The search for an inaugural Dean of Arts and Sciences is on, College President Sian Leah Beilock announced in a Sept. 25 email to faculty and staff. This comes after the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the Division of Undergraduate Education and the division of Undergraduate Student Affairs merged to form the School of Arts and Sciences on July 1.
A search advisory committee, consisting of faculty, staff and students from across the newly established school, will lead the search for interim dean Nina Pavcnik’s replacement. The School of Arts and Sciences was established to “strengthen undergraduate advising,” “allow for targeted investments,” and “enable better coordination among graduate students, postdocs, and faculty,” according to a Nov. 13 email statement to campus from Beilock.
Psychological and brain sciences professor Thalia Wheatley, who will chair the search advisory committee, wrote in an email statement to The Dartmouth that the new dean’s role will be to bring “the key parts of the student experience together.”
“For the first time, the Arts and Sciences will manage its own budget, faculty, staff and student support,” Wheatley wrote. “The new dean of Arts and Sciences will be central to making this vision real.”
In an email statement to The Dartmouth, Pavcnik wrote that the new dean will be “responsible for providing a vision” for the School of Arts and Sciences and for “delivering on its mission.”
The dean “will collaborate with faculty, staff, students and Dartmouth administration to gather ideas on how to best position Arts and Sciences to deliver on our educational and research mission,” Pavcnik wrote.
Vice president for development Matt Rizzo, who also serves on the search advisory committee, said the new dean will be “a highly accomplished scholar.”
“We will look all over the country, if not all over the world, to find the most qualified and best fit individual to help lead this new role,” Rizzo said.
Wheatley wrote that the role was a “great responsibility” and added that the new dean will need to have “a wide range of skills.”
The College is seeking a dean skilled in “listening and communicating well, recognizing what makes Dartmouth distinctive, managing complex operations and offering a clear vision for the future,” Wheatley said.
Wheatley added that the search was “just getting started.”
“I was recently elected chair of the committee, and so far we’ve only met once to get to know each other,” Wheatley said. “Our next step is to set up listening sessions with faculty, staff and students so we can learn directly from the community what qualities they believe this new dean should bring to Dartmouth.”
Geography professor Alvarez Léon, a member of the search advisory committee, wrote in an email statement to The Dartmouth that he is “very excited” to be a part of the search.
“The inaugural dean of Dartmouth’s School of Arts and Sciences will be someone with the vision to continue the College’s mission while taking it to the next level,” Leon said.
Rizzo said he was “excited” that the College was creating a new school within “an institution that’s hundreds of years old.”
“The establishment of a new school at an institution as old as ours, is a big deal,” Rizzo said. “We’re excited about where this new leader is going to take us.”
