Final dean candidate wants to be student advocate

Geneva Walker-Johnson covered an array of material Wednesday at her open forum but related all her answers to serving the college student as a whole.

“Learning is a continuous process,” Walker-Johnson said. “It isn’t confined to the classroom.”

At the IU Maurer School of Law, faculty, students and staff came to hear the fourth and final candidate for the dean of students and vice provost of student affairs position.

Walker-Johnson, the current dean of students and chief student affairs officer at Old Dominion University, answered questions about main topics that came up at each of the other three open forums, such as greek life, student advocacy and improving the relations between students and faculty.

She said as a member of the greek community herself, she would support self-governing if greek members can be responsible as well as independent.

“It’s an awesome responsibility, to be greek,” she said, comparing the role of representing a sorority or fraternity to representing herself as an African-American woman.

She also talked about student advocacy and how the role of the dean of students is to be the student voice when trying to accomplish large tasks. She used an example from ODU, saying she helped a group of students improve safety issues caused by a busy street that crosses ODU’s campus.

Another main theme of the night was improving the rapport between students and faculty, especially at a large research institution such as IU. Walker-Johnson said she helped set up events at ODU for students to speak with professors about different issues away from the traditional classroom setting.

“We’re trying to expose the other to the other, instead of force the other to the other,” Walker-Johnson said.

With every answer, Walker-Johnson provided examples from her background to support her position on certain issues. Judy Speer Palmer, who represents the Greek Advisory Board and the IU Student Foundation, said she thought it was good to see how Walker-Johnson affected change.

“She definitely has a lot of examples how she has made things better and innovative ideas that affect students and faculty, students and campus,” Palmer said.

Informatics professor Marty Siegel, who also attended the forum, said he was impressed by Walker-Johnson’s “freedom with responsibility” attitude.

“I love that she emphasized responsibility along with independence and growth and learning,” Siegel said. “She’s not a pushover. She will expect a lot from students.”

With the open forums finished, the next step in the search is for Executive Vice President and Provost Karen Hanson to make the final choice.

Palmer said the decision will be difficult, because the four candidates are different and have varied expertise.

“Each candidate could be good for the University,” Palmer said, “but it’s which candidate could be the best for the University.”