The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) is a fast growing institution and is the largest public university in Nevada. However, it cannot create its own rules for the administration of its classified personnel system. Many large public universities possess this ability and function independently. This is in direct contrast to the traditional role of other state agencies and the administration of civil service rules for their classified personnel. This paper addresses the prevalence of independent classified personnel systems in public universities and presents a review of current movements in that direction. The paper also presents a case study of an independent classified personnel system of a public university. At the conclusion of this paper, implications of a possible move by UNLV toward an independent system are examined
