Two dean searches nearing end

The announcement of the new Law and Wharton school deans is expected in the next few weeks. After extensive year-long searches, the University could announce new deans for the Law School and Wharton School sometime within the next few weeks, according to administration officials. The Law School dean search committee has submitted its list of recommended candidates to University President Judith Rodin, School of Arts and Sciences Dean Samuel Preston said. The Wharton search committee submitted its list of finalists last fall. Wharton Vice Dean Richard Herring, who has been leading the Law School dean search committee, said yesterday in an e-mail that he expected a final candidate for that position to be formally selected very soon. "The committee is at the end of its deliberations, and I expect a decision from the president and provost in the next few weeks," Herring wrote. Officials would not confirm whether the list was composed of internal or external candidates. Now that the short list has been submitted to Rodin, the process is in its final step before the naming of a successor to former Law School Dean Colin Diver. "The committee has finished its work, and at that point, the decision moves to another level," Preston said. Diver announced his resignation in October 1998 on the same day that Thomas Gerrity also said he would be leaving his position as dean of the Wharton School. Both officially stepped down last summer and interim deans have been serving while the searches for candidates continue. Search committees for both deans were appointed in November 1998 and the Wharton search committee submitted its list of potential candidates to Rodin and Provost Robert Barchi last October. Graduate School of Fine Arts Dean Gary Hack, who heads the Wharton dean search committee, said earlier this week that he does not know whether Rodin will make a final decision soon on his committee's recommendations. "At a point in any such process, the president needs as much latitude as possible," Hack said. But Barchi said on Wednesday that both dean searches may be very close to completion. "We have two recruitments still underway that we hope are very, very close to being finalized," Barchi said. "Firming up that team [of deans] is an important part of the president's Agenda for Excellence." University spokesman Ken Wildes said last night that he believed the search processes for both the Law School and Wharton deans were nearing an end. "There's every reason to believe that these searches will be concluded in a very short period of time," Wildes said. The Law School dean search committee had one of its members resign during the summer. Law Professor Heidi Hurd left the committee for "personal reasons," according to The Penn Law Forum, the Law School's monthly student newspaper. The move prompted speculation that Hurd had herself become a candidate for the position. Herring denied last November that Hurd's departure had anything to do with internal strife in the committee. Last November, Philadelphia Magazine reported that Legal Studies Professor Kenneth Shropshire was under consideration by the Wharton search committee as a possible candidate to be the next Wharton dean. Shropshire refused to say at the time whether he had been interviewed by the search committee, but said he did not believe he was a candidate for the position.