As the recently appointed dean of the College of Applied Sciences and Technology prepares to take office, university administrators are searching for several people to fill administrator's and director's positions.
Provost Terry King said Ball State University had two interim deans, an interim vice president and about a dozen interim directors.
He said he had no time frame to fill the positions, but he hoped to do it as soon as possible.
The potential for problems with interims is always present, such as not wanting to or being able to make big decisions, he said. He saw those problems at other universities, he said, but never at Ball State.
"Here at Ball State, I've been very pleased with the quality of leadership from interims," he said.
Ball State has filled one dean position earlier this month, he said. Mitch Whaley will take over for Jack Wescott as the dean of the CAST in May, he said.
Ball State has two active searches for deans, King said.
Rodney Davis has been the interim dean of the Miller College of Business for about a year. Ball State is conducting a second search to fill the position because the first didn't yield qualified candidates, King said.
The other search is for a dean of the Teachers College.
A search for Roy Weaver's replacement has recently commenced after he announced his retirement in February. He expects to finish the search in about a year, King said.
Searches for deans usually cycle with academic years, he said.
Advertisements are put in newspapers in the first month of the Fall Semester and applications are collected for the first few months.
The applications are then reviewed and whittled down to about 10. Those applicants are interviewed over the phone, and their references are consulted. The list is whittled down to two or three, and they are invited to campus for two days of interviews with administrators, faculty members and deans.
Philip Repp, who has been interim vice president of information technology since October, said Ball State would always have interims.
He said he was happy to step in to fill one of the gaps left by an administrator stepping down.
"As an interim, you set up the transition, not create change," he said. "Your ideas are part of the discussion, but I don't see the job as making changes."
Several departments on campus have interim chairs.
Lynn Sousa, interim chairman of the chemistry department, said he had been in the position since last summer. The former chairman, Robert Morris, was appointed the interim associate provost for research and dean of the graduate school. Sousa said Morris would have returned as chairman if he wasn't appointed to the permanent job.
King said interims usually didn't want the permanent positions, with the exception to Morris and a few others. He said he heard concerns that interims would have unfair advantages during interview processes, but he said every candidate went through the same process with the same scrutiny as others.
Department chairpersons don't go through the same hiring process as administrators, Sousa said.
Tenured faculty from the department form an election committee and search for qualified candidates. The committee makes a recommendation to the dean and he or she typically follows.
Sousa said the chemistry department has had no problems and has functioned normally during his time as the chairman. Departments have committees that help keep things running.
"We've done all the things the department does, and the fact that I was an interim did not get in the way with that," he said.
Duncan Campbell, interim director of the Center for Historic Preservation, said he had some concerns that if he came forward with a big idea, he would face resistance from the administration, but that comes with being an interim.
"You do feel sort of like a lame duck at some point," he said. "Knowing you're an interim deters you from letting your imagination run wild."
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