At the December 16, 2005, meeting of the ASU Board of Trustees, the Board approved a resolution that calls for the development of a plan to separate the ASU system president from the day-to-day leadership responsibilities for the Jonesboro campus. This initiative is an extension of developments that began in 1999, and were intended to prepare for the eventual separation of the system and Jonesboro campus responsibilities.

Part of the plan will result in the definition of the role for the Jonesboro campus Chancellor. Chancellors are already in place at the ASU campuses at Beebe, Mountain Home, and Newport. The position called Chancellor is a familiar one in higher education. There are numerous campus executives in Arkansas and other states who are called Chancellor, and many of those are within systems of multiple campuses. At ASU, the campus chancellors report to the President who, in turn, reports to the Board of Trustees of Arkansas State University. It is the Board that has constitutional and legal authority for management and control of all of the campuses of ASU.

Therefore, the Board of Trustees has great interest in and responsibility for the appointment of the Chancellor of ASU-Jonesboro, the largest and oldest campus in the system. The Board has asked the President to organize a process to identify a group of candidates to be considered for appointment as Chancellor. The group of candidates will be identified using a nationwide search with the assistance of an executive recruitment firm, as this has come to be a typical pattern for executive recruitment in higher education.

The group of candidates will be identified by criteria to be developed early in the spring semester through a series of discussions conducted by the President with constituents on and off campus. Because it has been more than a decade since a similar process was undertaken, and because the new position of Chancellor will be focused on issues pertaining to the Jonesboro campus, we will have an opportunity to collectively imagine the characteristics we would like to see in this new leader.

A process has been planned that will include several aspects of participation but that also may add components that may be suggested or required to obtain the fullest measure of advice and counsel during the process. There will be several “Town Hall” meetings to which the entire campus community will be invited. The general agenda of these meetings will be to invite comments about the expectations for the role of the Chancellor, and what characteristics the campus community would hope to see in a new leader. Meetings will be arranged with the Faculty Senate, the Staff Senate, and the Student Government Association to discuss the role of the Chancellor and ways in which that position might interact with those constituent groups. Similar discussions will be held with alumni, donors, business and community leaders. Deans, chairs, and directors will be invited to meetings for the same purposes of seeking advice and counsel for the profiles and expectations for the Chancellor.

The existing executive staff of the university will be asked to provide briefing materials for candidates. These reports will be designed to give an overview of the operational activities in Research and Academic Affairs, Finance and Administration, Student Affairs, and University Advancement. This group of university officers also will be asked to quickly provide detailed information about any aspect of operations that may be requested by candidates to provide a fuller understanding of the status of activity on campus, in the community and state, or within the larger ASU system.

Dr. Glen Jones will be the campus coordinator of the process to recommend the Chancellor candidates. Dr. Jones will work closely with the professional recruitment consultant to provide information for the candidates. He also will receive information from the campus community throughout the recruitment process, so please feel free to contact him with your thoughts, observations, or concerns about any aspect of the undertaking.

Later in the spring, after potential candidates have been recommended to the consultant, or have applied directly, or have been sought for consideration, we will compare the statements of expectations developed in campus and community discussions with the total pool of potential candidates. A process of elimination of unqualified candidates will occur. The resulting pool of qualified potential candidates will be shared by the President with individual board members to determine if the pool generally meets their expectations for the new Chancellor.

Eventually, final candidates will be brought to campus to meet with a select committee, formed to give advice and counsel to the President for summary presentation of candidates to the Board. Candidates will be introduced on campus and in the community. The Board will then select the Chancellor and authorize the President to negotiate an appointment for the individual. It is hoped that the Chancellor will assume responsibilities at the start of the new fiscal year, July 1, 2006.

There are traditional and customary responsibilities that accrue to the role of the campus executive. Among these are frequent and close interaction with the President and the campus executive staff; oversight of campus systems of operation; oversight of planning activities; oversight of budget management; oversight of facilities; oversight of programs of the institution; representation of the institution to external agencies and the public; interaction with internal constituencies; and leadership to provide for stability and progress of the institution. Fulfilling even these traditional expectations is a tall order.

But in addition, the new Chancellor will have the opportunity to address aspirations that have been developed recently by the campus. These include the directions for university development identified in the Strategic Plan and its collateral activities such as the Enrollment Management Plan, marketing and branding initiatives, the Capital Development plan, and the related opportunities provided by the Centennial celebration; additional facilities construction possibilities related to the Higher Education bonds and master plan development; new grants and sponsored program opportunities that are increasingly a part of ASU; academic program expansion at Jonesboro and extension sites; and growth of technology and information resources for the Jonesboro campus.

Many of theses issues have been identified in previous First Friday reports, and are available in the archives of First Friday for review by potential Chancellor candidates. What these reports will reveal is a modern, comprehensive university campus, ASU-Jonesboro, which has experienced exciting and recent developments, is healthy and poised for its future, and has spent time and effort thinking about what it wants to do and where it wants to go.

This campus, ASU-Jonesboro, is now ready to select the leader who will take us there. This is among the most exciting of our opportunities, and will be realized by all of us working together with the new Chancellor.

Thank you for reading First Friday. If you have thoughts about this or any other aspect of ASU, please contact me at president@astate.edu.