With the end of the fall semester days away, the Presidential Search Committee finds itself on-schedule and anticipating its workload for the spring, including the first round of interviews for President Doug Bennet’s successor.
“We are where we thought we would be at this point,” said Vice President and Secretary of the University and Executive Secretary to the Presidential Search Committee Peter Patton.
Vice President of the Wesleyan Student Assembly (WSA) and Search Committee member Brittany Mitchell ’07 agreed, noting the function that the committee’s flexible agenda serves.
“The timeline we are following is very fluid,” Mitchell said. “We are allowing for candidates to come in and out of the process at any point until the final decision is about to be made.”
Patton echoed the committee’s de-emphasis on a deadline for nominations.
“If some superb person parachutes in later, we want to consider them,” he said.
Still, the committee expects to present its recommendation to the Board of Trustees next March or April, as it originally planned. Board members will then make the final decision for the University’s 16th President.
During the past several months, committee members have been reviewing the more than 300 nominations. Guided by its search consultant, the Spencer Stuart firm, the committee has also sought input from academics and additional consultants from other countries.
“We’re doing a lot of outreach,” Patton said.
Students’ voice within the search will soon increase, with voting currently underway for the panel of student interviewers. Nine students are on the ballot, representing all class years, with Kimberly Greenberg ’07, Abigail Huber ’07, JZ Golden ’08, Izaak Orlansky ’08, Nathaniel Lichten ’09, Matthew Podolin ’09, Derek Silverman ’09, Gianna Palmer ’10 and Gregory Silver ’10. Polls close on Saturday night.
The four elected students will join members from the WSA Executive Committee (EC) on the panel. Members will interview nominees remaining after the search committee conducts the first stage of interviews and chooses finalists. The students will submit an evaluation of each finalist.
“These student voices will be important in providing an expanded student perspective on the finalists that will be presented to the Board,” Mitchell said.
Mitchell said that the initial proposal for a student panel of interviewers, which is similar to a body from the last presidential search, called for only WSA EC members. She explained the Search Committee’s decision to also include panelists from the student body at-large.
“We felt that having some of the students elected on to the panel would be a way to further engage students in the process,” Mitchell said. “Therefore, the panel will consist of the four elected students as well as several members of the WSA EC to have a mix of students who have worked closely with the administration and the president and those who interact with the president on a more casual or abstract level.”
The Search Committee plans to begin its interviews in January. In an all-campus e-mail, Mitchell said that student panelists will most likely meet with finalist nominees during the second week of Spring Break, in March.
As for the search’s progress this semester, Mitchell pointed to the Position Specification. The specification, which is available on the committee’s website (http://www.wesleyan.edu/presidentialsearch/), lists a summary of the position and key selection criteria that the committee members look for in presidential nominees, such as ideal experiences and critical competencies for success.
Mitchell highlighted the varying sources of input present in the document, including students and other University community members.
“The document was a product of input not just from the committee members but a vast cross-section of the Wesleyan Community,” Mitchell said. “It was very rewarding to speak with such a variety of people regarding their thoughts about Wesleyan and Wesleyan’s president, and I believe the document is representative of the various concerns and input we received.”
The Presidential Search Committee will hold its last meeting of the semester on Dec. 21. Nominations and general comments are still welcome on its website.
Leave a Reply