Trustees set Jan. 1 chancellor search deadline

RICHMOND, Ind. -- The board of trustees Friday pressured IU President Adam Herbert to name a permanent chancellor for the Bloomington campus by the first week of January but supported the president's decision to reopen the search in the face of mounting faculty criticism.\nIn a unanimous resolution passed at IU-East Richmond, the board supported Herbert's decision to reopen the chancellor search but told him to "expedite the search process with the intent of filling the position as early as possible." Trustees said they hoped the search committee, headed by former School of Journalism Dean Trevor Brown, would find and recommend at least one suitable candidate by Jan. 1.\n"We want to have a candidate by the first or second week of January," trustee Thomas Reilly Jr. said. The resolution was meant to give Herbert a message that the trustees wanted a permanent chancellor, he said.\nTrustees also voiced discontent about the length of time the search committee took to recommend its first list of candidates. IUB has not had a permanent chancellor since Sharon Brehm resigned in October 2003. Former chancellor Ken Gros Louis has filled the position on an interim basis for the last two years.\n"The board also believes that it is not in the best interest of IU to extend what has become a long and cumbersome process," Trustee President Stephen Ferguson told the board. "We do not have to wait another six months to conclude this search."\nThe trustees said the University is making progress but believe a permanent chancellor would be more effective for long-range planning.\n"A person who is in a more long-term position can look at (long-range planning) in a more longitudinal way than a person who is interim who knows that there is an end coming," trustee Sue Talbot said.\nHerbert refused to speak to any specific criticisms against him by many faculty members. He also declined to speak to the faculty's anger with his decision not to appoint College of Arts and Sciences Dean Kumble Subbaswamy as chancellor and refused to say whether Subbaswamy was even a candidate for the search, despite previous confirmations by those close to the search process.\nIU law professor Fred Cate said Herbert and the trustees should address the Subbaswamy and faculty criticisms "head on." He said faculty are currently concerned about whether the IUB chancellor can balance both the tasks of managing the Bloomington campus and the duties of being the senior vice president for academic affairs. Political Science Chair Jeffrey Isaac echoed that concern. \n"For me, and for many faculty, the crucial question regards the current job description with two portfolios, linking academic vice president and Bloomington chancellor," Isaac said in an e-mail. "There is a strong feeling here that this job description is too unwieldy and that the Bloomington campus needs a full-time chancellor to attend to and advocate for the interests of the campus."\nCate said the faculty also want the trustees to review Herbert's job performance as IU president. \nBut the trustees' call for Herbert to "work with faculty governance to prescribe new procedures for filling future senior academic positions that will result in appointments being made in a more timely manner" was welcomed. \n"I'm really pretty sure that if the faculty gets together and works with the board of trustees, things will come together," said Ted Widlanski, Associate Dean for Research and Infrastructure in the College of Arts and Sciences. "The faculty can't do it by themselves and the board of trustees can't do it by themselves"