Committee begins search for next SAS dean

Stevens' replacement will not necessarily come from within the University. The committee to select a new dean for the School of Arts and Sciences has begun the preliminary stages of the search. Four months after former Dean Rosemary Stevens' resignation, the search committee is taking action to ensure that a new dean will be appointed this semester and begin work July 1, according to Provost Stanley Chodorow. Chodorow said the committee is currently writing to prospective candidates across the country seeking nominations and will probably advertise the opening in The New York Times and The Chronicle of Higher Education. He added that the search will not be confined to within the University. "We do not have a prejudice about whether he or she should be an insider of outsider," Chodorow said. "We want a person of the highest caliber." Chodorow added that the new dean should have "high academic standing and superb academic judgement? a commitment to undergraduate education? and [be] very good with the outside constituencies of the school, principally the alumni." When Stevens resigned in early September, University President Judith Rodin said she hoped to establish a search committee by the end of that month. But the University Council's Committee on Committees -- which chooses the members of other University committees -- did not meet until October 1, according to Janine Sternlieb, assistant to the dean of SAS. After several delays, the final search committee was chosen in December, consisting of eight faculty members, two students and one University alumnus. SAS faculty voted to approve four of the committee members November 4. The professors selected are: Chemistry Professor Kent Blasie, Biology Professor Anthony Cashmore, History Professor Lynn Hunt and Sociology Chairperson Douglas Massey. The remaining members -- selected in early December -- include Wharton School Deputy Dean Janice Bellace, Law School Dean Colin Diver, Communications Professor Oscar Gandy and Economics Chairperson Mark Rosenzweig. College senior Justin Shellaway and American Civilizations graduate student Bruce Lenthall will represent student interests as the search for the new dean continues. And Natalie Koether, a 1961 College for Women graduate and chair of the SAS Board of Overseers, is the alumni representative on the committee.