancellor during the search.