The University of Illinois' new chancellor carries everyone's best wishes as she embraces the challenge of overseeing the local campus

Hired this past summer, Chancellor Phyllis Wise officially started work this week. If her UI tenure is as successful as her previous experiences at other prominent universities, the future holds promise.

Wise comes to the UI from the University of Washington in Seattle, where she was provost and then acting president for a year. Her academic background is in the hard sciences, and she has conducted serious research for more than 30 years.

The chancellor's post is not an easy one to fill. Managing a faculty can be like herding cats. Dealing with legislators requires attention to detail and diplomatic skills.

Students present a wide range of opportunities that make a school look good and a chancellor proud. Then again, their more rebellious or ill-conceived activities can be an embarrassment that puts a chancellor on a public relations hot seat.

But Wise shows every sign of being up to the job.

She has a broad background and many years of experience. One of her first plans is to get out and about and see what people have to say about how things are going and where the UI should be headed.

That's a good start, just one of many good decisions we anticipate from the UI's new chancellor.