If faculty members pass a policy on Aug. 20, a new search committee for a dean of the College of Communication, Information and Media will be two members smaller than it was last year.
Michael Holmes, interim dean of the college, and the chairs of the four departments in the college met this summer to create new guidelines for the search committee, Holmes said.
The guidelines combine the position of the alumna and the industry representatives, remove the undergraduate representative and removed the sub-committee to evaluate resumes.
The original search committee was created in September 2003 after Scott Olson, former dean, announced in May 2003 he was leaving Ball State University. The committee brought two candidates to the university but decided neither was suitable to submit to Provost Beverley Pitts.
Holmes said the size of the original committee, which was 14 members, created problems that led Pitts to ask the committee's size be reduced.
"The larger a committee is, the more difficult it is to bring all members to a meeting," Holmes said. "It's also easier for a smaller group to work together than a larger one."
The guidelines call for the committee to consist of the four chairs, a faculty member from each department, a graduate student, a representative for President Jo Ann Gora, an alumnus in an industry-related field and the chairman, Associate Dean of the Miller College of Business Rodney Davis.
Davis is out of the country and could not be reached for comment.
Faculty members in the college will vote on the new guidelines at their faculty meeting Aug. 20. If they pass the guidelines, departments can choose the representatives that afternoon at the department meetings.
Holmes said the chairs decided to keep the graduate student position instead of the undergraduate position because graduate students have more experience in a university setting. Graduate students also are more likely to have an interest in several of the departments in the college, he said.
"A graduate student might have a degree from one department but is getting a master's in another department," Holmes said.
Nancy Carlson, chairwoman of the telecommunications department, said the graduate student also made sense because all the departments have graduate students, but only three have undergraduate students.
"It's not that we're trying to be less democratic, it was just becoming impossible to meet," Carlson said. "I'm not sure every person was ever in the room at the same time."
Just because undergraduate students lost a spot on the committee does not mean they will not have a voice in the selection process, Holmes said.
The committee is in charge of finding two to five candidates to submit to Pitts and the Board of Trustees. Each candidate must make a visit to Ball State, during which all members of the university will have a chance to meet and question them.
"What we don't have here is an opportunity in a bureaucratic process of narrowing down a pool candidates," Holmes said. "What's more important is how students feel about the candidates."
However, Gora said she thought an undergraduate student should be on the committee.
"It's important for students to be involved in big decisions on campus," Gora said.
Along with the reductions, the subcommittee to review the candidate's files was also removed.
Ray Montagno, chairman of the original committee, said the subcommittee was awkward.
The university hopes to start the search by the beginning of September, several weeks earlier than last year, Holmes said.
Starting the search early is important in finding quality candidates, Pitts said.
If the university does find a successful candidate this year, the new dean will take office July 1, 2005.
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