Provost Search Committee & Restructuring
November 17, 2009
To the campus community of Georgia Tech:
Late yesterday, the University System of Georgia (USG) Board of Regents approved plans to adjust the System’s budget from a 6 percent reduction to an 8 percent reduction for the current fiscal year (FY10). The Board’s actions will require each of the System’s 35 public colleges and universities to make appropriate cost adjustments as well as increase the mandatory institutional student fee.
Over the course of the past month, I have met with numerous faculty, staff, and student groups to discuss the Provost Search Committee and the current leadership/support structure within the Institute’s central administrative offices. These meetings and the valuable input I received have been enormously helpful in developing an organizational structure that will best support our education, research, and other related functions as we continue working to develop and implement our new Strategic Plan.
The current plans for implementing the new structure begin with the important task of selecting Georgia Tech’s next provost and executive vice president for academic affairs. I am pleased to announce that College of Management Dean Steve Salbu has agreed to chair the Provost Search Committee. Other members of the committee include:
- Mostafa Ammar, Regents’ Professor, College of Computing
- Giselle Bennett, Director, Electro-Optical Systems Laboratory, Georgia Tech Research Institute
- Kim Cobb, Assistant Professor, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences
- Susan Cozzens, Professor, School of Public Policy and Associate Dean for Research, Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts
- Marta Garcia, Assistant Vice President for Development
- Julia Kubanek, Associate Professor, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
- Steve McLaughlin, Ken Byers Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Vice Provost for International Initiatives
- Pat McKenna, Executive Director for Affiliated Organizations, Office of Administration and Finance
- Gordon Moore, Managing Partner and Director, OMED: Educational Services
- Catherine Murray-Rust, Dean and Director of Libraries
- Robert Nerem, Parker H. Petit Distinguished Chair for Engineering in Medicine, Institute Professor, and former director of the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience
- Catherine Ross, Harry West Chair and Director, Center for Quality Growth and Regional Development, College of Architecture
- John Stein, Dean of Students
- Undergrad student - TBD
- Ex Officio, Chuck Donbaugh, Associate Vice President, Human Resources
This committee is charged with identifying and forwarding a list of three candidates for the position, with the goal of having an individual in place by July 1, 2010.
During my conversations with these groups, several organizational changes were proposed and discussed. I have decided to move forward on two of these. The first involves the creation of an executive vice president for research (EVPR) that reports directly to the president and serves as a member of the president’s cabinet. This individual will have overall responsibility for all research at Georgia Tech: faculty-based research as well as research conducted at GTRI and the Enterprise Innovation Institute. Given that research comprises nearly half of our annual budget and continues to increase I believe this will provide greater opportunity to bring the efforts of our institutes, centers, and academic faculty together with the research at GTRI, leading to better cooperation and collaboration. Because it is important to have this individual in place prior to interviews with candidates for the provost position, we intend to conduct an internal search for this position with the goal of having someone in place by March 1, 2010. The EVPR search committee chair and membership will be announced shortly.
The second organizational change we will implement is to expand the duties and elevate the current position of vice provost for academic diversity to a vice president for institute diversity. This individual will have oversight for all diversity-related matters at Georgia Tech, report directly to the president, and serve as a member of the cabinet. Over the next several months, we will be formulating and defining the responsibilities for this position and will initiate a national search later this spring.
Given the current economic challenges we face, some may have concerns about the additional costs associated with these changes. Since April, we have reduced the overall personnel costs within the Office of the President by more than $350,000 annually. The changes outlined above will result in one new administrative position that will be funded by a combination of a portion of these savings and support from GTRI. I want to assure you that we are doing everything possible to control costs and reduce administrative overhead.
We will keep you apprised of the progress on all three of these initiatives.
G. P. "Bud" Peterson
President, Georgia Tech
