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Penn State said former president Graham Spanier offered to resign last week to university trustees in the wake of the child sex abuse case that has enveloped the school.
The board announced after a meeting Nov. 9 that it decided Spanier was ''no longer president.'' Spanier said in a statement the same night ''there is wisdom in a transition in leadership so that there are no distractions in allowing the university to move forward.''
Neither the board, nor Spanier, had specified then if he resigned.
School spokeswoman Lisa Powers said in an email Thursday that Spanier offered his resignation in the best interests of Penn State. School officials could not immediately confirm whether the resignation was accepted or whether Spanier was let go regardless.
Spanier left the same night the board fired Hall of Fame football coach Joe Paterno in a tumultuous week that began with authorities charging former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky with abusing eight boys over a 15-year span. Pressure mounted on the school over whether Spanier, Paterno and other leaders should have done more to prevent alleged abuse.
The board named provost Rod Erickson to replace Spanier on an interim basis initially. Then at another Nov. 11 board meeting, Erickson's ''interim'' tag was removed, but school officials said a search would still occur at an undetermined time in the future.
Powers confirmed a Patriot-News of Harrisburg report http://bit.ly/uL06iW that there were no plans to find a replacement.
Since last week, ''the board has indicated ... that it has put its full support behind Erickson as the 17th president and we would not begin the search process,'' Powers said. ''They have put their full faith in his leadership of Penn State.''
