Even though Thomas Lowe took on his first administrative duties 15 years ago, he has remained a faculty member at heart.
Lowe will retire today, after 32 years with the university, of which he spent the last 11 years as dean of University College and the last three as associate provost.
"When people ask me what I do now, I say I'm a faculty member doing administrative work, I never say I'm an administrator," Lowe said. "I think that's the way it should be."
Charles Jones, executive director of the Office of Teaching and Learning Advancement, said that Lowe has been an administrator that has never lost touch with the faculty.
"Quite often, administrators become so emerged in day-to-day issues," Jones said, "they kind of lose sight that it's actually about the students and the faculty."
Randy Hyman, interim vice president for student affairs and enrollment management, said Lowe never lost track of his responsibilities as a faculty member when he became an administrator.
"He always tried to strike a balance," Hyman said.
Lowe came to Ball State in 1973 and was a faculty member in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management until 1990. At that time, Beverley Pitts asked Lowe for help in the general studies area.
Lowe became the director of the General Studies program and eventually the dean of University College and associate provost.
Through his work on the core curriculum and the Freshman Connections Program, Lowe played a major part in the university's recent recognition as one of the top 13 schools in the country for first-year programs.
"He's made a big impact on that by energizing it [the core curriculum] in a way that has become widely expected," Jones said.
Ball State's program is outlined in a chapter of the book "Achieving and Sustaining Institutional Excellence for the First Year of College." According to the team that researched the book, "there are only a handful of other universities in the United States that come close to achieving a comparable range of depth at first-year initiatives."
Lowe said that the recognition the book gave Ball State was one of the reasons he decided to retire.
"Most everything that's in there I've been involved with in one way or another," Lowe said. "I thought, 'well, if you want to leave on a high note, it's not going to get any better than this.'"
Lowe has not only been active with core curriculum on the campus, he has also been executive director of the Association for General and Liberal Studies, which is a national organization.
Some of Lowe's best memories come from his work helping to put on about a dozen workshops for faculty to learn how to teach within the core curriculum.
"To see faculty work together on a common problem that's not disciplinary based and [is] sort of out of their traditional academic role and see us sort of come together around a solution is extremely rewarding," he said.
While cleaning out his office, Lowe has found many cards he received from students expressing their thanks to him.
"We know we've helped a tremendous amount of students here. You're really changing people's lives, and that's rewarding to watch," Lowe said. "It's really a pleasure to see students grow and change."
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