Kimberly Fenwick, dean of social sciences, has temporarily been appointed as St. Thomas University’s vice president of academic and research until a replacement is found.
Barry Craig, who previously filled the position, announced last December he had been hired as the president of Huron University in London, O.N. and took a leave of absence, which began the university’s search.
Jeffrey Carleton, the director of communications at STU said the position will not be filled until next July, 2017.
“It’s quite an involved procedure,” said Carleton. “It’s deliberative, it’s consultative, and it very much involves consulting with the community and various parts of the community to make sure that we’re going to get the person that is the best fit for St. Thomas in the future.”
Appointing Fenwick as acting vice president of academic and research was just the first step in the process. The next step was forming a vice president academic search committee, which was formed in early January.
The committee is composed of: President Dawn Russell; Dawn Clarke, the chair of the criminology department; Megan Thomson, student union president; Lily Fraser, vice president of finance; and Patrick Malcolmson, a political science professor who used to be the vice president of academic.
Part of the board’s responsibilities is to select an interim vice-president of academic who will serve from July, 2016 for a year until the permanent replacement is found.
“The search committee will do two things,” said Carleton. “It will manage the process for the interim individual, for one year. And it will manage the larger and much more involved process for the selection of a permanent vice president academic and research.”
Carleton also mentioned since it’s creation, the search committee has sent out an e-survey to various constituencies within the community that focuses on three main questions.
The survey questions addresses the following: what the opportunities and challenges are ahead for the school in the next three to five years, what are the priorities for the vice president of academic over the short and long term, and which characteristics and competencies the ideal candidate who have.
The search committee is also working on forming and refining a position description of the vice president academic and research role, said Carleton.
He also said whether Fenwick fills the position permanatly is at the discretion of Fenwick, and the final decision is up to the search committee. The university will proceed with the decided process and begin to advertise the position opening soon.
“It’s an exciting position, it’s an interesting position, especially relative to the small school,” said Carleton. “Clearly we’ve had successful people in the role in the past by the fact that they’ve gone on to lead other institutions in the country.”
