Dean Stevens restructuring SAS leadership

New position of deputy dean created School of Arts and Sciences Dean Rosemary Stevens is trying to streamline the senior leadership of the school by restructuring her office. But while she is very happy with the new administrative structure she has created, there are members of the University community who are apprehensive about the changes. Effective September 1, there will be several personnel changes within the SAS Dean's Office. Stevens has appointed SAS Associate Dean Frank Warner to a new position called Deputy Dean. Warner, who is also a Mathematics Professor, will be Stevens' principal representative, and will therefore be authorized to act on behalf of the dean. His responsibilities include planning, budget, personnel and facilities. "My goal is to support Dean Stevens and the rest of her administrative team, to the best of my ability, to move the School of Arts and Sciences forward," he said. He added that he has already dealt with some of the budget and facility issues in his associate dean position, but that as deputy dean he will have "additional time to devote to these important issues." As a result of the creation of this post, the position of vice dean for finance and administration will be eliminated. This position is currently held by Mary Cahill. As deputy dean, Warner will have more responsibilities than Cahill did, because she did not have oversight over faculty or academic matters, according to Janine Sternlieb, executive assistant to the dean. One University official, who spoke under the condition of anonymity, attributed the creation of this new position to the fact that the SAS is being poorly run by Stevens. "[Stevens] is shifting a lot of the responsibility of running the school to Frank Warner because I think she is having a lot of trouble doing it herself," the source said. But other members of the University see Warner's appointment as a welcome addition to the SAS community. "Frank Warner is an amazingly responsive person," said Al Filreis, Undergraduate English Chair. "In my experience he's been very fair to the Humanities -- what he doesn't know about what we do, he's willing to learn. "I'm glad that the person with the keenest sense of budgetary planning in the school is now a member of the faculty," he added. Cahill said she will continue in this position until September 1, and will help Warner with the transition. She said she would like to continue working at the University, adding that she has been "having some conversations with various people in central administration and also in the health system." Cahill added that she hopes to have the opportunity to apply her business background to a position at the University. She has an MBA from Harvard University. "I have been with the University for two-and-a-half years, but I have spent about 12 years in the business world, so I have a lot of good experience that I hope I can draw on," she said. David Balamuth, Chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy, will be taking over as Associate Dean. He will be in charge of the Natural Sciences, Economics and History and Sociology of Science departments. Sternlieb said it has not yet been decided who will replace Balamuth as the Physics and Astronomy Chair. And Music Professor Eugene Narmour has already taken over as Associate Dean for the Humanities. He started in this position July 1, one day after History Professor Richard Beeman stepped down. Stevens said the goal of this administrative reorganization is "to strengthen the leadership of the school in order to be as responsive to faculty as possible, and to develop the School of Arts and Sciences into the best school it can be with both short and long term goals." She added that she is very pleased with the restructuring. "We are making our financial services and our facility services as effective as they can possibly be," she said. "I feel very good about what we are doing." And Provost Stanley Chodorow said he supports this re-engineering. "The SAS effort will streamline the operation, clarify the lines of authority and responsibility in the dean's office and save money," he said. Since assuming the SAS deanship in 1991, Stevens has been working on streamlining the school. In several cases, this meant making decisions unpopular within the University community. In September 1993 she announced that she would disband the Religious Studies, American Civilization and Regional Science departments. At the time, she said this was necessary to save the school money and use resources more effectively. This decision was met by much disappointment and debate among SAS students and faculty members. The Religious Studies Department was ultimately spared, but the other two departments were disbanded last summer and transformed into inter-departmental programs.

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